Hasegawa

1/35 Lunadiver Stingray

Kit Number: 64003

Reviewed by  Dave Morrissette, IPMS# 33653

MSRP: $122.95 Website: www.dragonmodelsusa.com Like a lot of modelers, I have seen a lot of this series of models on tables at contests and thought the designs were unique- things such as the Fliedermaus and the previously reviewed Falke. The Maschinen Krieger universe is a SciFi series created in the 1980's by Kow Yokoyama and ran as a series of stories in Japanese Hobby Magazine Hobby Japan. Many of the creations are permutations of WW I and WW II tanks and aircraft upgraded and all started with powered armored suits. In 2009, Hasegawa received the license for the kits and entered the market with the Falke and followed up with the Lunadiver Stingray which is a fighter looking aircraft with what also looks like a large radar dish below. When this came up for review, I couldn't pass it up. On to the kit. It contains all the parts for the Stingray, a nice base- a pilot and ground support figure and two complete Fireball SG combat suits in the same scale. There were 12 sprues for the craft and 4 for the suits. All were perfectly molded and had no flash or sink marks. I have two suggestions up front to help with the whole process. Build the stand first- the Stingray has no landing gear, and the stand is a perfect holder for painting and holding the craft once you start working on it. Also, read the instructions carefully. I didn't and it bit me, twice, which we'll see in a moment.

Due to the shape there are a lot of sub-builds that go into the whole. You start with the bottom and add pieces. No hitches here and fit is good. In the second step, you add the cockpit. There are no seatbelts, but I was going to close up the opening and put the ground crew to work so it would be invisible. During this part of construction, you start to add things to the basic bottom. The side pods and their connection are made up of about 20 parts. I seamed and sanded where needed prior to adding them to the bottom for ease of sanding. The rest of the construction went well with the top being added and the rest of the airframe being completed. Until I realized I had missed added a piece in the very 1st step- argghh!. I had to pry the fuselage apart and put it in, which took some time but went well. Several of the later parts such as the exhaust, sensor pod, radar and gun are held in place by vinyl grommets in the same manner as many kit manufacturers are doing with airplane props. These parts were all kept separate for painting. Fit overall was good. Prior to painting the craft, I built one of the armored suits for display on the base. There are separate kits unto themselves, with each suit consisting of well over thirty parts. There are two types of suits to build and optional parts as well. The suits themselves have specific paint call outs to match the squadron of the Stingray itself. I had determined up front that I wanted to paint everything to match the box art. There are four options for painting the kit and a full decal sheet is included for the Stingray and the fighting suits. Paint call outs are all Mr. Color. You will have to do some mixing, but these are really simple as they are pretty much based on military colors. Painting went without a hitch. Decaling, not so much. I started with some of the smaller decals first. The decals are thick- real thick but on most of the surfaces went on without a hitch and needed minimal solvent, if any. When I tried to add the large skull decal to the top of the Stingray, it wouldn't conform. I tried hot water, Solvaset, and finally even cutting it into sections, and could not get it to fit at all. It finally was destroyed. I was at a loss as this was the main thing in the scheme I wanted to do- I considered masking and painting, but doing so would have required me to have matched the decal colors. In the end, I skipped the skull decal for both the Stingray and the suit and added a couple eyes and a shark mouth. As long as the decals went on a smooth, flat surface, they worked well, but getting them to conform to any contours was not possible. The crewman was added and painted at the very last.

A little flat coating, weathering with some pastels and another couple flat coats and the Stingray was done. Outside of the decals and my own screw-up, this kit was a blast. I am definitely hooked and can't recommend this kit highly enough. My thanks to Dragon Models USA* for the review sample and Hasegawa for producing the kit. *Editor's Note: Since this review was written, Hobbico has taken over as the importer for Hasegawa models.