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REVELL 1:72 DE HAVILLAND MOSQUITO B.IV
The very impressive boxart. The scanning and
stitching together of this enormous cover was relatively painless - unlike the
building of the kit itself, which was tortuous in places.
Reviewer:
Kevin Ronayne kevin.ronayne@nuigalway.ie
Kit Review submitted:
15 May 2002
The de Havilland Mosquito began life as a private venture in 1938, after the UK Air Ministry turned down a de Havilland proposal to build a fast and unarmed bomber/reconnaissance aircraft. Such a concept was too radical for the Ministry, especially as the aircraft was to be of all-wooden construction - a seemingly retrograde step. De Havillands decision to use wood was based on the premise that not only might there be a shortage of aluminium during any future conflict, but that an aircraft built of wood could also avail of a large pool of tradesmen experienced in woodwork. De Havilland surmised - correctly - that there might also be a high demand for workers skilled in the use of aluminium, especially in aircraft construction.
Despite the Air Ministry rejection, de Havilland continued to develop the aircraft on their own initiative. What emerged was the classic layout with twin Merlin engines and exceptionally clean lines. The decision to omit defensive armament not only saved weight by reducing crew numbers to just two, but it also removed drag-inducing gun turrets. In March 1940, de Havilland received an order for 50 aircraft against an Air Ministry bomber specification (B.1/40). Because of the cancellations and general hiatus in the months that followed, the first prototype did not fly until November 1940. Once the official test in February 1941 confirmed a top speed of close to 400 mph, the attitude of the Air Ministry changed, and the Mosquito was on course for a long, varied and illustrious career.
It would take far too long here to give even a 'potted' history of Mosquito variant development, or of the aircraft's service record. The 'Wooden Wonder' continued to be full of surprises - it was able to take a lot of damage, despite the plywood and balsa construction. This ran contrary to the negative opinions of American aircraft manufacturers, when asked for an assessment by General 'Hap' Arnold, who had been suitably impressed when he saw the Mosquito fly in the spring of 1941. Not only could the Mosquito take a lot of punishment, but it could also carry loads much heavier than originally envisaged. Aircraft with specially adapted bomb bays could carry a large 4,000 lb bomb. In theory, such a Mosquito would have the range and bomb load of a B-17, but with only a fraction of the crew size and aircraft cost! Despite the original unarmed design, the Mosquito was easily adapted to carry a battery of cannon and machine guns for various fighter and strike roles.
The Mosquito was one of the most versatile aircraft of World War II, along with the Junkers 88. Reconnaissance, day bomber, night bomber, night fighter, night intruder, fighter-bomber and maritime strike - these were just the main roles performed by the Mosquito. Some of the most famous Mosquito missions have passed into legend, including precision strikes on various prisons and Gestapo headquarters. The Mosquito made a deep impression on the Germans, who were never able to cope with the threat it posed in all its various roles. For a time, Luftwaffe night fighter pilots were allowed to count a downed Mosquito as two victories, so difficult were they to shoot down! Even more impressed was Hermann Goering: on 31 January 1943, Mosquitoes disrupted two Nazi parades which were to be addressed by Goering and Goebbels respectively. It is worth repeating the reported comments of Goering himself:
"In 1940 I could at least fly as far as Glasgow in most of my aircraft, but not now! It makes me furious when I see the Mosquito. I turn green and yellow with envy.
The British, who can afford aluminium better than we can, knock together a beautiful wooden aircraft that every piano factory over there is building, and they give it a speed which they have now increased yet again. What do you make of that?"
Piano factories or not, Mosquito production would continue for some years after the end of the war. Total Mosquito production amounted to some 7,781 machines, including those built in Canada and Australia by de Havilland subsidiaries. Until the introduction of the Canberra in 1951, the Mosquito was the fastest bomber in RAF service. Long-range reconnaissance versions continued to serve with the RAF until the mid 1950's, and the last target tugs were not retired until 1961.
