This accessory is designed to be used with the Airfix, Hasegawa, Heller or Matchbox kits. The parts are a replacement for the pitot tube, angle of attack probe (AOA) and secondary pitot, located on the vertical stabilizer. I used a Heller Viggen which was previously used for a paint mask review. The sensor and pitots are silver on this aircraft. I found a great shot of a Viggen on airliners.net which showed this color nicely.

The Kit

You get three finely done brass parts in a plastic envelope, which is inside another plastic envelope. This is done to prevent losing these tiny parts during shipping, handling or storage.

Assembly

I painted the brass parts with Testors Aluminum Metalizer.

Review

Italeri’s P-47D in 1/48 scale is re-boxing the well-known Academy P-47D. If you visit different websites (including Italeri’s), you will see “Photo-etch parts” listed as a part of the kit; however in my review sample the photoetch part was not included. I actually think it is an error on the websites, as there is no reference to the photoetch fret neither in the box nor in the instructions.

Once you open the box, you’ll find 5 sprues, plus an extra sprue for the clear parts. There are several options for underwing stores: bombs, drop tanks, bazooka rockets, and HVAR rockets. Just be aware that some of them are for the P-47N and not applicable to the –D mark. You also get an excellent decal sheet with a great selection of markings, two USAAF NMF, plus French and Brazilian markings in Olive Drab over neutral grey, all of them serving in the Italian Front from 1944-45. Stencils are provided for one model.

When one looks at French aircraft of the period immediately before and during World War Two, it is evident that there were two schools of thought when it came to aircraft design! One school was to design elegant, graceful and beautiful aircraft. The other was to see just how ugly they could make the airplane and it still fly and perform the duties it was designed for. This book is filled with examples of aircraft from both schools.

The book begins with a discussion of the main categories of French flying boats and what these categories entail. The “Croisiere” category is the very long range maritime reconnaissance aircraft with a range of 2100 to 2800 miles. The “Exploration” category was the long range maritime reconnaissance with a range of 1200 to 1900 miles. The last category, “Surveillance” had a range of up to 775 miles. Floatplanes are not discussed in this volume.

Scale Aircraft Conversions specializes in white metal replacement parts. Its line of replacement landing gear has been expanded to include a set for the Academy 1/48 P-47D, which has been boxed by Italeri and Eduard too.

The set includes 5 parts, two landing gear struts and scissors plus the tail wheel, finely molded in white metal. These parts are drop-in replacements for the plastic parts.

You can see from the pictures the parts are very cleanly molded and formed. Attaching the struts scissors is very easily accomplished with superglue as regular plastic glue will not work on white metal.

While dry fitting the parts, I’ve noticed that the white metal landing gear struts are molded a little bit shorter than the plastic ones. I was able to tell that when I presented the metal part to the landing gear cover and the alignment pins did not completely line up. Not a big issue and actually the shorter struts represent a combat loaded P-47 better in my opinion.

This accessory is for the Heller Tunnan kit. The parts are replacement pitot tubes.

The Kit

You get two finely done brass parts in a plastic envelope, which is inside another plastic envelope. Good plan – lost parts of this size would be a disaster, not to mention impossible to find. I liked the instruction sheet, it was simple, to the point, and uncluttered.

Assembly

I used a Tunnan I built several years ago. It was great to have these brass pitots, as the plastic ones had been broken off soon after I did the model.

I cut off the little projections where the pitots had been earlier and drilled tiny holes in the wing leading edge.

I painted the brass parts with Testors Aluminum Metalizer.

There is a difference between the left and right pitots, and the instructions are VERY specific about which is which.

A bit of gel-type CA, and a bit of touch up, and the project was finished.