Don’t forget the actuators for various ramps and doors. It was only when I attached the gear doors that sit against the engine intakes, that I realized there should be a gap between the inlet and gear wall to seat the edge of the door. The compressor and turbine/afterburner faces were really nicely detailed and fit well.īefore the fuselage is closed up parts of the main gear wells go in, and I had some trouble figuring out their location. The intakes and exhaust tubes are split, so the usual cleanup of the internal seams was needed. Aftermarket resin seats would be nice, but not really necessary. I made these from tape and then completed the seats with the P/E ejection handles. The seats are nicely detailed with shoulder/parachute harnesses, but no lap belts. I used the decals and had to trim some of the clear decal film to get them to fit properly. You may also paint the panels if preferred. All panels are furnished by decals, and the side consoles include photo etch parts. The fit of the shroud/coming over the instrument panels was tight, but some trimming helped. The cockpit is the first to be built, and both are the same. There is a helpful parts map on the last page, as well as the paint reference. Some careful studying shows which parts pertain to either model. The F-14A is referred to a #1, and the B is #2 as per the painting and decal pages for each aircraft. It is typical Hasegawa quality with good diagrams and clear instructions. There is a tremendous amount of plastic in this box, and there are plenty of spare parts left over at the end of the build. A nice photo etch (P/E) fret for each aircraft contains canopy rails, cockpit side consoles, rear vision mirrors, ejection handles and afterburner “rings” for the Alpha model. The kit is furnished with many different weapons pylons to mount these. No weapons are provided, however, there is a Hasegawa Weapons #3 set that will accommodate what these aircraft carried. The kit has parts to build both an “Alpha” and “Bravo”, and includes a TARPS pod, AAQ-14 Lantern pod, LAU-135 BOL, external fuel tanks, and Phoenix missile pallets. The worst areas being the wing roots, and slat tracks. As there are two models in the box, the cleanup is duplicated. The actual parts are very nicely molded, with crisp recessed panel lines and detail, but there was quite a bit of flash on some parts requiring removal. The Hasegawa 1/72 scale F-14 Tomcats have been around for many years, and the molds are showing some wear. These look fantastic displayed next to the finished models. The main canopy in both bags had come loose, but no damage was found. All the grey plastic sprues for one aircraft and a photo etch fret are contained in one plastic bag. The large sturdy box features two nice color photos of each aircraft, and I referred to them several times while building and painting. In this package are two complete kits, and include decals for VF-84 Jolly Rogers aboard USS Nimitz in 1978, and VFA-103 Jolly Rogers aboard USS John F. Iran is the only other operator of the F14 Tomcat and is still in service.
It served faithfully, and saw action from 1974, until its retirement from the US Navy following its last deployment in 2006. The F-14 Tomcat is well known as a formidable, and versatile Fighter aircraft.
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