I don’t think that much needs to be said about the venerable Hellcat, the premiere US Navy fighter of WW2 (sorry Corsair lovers, I’ll admit to some bias here. When I started as a structural designer at Grumman many decades ago, some of my mentors had actually worked on this aircraft).

Eduard’s Profipack boxing of this little gem includes crisp moldings in light gray and clear styrene, two decal sheets (markings for 5 variants as well as a very full stenciling sheet in both black and white fonts), two sets of p/e parts (one of which contains their beautiful pre-painted etched cockpit parts) and two sets of canopy masks. As is common in Eduard kits, you’ll find some parts that are not used in the build, but this is made clear in the assembly booklet – full color, over 10 pages, including color profiles).

Brengun produces a wide range of unique resin, photo-etch (PE) accessories and full kits in 1/32, 1/48, 1/72 and 1/144. These nacelles were previously produced by Attack Squadron (Arma Hobby) and that product line was sold to Brengun which now offers the C-130 product line many are familiar with.

The Kit

Tamiya’s French Light Tank R35 is a new tooled kit of the pre-World War II tank. By the 1930s French military planners could no longer ignore the obsolescence of their masterpiece FT17 tank from late WWI, and work started on a genuine successor to fill the void. One of the answers they came up with was the R35 light tank, which utilized rolled steel lower and three-piece cast upper hull designs and was armed with the short barreled 37mm gun. It was crewed by two. When hostilities with Nazi Germany burst into life in May 1940 the R35 was right in the front line. While it showed its armor was reliable, the 37mm gun was inadequate when it came to take out German armor. The Fall of France in June 1940 meant that production of the R35 was curtailed to approximately 1,600 units.