One of the very first kits that I built was a Mosquito - a Matchbox NF.30, to be exact. Since then, the 'Mossie' has been a firm favourite of mine. However, finding good Mosquito kits has always been a bit of a struggle. The best that European kit manufacturers had (and still have) to offer was the Airfix late 1970's mold. Older modellers will remember this as a kit had the option to build a Mk. II, VI, or XVIII. This tooling was reworked in the 1990's as a bull-nosed night fighter version - the Mk. XIX, I think. If you want to get a top-class Mosquito kit, you have to go for the Japanese manufacturers. However, in Ireland or the UK, the Hasegawa offerings are quite expensive - and the Tamiya kits are even more costly.
This particular kit is, of course, the Hasegawa tooling. Revell don't follow the Italeri practice of putting the logo of the source manufacturer on the cover, but no attempt has been made to obscure the Hasegawa stamps on the molds. Revell's reboxing arrangement with Hasegawa is quite a recent one. The kits that have been reboxed tend to reflect a particular market requirement of Revell's, as is the case with most of the kits Revell rebox from various sources. A Revell reboxing is at least as expensive as the Hasegawa original - this kit set me back 22 Euro, which was slightly less than the Hannants' list price of 14 STG. I suspect that Hasegawa are dictating this price policy: where Hasegawa don't have a retail presence, a Revell-boxed kit will make them as much money as if their own kit was sold. Where the kits of both companies are sold together, Hasegawa kits won't be undercut by the Revell equivalents.
This Revell kit comes in a huge one-piece box, as if to emphasise that this is a top-class kit, and to justify the price tag. The original Hasegawa tooling is a multipurpose one. Apart from the B.IV version, the there are also NF.II and FB.VI kits available - but only from Hasegawa (not Revell) at this moment in time. This is reflected in the number of sprues: there are a total of 13 sprues, including three pairs of duplicate sprues. Also included in this total are two transparent sprues, and a set of four polyeurathane (poly) 'sleeves' for the propeller assemblies. Everything else is molded in standard-issue light grey plastic. There are just over 100 parts in total, although not all parts supplied are required for this version. Everything is packed in a number of sealed plastic bags, ensuring that parts are not damaged or lost.
The instructions come in a 12-page fold-out A4 booklet. It is a typical Revell production, and includes everything you could possibly need - with the exception of paint codes. Only Revell codes are provided, with no cross-references. However, for a subject like this, there would be no problem in selecting suitable Humbrol shades. The instructions include a full-page sprue diagram, with parts not for use being grayed out. These are at a minimum - don't expect too many spare parts in any of the Mosquito kits, due to the extensive number of specialised sprues. The construction guide has 23 steps, reflecting the Revell tendency to spell everything out in excruciating detail. The decal sheet is small, but is one of the recent Italian-produced decal sheets, meaning excellent quality. There are two subject options, both finished in the standard day scheme of green/dark grey over light grey. One is an aircraft of 139 squadron, based at RAF Marham in late 1942. The other aircraft is from 105 squadron, also based at RAF Marham, in June 1943. This aircraft was flown by a much-decorated Wing Commander John Wooldridge, DSO, DFC, DFM. The paint and decal guides also identify these as B.IV srs ii (series II) models. This is an important detail. The B.IV series I had the original shorten nacelles - there were only a handful of these, being conversions of the PR.I. However, the B.IV series II had the normal lengthened rear nacelle section, so this kit is correct.
I started this kit with the expectation that this would be the proverbial box-shaker - this is a high-class Hasegawa tooling, isn't it? My initial experience seemed to confirm this, as I built the cockpit and fuselage assemblies. The forward cockpit assembly was very straightforward (including a very nice instrument panel decal), with almost everything being painted in Humbrol 78, for RAF interior green. This colour was applied to every other interior part of the aircraft as well, naturally. The next stage was to enclose this forward area between the two halves of the nose section. Obviously, to provide for different versions, the nose fuselage section needs to be separate from the main fuselage. I only attached the cockpit assembly to the starboard nose part, based on some issues that I thought might arise later on during construction.
