Pavla has come out with a cockpit and operators station set for the Hasegawa 1/72 S-3A Viking. The big difference between the Hasegawa cockpit and the Pavla one is that Pavla’s also includes the operators’ stations behind the pilots.

This offering is really a quality set of resin pieces – smooth, seamless, and bubble-free. The detail is also very nice and doesn’t need any extra work to bring out the detail; just a little bit of dry-brushing and it just pops out. As with most of the Pavla aftermarket parts, there is some cutting involved. There is a nice sheet included that shows where all the cutting is to be done. They also include the area from the entrance hatch to the cockpit, and that involves the removal of a pretty stout piece of plastic.

There were a couple of problems that I faced with the set. All four seats came to me broken. The S-3A has a cross spar at the top of the seat which is pretty delicate. I believe that the problem is with the packaging. It comes in a small box and the parts are just put in there loose so they can hit each other. I found two of the pieces and will be able to replace them but the other two will need to be fabricated. Oh, well, we are modelers after all and can fix any problem that comes up.

The second problem I had is that I just can’t get this thing to fit into the model. This could just be me, but Hasegawa molded the top of the fuselage with a down angle so that the wing fits tightly, but it bends down right where the operators’ area is. I checked the drawings that Pavla included and they do show that feature, so I’m a little perplexed. There is room if this indent is removed, because the upper part of the wing there has a hollow area. There is a bulkhead on both fuselage halves and the wing assembly which must be removed to allow the back seats to fit. This is not in the instructions.

I still would recommend this product because of the detail alone and it is the only offering I have seen with a back seat. Just know that there is a lot of work to get it installed, so I would recommend this to modelers with experience doing these kinds of improvements. Thanks to Pavla Models and IPMS USA for the chance to do this review.