bottom of the box, beneath the
individually bagged kit frets,
there was also a Quickboost pack
containing resin exhausts and a
pack of Montex canopy masks,
which proved to be very useful.
Upon examining the kit
parts more closely, it became
immediately apparent that the
cockpit and wheel bay were actually
quite decent. In fact, the kit exudes
quality, from the crisp panel lines
and engraved fastener detail to
the rendering of the Hurricane’s
distinctive fabric-covered fuselage.
The rudder and ailerons are
all moulded separately, as is the
pilot’s side door. The engine bay
can be posed open on the port
side to reveal the Merlin power
plant, and the undercarriage
features weighted tyres – always
a nice touch. I couldn’t wait to get
started on this little gem of a kit!STORMING AHEAD:
INITIAL ASSEMBLY
The kit cockpit is fairly well
provided for straight from the
box. It comprises around twenty
parts, though I naturally chose to
use the Aires set, which features
much finer detail and includes the
two side consoles and associatedlevers that are absent from the kit.
Consisting of just 14 resin parts,
an acetate instrument panel, and
a very busy metal fret, it didn’t
take long to separate the resin
components from their moulding
blocks and begin construction.
Dry-fitting the cockpit tub- made up of the floor panel, a
back panel featuring the pilot’s
head armour, and two sidewalls –
showed it to be slightly too narrow
to fill the Italeri fuselage, so to
bridge the gaps I added plastic
card shims to either side of the
rear panel and to the outside edges
of the sidewalls. Once the super
glue had set, I sanded the shims to
match the inner fuselage profile.
The wheel bay supplied in the
kit is also very decent; however, the
Aires replacement again displays
far finer detail, and more of it, so
the kit bay went into the spares
box. The large centre section of
the Italeri wheel bay comes as a
single separate part that needs
to be glued to the lower wings.
The end sections of the bay,
into which the landing gear fit,
are moulded as integral parts of
the lower wing, and therefore
need to be removed. Mimicking
the “V” shape of the upper part
of the undercarriage legs and
solidly moulded, these sections
require careful drilling along
their inner edges before being
surgically removed with a
scalpel. I used a chisel-edged
scalpel to clean the jagged edges
before the area was smoothed
with wet and dry sandpaper.
The Aires set features a
beautifully cast one-piece resin bay,
which spans the entire width of the
central wing section, and into which
are glued a compressed air bottle
and several small pipes and rods.
The large moulding block must be
removed entirely from the top of
the bay before attaching it to the
kit’s one-piece lower wing; because
space in the fuselage is limited, if
left in place the moulding block will
prevent the fitting of the cockpit
tub and hinder attachment of the
wing assembly at a later stage.I drilled and sawed the moulding
block free, then used the flexible
extension of my Dremel 3000,
fitted with a burr attachment, to
level the resultant jagged surface
and reduce the depth of the resin
insert. Once cleaned up the one-
piece bay was then held in place
against the inside of the lower
wing, and super glue was allowed
to run along its outer edges and
secure it in place. It fit perfectly.
With the wheel bay set in place
and the ailerons loosely placed into
their respective recesses in the
wing trailing edges – they would
later be posed at a slight angle and
glued – the upper wing halves were
cemented to the one-piece lower
wing. I wrapped them in rubber
bands and put them aside to harden.
The wing tip navigation
lights come as two separate
transparencies with pre-drilled
holes, which is another
nice touch. These holes
would later be filled with
a wash of red and green20 • APRIL 2018 • SCALE AVIATION MODELLER INTERNATIONAL
018-25-FEAT-Hurricane-0418.indd 20 09/03/2018 15: