Hobby Boss
1/72 Focke Wulf Fw-190D-9
Kit Number: 80228
Reviewed by  Brian R. Baker, IPMS# 43146

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MSRP: $8.95

The story of the Focke Wulf FW-190D-9 "Dora", powered by the Junkers Jumo "bomber engine" is well known, and need not be repeated here. As nearly 100 different kits of the FW-190 have already been issued in 1/72 scale, including at least 20 of the long nosed variety, and the currently available kits from Tamiya and Hasegawa are of state-of-the-art quality, not to mention the Italeri and Airfix offerings, one might legitimately ask "Why another FW-190?"

Industry Trends
Hobby Boss, a Chinese firm that hopefully does not include lead or other poisons in their paints (I don't know about their pre-painted models-that needs to be checked out), is probably trying to address an entirely new market, the "I want it NOW!" kids who are currently growing up, not knowing modeling as those of us older folks did when we grew up in the forties, fifties, and sixties, when kids all naturally tended to build models as a sort of "rite of passage". Since most scale models today, with a few exceptions, are aimed at adults, both in complexity and price, Hobby Boss is apparently trying to recapture the "kid market" with a series of high quality but extremely uncomplicated models. Other firms, Chinese and others, are producing pre-painted "snap together" kits, and completely assembled and painted models that bypass the construction process altogether. But this series, of which this is the first one I've assembled, is a legitimate model, accurate in outline, and with detail almost equal to the big boys. I wanted to review this kit because I have built most of the FW-190 kits that have been issued in 1/72 scale, and I wanted to see how good this one is.

[review image] The kit comes in a vacuformed insert box, with parts snapped into place, which means that there is almost no possibility of the kit being damaged in any way until you open the box and begin hacking on it.

Looking at the major structural components of this model, I would suspect that the fuselage, at least, is produced using a three way injection molding process, which allows for side detail without requiring complicated assembly. The result is a model with very few seams, and this one required very little trimming and filling.

The main feature of this kit is its simplicity, a one piece fuselage that snaps in place over a one piece wing. It could be assembled without glue, but a serious modeler will use the traditional trim, assemble, glue and fill process, and that is what I did.

Assembly
[review image] The wing and fuselage units snap together easily, requiring a minimal amount of glue. I needed to fill a small gap just ahead of the tailwheel, but this was no problem, and it was the only putty I needed for the whole model. [review image] Then I sprayed the interior of the cockpit, such as it is, with RML 66 grey, and the wheel wells with RLM 02 grey, along with the tailwheel, landing gear covers, landing gear, and a few other small parts. I then masked off the wheel wells. The cockpit is the worst feature of this kit. Other than a seat and the essence of a stick up against what is supposed to be the instrument panel, there is virtually nothing there. However, with the canopy, you can't see much in there anyway, so why bother. The elevators snap into position easily, as do all of the other parts.

Decals and Painting
Markings are provided for two aircraft, which include "White 1", an FW-190D-9 of JV-44, the so-called "Parrot Staffel" due to the bright red and white striped undersurfaces. This unit was assigned the task of protecting the ME-262's airfields, and they were painted in this manner to prevent local flak crews from mistaking them for Allied fighters and shooting them down. Markings are provided for this aircraft, but not the stripes. I wouldn't have used the decals even if they had provided the stripes, but kids might be tempted to. The second is an FW-190D-9 of II/JG3, which operated from various airfields in Germany at the close of the war. This plane featured the colorful red and yellow fuselage bands, which are also not provided in the decal sheet. Unfortunately, I had already modeled both of these aircraft before, so I chose a slightly different aircraft, still from JV-44.

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Problems
Nothing good ever happens without problems, and this kit does have some issues that a serious modeler would be concerned about. Beginners would overlook these, and rightly so. First, some of the detail is fictitious. The radiator behind the prop looks nothing like the real thing. There are some humps and ridges there, but they don't look like the real radiator. The landing gear doors have detail that doesn't appear in photos. I've already mentioned the cockpit and its lack of detail, but it would be difficult to convert this without an awful lot of grinding with the trusty Dremel. The headrests are a little odd looking, but they fit, and don't look too bad when installed. By the way, both headrest and armor assembles are provided, for the bubble and flat canopy versions, although the bubble canopy is the only one supplied. (I checked it out, and the Academy FW-190D-9 flat canopy fits perfectly. Two are provided in the Academy kit, so this conversion would be easy to do.) Maybe this part will be used when they finally get around to producing an FW-190A in this series. Also, the gun barrels do not pass through the wheel wells as they do on the real thing. If they used the FW-190D-9 at the Air Force Museum at Wright Patterson AFB as a pattern aircraft, this is understandable, as their airplane does not have the wing guns installed, or at least it didn't when the Squadron Walk Around was published. Also, the cowling cover for the nose mounted machine guns is very slightly too narrow, leaving a small gap when it is attached to the fuselage.

The propeller looks very unusual for an FW-190D, but it is apparently one of the two props used on these aircraft. According to Squadron, some Doras had the familiar VS-10 propeller with more rounded tips, while some had the more pointed VS-111 props. This kit provides only the VS-111 prop, while the vast majority of photos I've seen of the FW-190D-9 and later models use the VS 10 prop. I thought about using the prop from an old Airfix FW-190D-9, which is accurate, but went ahead with the VS-111 prop provided in the kit. And last, the DF loop antenna intended for the underside of the fuselage is hopelessly too small. I replaced it with a larger unit from another kit.

The exhaust stacks are one of the kit's biggest problems. They look nothing like the stacks on the real airplane, and they don't fit too well, especially on the left side of the engine.

Finishing
Since I had already modeled the two aircraft for which decals were provided, I built another aircraft of JV44, "Red 1", which is illustrated in the Squadron Walk-Around by both photographs and a color drawing. I actually used the decals from an old Airfix kit (Not the ancient one, but the re-pop they did about 30 years ago) and they turned out to be some of the best kit decals I ever used. I did use some of the stenciling provided by Hobby Boss. Incidentally, although some stenciling is provided, there is no mention in the instructions on where these stencils go. You'll need reference materials for that. Also, the instructions state that the prop on the JV44 aircraft is red. I don't know where they got that information.

Recommendation
This kit has several advantages. It is cheap, and it is easy to build. It is quite accurate, and builds up into a fine representation of the aircraft without a lot of effort. I have heard bad things about these kits, but from my perspective, having actually built one, it was fun to build, not tedious, and there were no frustrations associated with the experience. It is the type of kit that an inexperienced modeler could build and get good results on the first try, and one that a serious modeler can have fun with, especially if time is a consideration. If this kind of kit attracts new modelers to the hobby, then it will have achieved its goal. Try one---you might just get spoiled enough to want to build more.

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