I mentioned last week as part of the Lockheed 100 Campaign I’d start another HIMARS. I hope my tips from last year were helpful to some. This ain’t rocket science (Oh - it sort of is) but there are still some new pitfalls I didn’t mention last time.
I’ve also had the Kelik interior 3D Decal set on hand for quite some time, but never needed it as I wasn’t really doing much with the interiors. I decided I’ll build this one opened up, as it’ll be as it appears at a trade show for Lockheed Martin Missile Division.
Wow - was I disappointed.
I understand it was designed for the Trumpeter kit, but even so, there’s nothing really useful in this set. I’d give it a 3 out of 10, and that only because the decals are very pretty.
The arrangement and even number of gauges is incorrect, so even that piece is useless, unless you just want to throw something in there. A little careful painting of the Foreart parts should be sufficient. On top of that, the bezels for the gauges are black in the set, but green in real life. And the toggle switches are not correct either.
So - what about the seatbelts? Well, because it was designed for the Trumpeter kit you only get two sets. No big deal - I plan to put a driver in the seat. The real problem is that they are about as incorrect as you can get.
This is what they should look like - if you’ve ever ridden in a Black Hawk you’re familiar with the style. But they should also have red pull tabs which I’ll add:
The door mechanisms are another reason the set falls short - they’re inaccurate as well as incomplete.
But no build log is valid without actual photos, so I decided to do the cab first. If I couldn’t reasonably paint it, there’s no point in showing it opened. For better or worse, here’s one of the doors. I’ve made a diagram of the stowage layout to tape to the inside, which my wife will reduce at work.
I’ll try not to include the dog hair in the build:
Last week I made the egregious error of suggesting to someone that he could cut black decal film to make a “I”. I won’t make that mistake again. But I do practice what I preach - the Foreart kit doesn’t have these arrows for the inside of the door. They do have arrows, but they’re larger and for the rocket pods. So I made my own.
While not exactly the same style of belt, but I think I’ll have to resort to making them from scratch as I did these. Same method, different style of attachment. I checked all of my Eduard Black Hawk belts for the correct clasp, but no joy.
My graphic tape for the seatbelts is MIA somehow so I had to settle for doing something else. It wouldn’t be so bad if each individual gauge wasn’t a separate decal about the diameter of a pencil lead.
I was sorely tempted to “cheat” and use the dome lights in the Kelik kit, but they were way overscale. Painting turned out to be not too hard, and without a dental mirror, I doubt they’ll be seen.
Thank you.
I started on the four point restraints this morning. It’s tedious, but I’m convinced it’s worth the effort.
Here’s the layout of the seatbelts on the commander’s seat - same as the other two. The shoulder straps connect to the lap belts. There are only two fasteners. I still need to add the red emergency handle. I ended up using the fittings from the Kelik set added to black graphic tape. Even so I had to carefully modify the shoulder adjustments to make them look close to the real thing:
Once I hit it with flat clear it will look better. The garish lighting doesn’t help - and it’s dark in the cab.
What I really like about this setup is that you can see underneath the straps at several points - they don’t look painted on, which I imagine is exactly how they’d look if I used the original pieces.
