The Aircraft

The B-52 has been flying longer than a lot of IPMS members have been building. It entered USAF service in 1955, and 85 of them are still in active inventory, with 9 in reserve. The combat-ready B-52Hs left are at Minot AFB in North Dakota and Barksdale AFB, Louisiana.

The Scale Aircraft Conversions set

The SAC set for the B-52 consists of 4 identical main gear sets and two outrigger wheels and struts for the wings, all in white metal. The outriggers are cast with a protective sprue, which is a great idea since they’d be a little fragile.

The main gear uses the kit wheels.

Painting

This was pretty simple. The main gear and the outriggers are painted white. I used Floquil Reefer White, which goes on nicely from the airbrush and sticks wonderfully to the metal parts. I then brush-painted the wheels on the outriggers with Floquil Grimy Black.

I painted the kit main wheels the same way, except they came in white plastic, so I didn’t have to paint the hubs.

Assembly

The kit wheels fit nicely onto the metal hubs. I used gel-type super glue, as the applicator allowed me to put just a tiny drop on the hub and then slide the wheel on. The outriggers fit onto the little doors provided, and they fit nicely into the outer wing. The main wheels fit into a channel inside the wheel wells. It required some dexterity to get these into the holes, twisted, and aligned. I used thin super glue to hold these parts in place.

Overall Evaluation

Recommended, especially if you have to move your B-52 now and then to contests or displays. The SAC metal gear is much more robust than the plastic ones provided by the kit, and the outriggers are far less likely to be damaged. The parts fit very nicely. The main landing gear on a B-52 is kind of hard to see, but the outriggers can be seen if you look closely. Hey, it’s 1/144!

Thanks to Scale Aircraft Conversions for providing the aftermarket parts, and IPMS/USA for giving me a chance to use them in a project.