The next step was to attach the rear part of the cockpit to the front of the bomb bay roof, followed by the navigators' seat, which was affixed to the right-hand side of this rear cockpit section. The rear bomb bay bulkhead was also attached to the bomb bay roof at this point. There was no separate forward bulkhead part, as this was integrated into the nose/front cockpit assembly. On to the upper side of the bomb bay roof went the central spar unit. This has two pairs of thick spars which are designed to protrude through the fuselage halves. As the fore and aft spars are of a slightly different thickness, the spar unit had two different-sized attachment holes in a tandem arrangement. This ensured that you couldn't attach the spar unit back to front. However, there was still some 'give' when attaching the spar unit to the bomb bay. I had to take care to make sure that the unit was lined up exactly straight, which was easy enough to confirm visually. If I didn't do this, I could more or less have kissed the rest of the kit goodbye, as I would have had enormous difficulty in attaching the fuselage and wings.
The problem of loose fit was a recurring one throughout the kit. Before encountering the problem with the spar attachment, I had already seen this during the cockpit assembly. There seemed to be some leeway in how certain parts were attached. A similar problem was the existence of some gaps where none should exist. For example, when I eventually enclosed the fuselage halves around the bomb bay/spar/rear cockpit unit, I detected some small gaps, and shortcomings in fit. For the most part these were inconsequential, as they would not be visible once the kit was complete. For example, the rear part of the cockpit didn't quite mate with the fuselage halves, but it was not visually obvious once everything was in place. What this did mean was that some parts of the construction process were held up, as I had to take more time than envisaged to check that everything was going together properly.
Before assembling the fuselage halves, the bomb and bomb rack assemblies had to be completed and attached to the bomb bay roof. If you try and attach these units after enclosing the bomb bay within the fuselage, then you will find that the racks are too wide to pass through the bay door opening. This is what happened to me, and I had to trim the sides of the racks until they fitted. Thankfully, this little modification isn't really noticeable. In this particular instance, ignore the instructions at your peril. The rack assemblies were finely detailed, although attaching them to the bomb bay roof was a little awkward. The four 500lb. bombs were painted Hu 30, which was the same shade of green I would be using for the upper camouflage later on. Revell's instructions here showed a lack of consistency, as the bombs in their kits of the Mosquito, Hurricane and RAF Mustang III each required a different shade (or mix) of green. I went for the simplest option. Finally, I was now able enclose the bomb bay within the fuselage halves - the wing spars protruding through precise holes in the fuselage. Apart from the slight rear cockpit fit problem mentioned earlier, this was plain sailing.
© Kevin Ronayne 2005
Now we come to the wing and engine assembly, and this is where the fun starts. The instructions here assume that there are no fit problems and that the kit is perfectly engineered. By 'engineering', I mean that the kit is designed in a manner that makes for the most straightforward construction, and does not in itself lead to problems with kit structure or assembly. This was not the case here. I should point out here that the Revell instructions for this stage are pretty much a direct copy of the original Hasegawa instructions - I have an unbuilt Hasegawa NF.II kit in my reserves, which thankfully was bought on special offer, much more cheaply than this kit.
The obvious way to recreate the nacelles would have been to have pairs of full engine/undercarriage nacelles halves for each engine. All other kit manufacturers (Airfix, Matchbox and Tamiya) have done this - it is the obvious way, given the long, deep profile of the nacelle. Not Hasegawa: take a look at the excerpt below from the instructions. The rear parts of the nacelles are molded into the lower wings, with separate engine cowling halves to be attached to these (Note: The separate cowling arrangement may have been done with an eye to kitting later versions with more powerful engines, such as the B.XI or later - although the sprue layout doesn't seem to support this idea). The lower wings were attached to the mold in such a way as to try and preserve the form and shape of the nacelles. This didn't work, and some warping had occurred, just as I suspected it would. The first step in dealing with this is to attach each engine half to the nacelle independently of the other half. Only when they have set hard should they be cemented together - this is the only realistic way of creating a full nacelle without major difficulty. While doing this, you should attach the upper wings to the fuselage and spars. The instructions below suggest you can complete a full wing assembly before attaching anything to the fuselage. For a variety of reasons, I would avoid this. The upper wings mated very well to the fuselage and spars, with just a very small amount of filler required at some parts of the root join. The tail planes were also attached at this juncture - these required no attention at all, as the join was seamless, and very rigid.
