I've always been fond of the Supermarine Spitfire with its elegant design, but I certainly don't discount the role played by the Hawker Hurricane in defense of Britain in her hour of need. The Hurricane was far easier and quicker to produce than the Spitfire and made a very stable gun platform. Like the Spitfire, the early Hurricanes were originally equipped with a fixed pitch wooden propeller. By the end of 1939, Hurricanes were being equipped with either the De Havilland or the Rotol constant speed propeller, giving the Hurricane a much needed performance increase.

A quick review of the Quickboost website will show you that Quickboost offers the modeler a plethora of resin accessories from nose to tail in the popular scales. This review will focus on the nose and, specifically, a De Havilland constant speed propeller fitted to the 1/48th scale Hawker Hurricane. Quickboost recommends this propeller as a replacement on the Hasegawa Hurricane line of kits.

Provided in the accessory package are three propeller blades attached to a pour stub with protective spines at either end, the spinner, which is likewise attached to its own pour stub, and the last resin item, the alignment tool. A simple two-step instruction guide is included, but I'm not sure it is necessary. The quality of the resin parts was very neat and tidy indeed. The spinner, blades, and tool were all bubble-free and very cleanly formed. I am usually never very pleased with standard kit propellers since it is necessary to deal with seam lines and other molding anomalies. I'm happy to see Quickboost making this type of accessory since it appears to be a big improvement over the standard kit part.

The first order of business, as with any resin accessory, was to give the parts a quick wash with warm, soapy water. After the parts were rinsed and dried, I made quick work of removing the blades from the pour stub. A bit more work was necessary to remove the spinner from its stub, but a beginner should have no problem with that task. I decided to forgo the extra hassle of masking the finished product, so I loaded up my airbrush and painted the blades and spinner prior to assembly with a little enamel paint.

It is necessary to drill a hole in the backside of the spinner. The plans did not indicate what size drill bit would be needed, so I used the alignment tool as a guide. I tried a couple of bits in the alignment hole until I found one that fit just right. Next, I placed the spinner in the appropriate location on the tool and I noticed there was a tiny bit of slop, but nothing that should cause any problems. It took a few minutes using my fingers to drill the hole in the spinner.

I decided to tape the blade onto the alignment tool so the risk of the blade & spinner moving while the glue set up would be minimized. In hindsight, I think I should have also used the drill bit and some tape to keep the spinner in place. After applying a little white glue in one of the propeller holes, I placed the spinner in the alignment tool to the side and waited for the glue to set up. Two more blades and a couple of days later I was looking a very nice addition to my next Hurricane build.

This resin accessory will make a fine replacement for the kit-supplied propeller. I would highly recommend this product for your next 1/48 Hawker Hurricane build. I would like to thank Quickboost and IPMS/USA for supplying this product for review.