Scale Aircraft Conversions (SAC) continues to be the prolific leader in producing replacement landing gear in white metal. These products are convenient for many multiple reasons:

• Replace inherently weak landing gear (Pro-Modeler F-84G)
• Add strength to a model that has a lot of resin aftermarket
• Replace lost or damaged landing gear

While often their parts are just metal copies of the kit parts, SAC has also made alterations to improve the accuracy of their parts without compromising fit.

This set is designed for the Kitty Hawk kit of the Super Etendard (SuE). The Kitty Hawk has its critics with respect to accuracy of their SuE (all in all it is a nice kit), but I have not read of any complaints regarding the landing gear. One review regarded the gear as accurate and easy to fit. Still the part count is high and many modelers may find it fidgety. In casting the SuE landing gear, SAC has saved the modeler some trouble by assembling some of the components:

• Main landing gear with control linkages attached (and providing more strength to the delicate linkages)
• Oleo scissors assembled
• Modifying the nose gear to provide a more natural break at the swivel point, allowing a more natural pose

With these modifications, SAC drops the parts count from 14 kit parts to 9 SAC parts while still retaining the fit of the kit parts.

My only quibble with white metal parts is that they take more work to clean up than plastic landing gear and require adhesive like epoxy to attach the components. On the plus side the parts are far more robust and can be adjusted since the metal is malleable. There is no lead in SAC products, so from my experience the metal does not deteriorate with age like older white-metal aftermarket accessories. I like what SAC has done with this set and I highly recommend it for your Kitty Hawk SuE build.