The next part of the lower wing assembly is to attach the undercarriage roof/front and rear bulkhead part. The instructions above suggest that you should do this with the main undercarriage assemblies already completed and attached - don't do this! By all means build the undercarriage assemblies now, but leave them aside until later. The reason is that the roof/bulkhead part is very badly designed, and needs a lot of filler and other corrective work before the undercarriage bay looks the part. This would be very difficult to do if the undercarriage is already attached. All three parts of the roof/bulkhead part are a problem. The rear bulkhead is a very bad fit - lots of filler required. The roof-to-engine-nacelle/wing join is very unsatisfactory. It is difficult to reconcile the position and orientation of the part with the fact that the two edges of the nacelle/wing junction are at different heights: naturally, the outer edge is higher up, given the wing dihedral. Cue some more filling, and cutting and paring as well. To finish with, the front bulkhead was designed to only come down about two-thirds of the way. There is a big semi-circular gap at the base of the engine/undercarriage bay junction, in what seems a very deliberate design move. If this gap was there in reality, surely the kit would come with some form of engine block detail? I created replacement front bulkheads, cut and shaped from a sheet of hard cellophane - the sort of material you would use to cover a set of notes. I used these to completely cover both the original bulkheads and the gaps beneath them. After a bit more filler and other cleaning up, I could finally paint the bays using Hu 78.
Before attaching the lower wings, I had to add the nose section to the fuselage - this is a must, as the main alignment points would eventually be covered by the wing root. The instructions suggest that the completed nose/forward cockpit assembly can simply be 'snapped on' to the alignment points - after applying cement to the join area first, of course. This struck me as unrealistic, as there wouldn't be that much 'flex' in the nose assembly. Removing one of the alignment pins would be one way out. The second way was what I did: I attached the starboard nose half first, with the nose cockpit area attached. Once I satisfied myself that everything was in order, I added the port nose half. However, there was a gap between the top of the forward bulkhead (which was actually the back of the nose section) and the roof of the bomb bay. Again, it looked as if this had been done deliberately. I filled this in before I attached the nose - it would have been much more difficult to correct if I had left it until after everything was assembled. I then added the transparent nose, and the main canopy. This was of the 'angled windscreen' variety, and was split into two parts, right down the middle. This was a bit awkward compared to the single-piece canopy with the flat windscreen (it comes with the NF.II kit, for example). However, the fit was excellent.
At this point, I returned to the wings. The next step was to attach the lower wing/nacelle assemblies to the fuselage and upper wings. In theory, this should have straightforward; in reality, quite a bit of filler was needed at the lower wing root/fuselage junctions. This had to be a fault with the kit, not the manner in which I assembled it. As an aside, the lower and upper wings provided all the drill-out holes required for night-fighter wing aerials, or for rocket/bomb pylons or underwing tanks on the FB.VI kit. I had long believed that the B.IV was the last major version not to carry underwing stores, but in researching this kit I have found out that it could have drop tanks fitted. Other notable details in the wing construction were the fore and aft wingtip lights, and the large underwing lights - all these had separate transparent parts.
Now it was time to attach the main undercarriage. This was easy, despite the long, spindly undercarriage legs. The only problems were with the wheels. The alignment pegs on the wheel halves should be removed before cemented the wheels together; otherwise, the very crisp tread pattern on the tires will not match up between the two halves - the alignment needs to be done manually. The second problem relates to the hubcaps. Each wheel had the hubcap premolded on one of the tire halves, with a choice of separate parts to be attached to the other half. One part (M3) is the same as the premolded cap; the other part (M2) is different. The construction guide, sprue diagram and completed model pictures on the box all indicate that the 'different' cap (M2) is to be used. However, the part illustrated in the construction guide is M3 - I went with the majority view and used part M2. The completed undercarriage assemblies were 'plugged in' to the roof of the undercarriage bays without any difficulty, and simply left to set. I had no problem with the single-piece tail wheel either.
The remainder of the kit was comparatively painless. The exhaust shrouds were a bit tricky to position, even once some protrusions on the cowling had been removed, as per the instructions. No unshrouded exhausts were provided. (addendum supplied to Kevin by Christian Horn - The 105 Sqn aircraft flown by John Woolridge should have uncovered engine exhausts, and not the shrouded type supplied with the kit. It will probably be difficult getting unshrouded exhaust covers, because those supplied with Airfix's kit to my belief are not accurate. The Tamiya kit may be the answer.)
