Airfix 1/72 DH Mosquito NF.XIX/J.30

AIRFIX 1:72 DH. MOSQUITO NF.XIX/J.30

Reviewer: Brian Manning (rec.models.scale)
Kit Review submitted: 2 May 2003

Kit Details:

Airfix #3062 - 1/72 De Havilland Mosquito NF.XIX / J.30

Aircraft History:

The Mosquito origins are well documented, being an all wooden aircraft when most planes were being built in aluminium. After initial apprehension about the type's abilities the aircraft went on to become one of the more famous twin engine multi-role fighter aircraft of all time. The NF Mk.XIX was an improved Night Fighter version, as the NF designation suggests, that incorporated radar within the aircraft's nose instead of a protruding antenna array, which gave the nose a distinctive bulbous profile. Its main role was as a bomber escort for night raids into Germany and around 280 aircraft were built. Sixty of these were delivered to Sweden after the war and designated in their service as J.30 with four bladed propeller blades as the main difference. They served into the mid 50's until replaced by jet alternatives.

The Kit:

The kit appears to be the old Airfix Mk.II release with revised tooling and extra sprues incorporating the new nose, four blade props etc. The main parts are molded in the usual brittle light grey plastic coming on various sprues, while the revised parts are in a softer white plastic. There is a mixture of raised and engraved detail, mainly the former, including some rivets although not overly excessive. There are a few sink marks and a couple of ejector pin marks to deal with but there is no flash. Since the main thrust of the previous Mosquito release is here, it means you will have some props for the spares bin, whichever version you build, plus you could theoretically produce an NF.II or FB Mk.IV version by incorporating the included antenna array on the nose of the former and the underwing ordnance on the latter. The separate nose for the NF.XIX/J.30 is included which means you will need to slice off the nose on the fuselage halves to install this. Underwing ordnance include eight small rockets, slipper tanks and a pair of 500 pounders.

Construction:

The cockpit is pretty spartan as you would generally expect from an Airfix kit, with nothing more than a couple of crewmen and their seats pretty much to incorporate, although some rudimentary sticks, main instrument panel, radio rack/box and floor are provided. Airfix also include a decal for the instrument panel. These interior parts are also pretty basic, indicating the times when all modellers probably went with closed cockpits. Since the canopy part is quite clear, some extra work here will not go to waste. I scratchbuilt some various bits of equipment, from seat belts to fire extinguishers, using plasticard and stretched sprue. There is probably an aftermarket set out there you could use for the cockpit, one would think so anyhow, so might pay to do some digging around and invest in an etched set or resin cockpit replacement.

To incorporate the different bulbous radome, you need to remove the nose on the fuselage halves and attach the separate nose provided. This can be done by using a razor saw and cutting as directed in the instructions. The tailwheel is also installed at this point before the fuselage halves are brought together, and providing you cut the nose section correctly, should all mate up quite well. The nose can then be added.

Moving onto the wings, these are made up of upper and lower halves. You will need to drill out holes first if your aircraft is going to carry the slipper tanks or rockets. At this point I also decided on the D-Day example operated by the RAF, so rockets are the go here. The wings did not fit very well into the fuselage alignment holes, so a bit of coaxing was required, and a tiny dab of filler at the joins. The tailplanes told a better story but these come in halves and don't align properly to each other, so I shaved off the locating pins and butt joined the halves.

The next task was assembling and fitting the engine nacelles, and this is where things got a bit interesting. This also doubles up as the main gear wheel well bay which also presented its own challenges. The main gear assembly is broken into four separate parts and provide a dead ringer for a trapeze from a circus, with the wheel trapped between two struts. I opted to use superglue such was the fragile nature of this sub assembly, and I think optimum strength was needed. The mud guards provide the greatest challenge as there is virtually nothing for them to attach to, so again super glue came in handy.

The gear bays inside the nacelle halves provide virtually no detail, other than the holes to stick the undercarriage locating pins into on the sides. They could be better boxed off. The undercarriage struts need to be very carefully slotted into their holes and left to dry, with some test fitting and a slight nip on the locating pins required.

The kit provides the choice of three- and four-bladed propellers, the latter being used on the Swedish J.30 version. There is no real engine detail provided in the kit, and attaching the propeller to the shaft and trapping these between the nacelle halves... along with the undercarriage can be quite a challenge. But I succeeded so it can be done.

Finally the external detail bits and pieces, including the one-piece, thick but quite clear, canopy were added to complete the construction. Overall the construction was reasonably simple, and would be even more simple for wheels-up modellers! As mentioned in the the Kit notes above and versions below, if you are not into cutting out and adding the separate nose, you can build other night fighter Mosquito variants.

Painting & Versions:

The kit intends to cover three aircraft examples as covered in the instructions and on the decal sheet. Two of these are Swedish J.30's as depicted on the boxart. The other example is a No.157 Sqn "Special Duties" Mosquito flown during D-Day landings in 1944, wearing the invasion stripes. This was my choice, and the upper colours of Dark Green and Ocean Grey were painted as camouflage, before being masked off and the underside Flat Black sprayed on. This represented a different way of doing things for me, as I generally mask off the undersides first, usually because they are a lighter colour... but not this time!

To be frank, you could depict almost any night fighter type Mosquito because the nose included on the fuselage halves covers the main Mosquito fighter/fighter-bomber variants plus the antenna array is also included in the kit. So if you had your hands on some aftermarket decals, and weren't too keen on cutting off and adding a new nose, you could opt for an NF.II or even an FB.Mk 4 variant.

Decals:

The decal sheet is separated into five sections. One common for the two Swedish types (ie: roundels etc), two for the individual codes for the two Swedish examples; one for the instrument panel and fuel cap I think, and the other being of course the RAF version. The decals are a bit thin and a little misaligned slightly on a couple with printing, for example a slight yellow overstepping the "crown" outline on the Swedish roundels. I thought the Swedish blue was also a bit light and the red for the RAF too brown. If you have an aftermarket set from a more reputable company use them and ditch these. Anyway, if you use the kit decals, they responded quite well to Humbrol Decalfix but you needed to place them pretty much in the right spot the first time, as they were hard to move around. The invasion stripes are included, and for the wings have the upper RAF roundel embedded into them. I would prefer the decals separated. The invasion stripes caused the most annoyance, and in hindsight, probably should have painted them on.

Overall Recommendation:

Work is definitely needed to get a decent outcome of what the kit represents, and you have to be comfortable with things like removing the nose piece. The undercarriage and nacelles were frustrating to fit but the rest of the construction process was reasonably hassle free. Certainly as a different Mosquito I would give this kit the thumbs up, but only to those who know what they are doing and have the skills to overcome some of the mentioned obstacles. And invest in an aftermarket decal sheet as well.

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