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BAe Hawk T.1

history

The BAe Hawk T.Mk1 is a British single-engine, two seat, advanced jet training aircraft. First flown, in 1974 as the Hawker Siddeley Hawk. Since then it has been produced by its successor companies, British Aerospace, and BAe Systems. It was conceived for the dual roles of advanced pilot training and tactical weapons training, it is also used as a low-cost combat aircraft. Operators of the Hawk include the Royal Air Force (notably the Red Arrows display team), the Royal Navy, and a large number of Air Forces around the world. The Hawk is still in production in the UK and under license in India by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). Note also that the Hawk is one of the few modern jet aircraft that have been ordered into production from the drawing board.

Construction

This was an out of the box build—no after market accessories. Overall, construction is straight forward just following the instructions, which are all pictorial. The general fit of the parts is not too bad, but not great. Installing the instructor and student pilots into the ejection seats was a very tight fit. The instrument panels are very basic and you can't see them when you include the pilots. Mounting the cockpit to the right half of the fuselage is a bit tricky. The small upper nose gear shelf is not a great fit.

A nose weight is essential to prevent tail sitting—plenty of room in the nose. Joining the two fuselage halves was somewhat difficult—it is a very tight fit from the nose to the back of the cockpit. A lot of work was needed to get the engine air intakes seamless. The rest of the build was pretty much a standard build. However, I had to do the filler and sanding thing with every seam. The kit provides an assortment of under wing things. I chose to give my Hawk a gun pod and two AIM-9L air-to-air missiles.

Painting

Painting the Hawk was quite simple, except for the landing gears and wheel bays, the entire model is painted with MM Gloss Black. The landing gears and wheel bays are painted with MM Flat White, and the AIM-9Ls are painted with MM Light Ghost Gray.

Decals

In preparation for decals I hand brushed two coats of Future on the model and let it dry and cure for three days. The kit decal sheet provides common decals and decals for three British Hawk aircraft. I chose to use the decals for the Royal Navy. The kit decals are excellent, they adhered nicely to the model surface with no silvering. Just as a precaution to prevent silvering I applied a touch of Micro Set setting solution to each decal. Solvaset is too strong for the decals. Once decalling was complete I cleaned up the model with a damp cloth, then applied a light coat of Future over the model. To finish off the model, I airbrushed it with a coat of MM Gloss Lacquer Finish.

conclusion

Even with all the filling and sanding, the finished Hawk came out looking pretty good, I was quite pleased. The external detail is good, the decals were excellent, and the kit went together with no major upsets.