There are two sets of propeller blades provided. The sprues diagram does it's best to confuse matters by indicating the later paddle-blade units are the ones to use. However, the instructions correctly indicate that the earlier, narrow-blade units are the ones to use. The propeller assemblies involved poly 'sleeves' being held in position within the spinner units. The completed assemblies can then be attached or removed from the engines at will. They will rotate freely, yet stay in place unless removed deliberately. This is obviously the intent behind using this mechanism. It was the first time I'd actually seen it on a kit, and I was suitably impressed.
Last of all were the bomb bay and undercarriage doors, plus various aerials and other protrusions. The bomb bay doors are supplied as a single part which will obviously need to be cut in two for an open bomb bay. Conversely, a closed bomb bay will obviously require you to cut away the three attachment points on either side of the fuselage - the instructions omit this step. It is possible to attach the doors back to front unless you pay attention - there are a pair of lights at the front end of the doors. Unlike the bomb bay doors, the main undercarriage doors are already provided in separate halves. There is nothing stopping someone from building a 'wheels up' model, and instructions are given in this respect. In attaching the undercarriage doors, it would have been helpful to have some idea of the angle that the doors would typically hang at, as there is some amount of leeway here. As in other parts of the kit, a dab of superglue would not go amiss in ensuring a solid attachment, and a fast-setting one.
© Kevin Ronayne 2005
After everything that went before, painting was easy. The upper camouflage scheme used the standard colours of Hu 30 (mid green) and Hu 106 (Ocean grey). The lower half of the aircraft was painted Hu 64 (light grey). Leaving aside all the minor points of detail, that's all there was to it.
The decals were of exceptional quality all round. They were also thinner than Hasegawa decals, although the decal sheet supplied with my Hasegawa NF.II had quite a bit more in the way of stencilling. There is a Mosquito stencil sheet supplied by Tallyho!, with stencils for two aircraft. This is one of a set of stencil sheets for popular WWII aircraft, all of which are quite cheap. I just didn't get around to it for this kit.
I remember reading some adverse comments on the Internet about the length of the nacelles on this kit. Since this kit is designed to correctly represent a B.IV series II with standard full-length nacelles, I don't see a problem. They also look fine in terms of shape, outline, dimensions and panel detail. Overall, the surface detail is exceptionally crisp, with precise engraved panel lines, and raised detail as appropriate. The unsuual structure of the fuselage means that there is very little detail on the fuselage surface anyway. There was some minor interior detail displayed on the box artwork that was actually missing in the kit. For example, some interior rib detail is shown in the nose section, but it's not actually in the kit. This is to be expected, since Hasegawa don't really have a reputation for going all-out on interior details. Dimensionally, the kit looks correct - not only in length and wingspan, but also in terms of contours, panel lines and other details.
© Kevin Ronayne 2005
This kit came in a big box, with a big price tag, and with a big pedigree behind it. The bottom line is that it falls short of expectations. The failures in engineering and fit are very surprising and disappointing - I really expected more of Hasegawa. You can produce a top-class Mosquito kit, but it just takes a lot more work than it should. What makes it worse is that Revell themselves could have tooled a superior kit and sold it at a lower cost. They could also have financed a 'cooperative tooling' with Italeri, and produced a very good tooling even more cheaply. Either option would leave the way open to produce multiple versions, just as Hasegawa and Tamiya are doing - it's pretty much a no-brainer with the Mosquito. However, I suspect that Revell worked on the basis that they would get a quicker return for their money if they just reboxed the Hasegawa kit. Personally, I could build a dozen or more Mosquitoes if only the right kits were available at a reasonable price - who wouldn't want to? At least when I get around to building my NF.II kit, I'll be doing a 'wheels up' version, which will spare me a lot of the pain I experienced with this kit.
My main printed source of information for this was David Mondey's British Aircraft of World War II. There is decent amount of material on the Internet concerning the Mosquito. The best link was THE DE HAVILLAND MOSQUITO PAGE - this includes some detailed background information, including the Goering quote used above.
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