Very little needs done to improve Eduard’s Hellcat. The bar which supports the shoulder straps is molded as a ridge on the aft cockpit bulkhead. I shaved that off and replaced it with a wire bar. Simple fix, and the detail is prominent. I also replaced the center canopy section with vacuform. I re-used a set of Eduard canopy masks from an earlier build, they will work fine if they are removed carefully and placed on their backing sheets.
I didn’t originally plan to build an FAA bird, but I liked the markings on Xtradecal’s Yanks with Roundels sheet. They worked like a champ, and the sheet includes several other schemes which I plan to use at some point. The kit is one of the very best in our scale, and just about anything needed to build any service variant of a Hellcat is included in the box. If you haven’t built one yet, give yourself a treat and try one!
The model represents the Hellcat Mk. I of Sub. Lt. Spencer, , 800 NAS, HMS Emperor, Southern France, September 1944.
