Steffen, who told you that I didn't make any photos of the sprues
And don't think so negative abot the folded wings, they fit very good in my opinion.
Oh, before I start and forget other things - Jean-Luc, if possible please bring your Ki-45 to Merchweiler. That would make 3 in one place
Poor B-29 .... (if there is any)
Okay, but now let's see, what Hobbyboss has in the box for us. First we have here sprue A with fuselage and cockpit parts ....
.... a closer look on the left fuselage half. There are not as many rivets on fuselage and wings as on the Edu kit .....
.... some cockpit parts .....
..... sprue B with the wing parts. The 6 holes on each underside are for the rockets, but I don't think there were rockets on early Hellcats, so I closed them with glue and flour ....
.... a closer look to an upper wing .....
.... sprue D with the interesting parts for folded or unfolded wings ....
.... the underside of the fuselage with the wheel wells. Here I have also closed the unnecessary holes for the bomb racks as my Hellcat gets only the drop tank ....
.... here you have to decide how you want your wings. Parts 5 and 10 are for folded, parts 6 and 9 for unfolded wings .....
.... sprue E with parts for gear, engine, prop, drop tank and the not need stuff .....
.... sprue F with the intrument panel and exhaust pipes plus the cowling ....
.... sprues H and J with all clear parts which look fine and are packed in an extra bag ....
.... let's have a short look on the building intructions. At step 4 you can see the differences for the 2 ways of the wings ....
.... now we come to the important things - the decals! There are 2 versions and the decals are well printed, thin and glossy. Decals 45-49 are the "tapestry" for the cockpit which is a good idea on one side, but as they are glossy it makes it not so funny .....
.... the painting intructions are a bit tricky if you just follow them. Version 1 is an aircraft of VF-27. To me it seems as if there are no other nose arts than this angry "what ever it is". Why does everybody has these decals in the standard box (also Hase and Edu)? And can anyone tell me why HB think the upper wing colour is Intermediate Blue? Well .... if they like it that way ....
.... the 2. version is more interesting for me in its early twotone scheme of VF-9. But here comes another mistake by HB as they simply paint the underside white ....
When I paint my Helli it will get Blue Grey FS 36118 on the upperside and Light Grey FS 36440 on the underside. I think that looks better ....
If you compare this kit with Edu and Hase you will also find light and shade here. No doubt, the folded wings are a big advantage to the other kits. For me the biggest mistake are the machine guns, which are completly missing. The Hobbybosses must have had a very deep sleep here
But fortunatly Evergreen Profiles can help us out. The price of 16 Euros here is also no argument to buy the kit, as Edu sells its Weekend kit for just 1,50 Euro more. I think this kit is no real competitor for Edu (this is just my own private opinion!). I know this doesn't sound nice to the ears of the chinese guys, but when I look on these great Wildcat kits from the same manufacturer, I can only say that.
Finally, if you prefere a german version of all this, I can recommend my "Bausatzvorstellung" at the Flugzeuforum. It's a bit more detailed as my german is a little better than my english ....
http://www.flugzeugforum.de/forum/showthread.php?t=56495Cheers
Torsten
Im a bit of an early Hellcat fiend and ive been waiting for this one.As for the Tamiya comment - ive just started Hobby Bosses early Wildcat and Tamiya could learn a thing or two from that kit. Cant wait to build this baby with its wings folded.
Senior Editor
yes, I could do that, but please remember I'm just an average builder who builds always oob with no extras and no weathering. 
The rockets must be for an future F6F5 kit. As stated above the 5 had a slightly different wing than the 3 to cope with the rockets etc. I will buy one of these for sure just for the wing fold but i am also converting a Hasegawa 5 to a post war drone using Alley Cats decal sheet. They make for a colorful kitty that for sure.
I again noticed that yesterday in Bühl.
