Another in a long series of resin parts to make our models better from our friends at MMD/Squadron; thanks very much to you for providing IPMS USA this review item!

The venerable Monogram F-106 has been re-released several times, and is most recently in the Revell catalog. Still the only game in town in this scale, it is undoubtedly a great model of a great aircraft; it requires a bit of work for fit, but nothing that cannot be addressed by careful assembly and a bit of putty here at there. And the seat is an older version; read on.

This kit was released with the earlier Weber “bang seat”; as such, this seat did not have the capability of the newer rocket-powered seats coming along in the late 1970’s and early ’80s. This was not the fault of the manufacturer, as seat design is an evolving science. NOBODY had a seat that could eject a crewmember at zero altitude, zero airspeed in the early days. One drawback to the old seat was a requirement to be moving at about 100 knots, be straight and level, and have about 200’ of altitude before you could safely eject. Not what usually happens at low level in an emergency.

By safely, I mean survive the ejection with the parachute opening fast enough (within 5 seconds) to slow you down before you hit mother earth; otherwise you become a pink skidding mass on the runway, as time and altitude are your friends when a timely ejection is in order. The Zero Zero seat was the answer; the rocket motor propelled the pilot about 200 feet above the ground, and as long as the sink rate of the aircraft going down did not negate the distance and time required to get a fully open parachute and slow you down to a survivable speed… you could live. Beat up maybe, but live.

This resin seat upgrade is a simple, one-piece upgrade to the original Monogram F-106 seat, to replicate the seats seen late in the ‘six’s lifetime. You will have to check your references, but the seat looks great when painted, and if you are modeling a later year aircraft (Like when I stayed for three weeks with the 5^th Fighter Interceptor Squadron in 1979) this seat is appropriate. High marks here, and well done MMD Squadron!