Darren Baker takes a look at one of the latest releases from Hobby Boss in the form of the A-6A Intruder in 1/48th scale.

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Thanks!

Darren,
Thanks for a really excellent and well detailed review. I'm currently building their A-6E offering, which is basically the same kit plus some added parts, and the TRAM version, while being a planned additional release, all the parts are included in the kit, just not on the instructions.

I found the landing gear landing gear with it's white metal cores to be exceeding stonge, and very well detailed. They're basically little mini kits. The only issue that will take some time is the clean up of the halve joints. Polishing the white metal produces perfect oleos. They look fantastic.

I did encounter fit issues with the fuselage major parts, which took considerable work to blend in correctly. Just takes time, but the end results are worth it. I closed up the radome rather then having it open to expose the detailed radar assembly. Unfortunately, I glued up the radome separately, then glued it to the fuselage, which created a lot of extra work. The better option would have been to glue each half to the proper fuselage half, resulting in a better fit with much less blending work.

Cockpit detail is excellent, although I added details to the rear deck, and replaced the seat with MK7's from Wolfpack.

I opted not to fold the wings as I wanted to extend the slats, and lower the flaps. The A-6 series uses Flaperons rather then Ailerons which are computer controlled. The kit instructions have them in the up position if you drop the flaps. After many conversations with a 12 year A-6 Crew chief, they would be in the down position in a pre-flight condition.

As you recommended, I left all the landing gear off till after painting out of fear of damaging the parts.

The Hobby Boss kit after a few months of work,is building up to a spectacular model with much effort.

Joel

Nice Review, Darren. An A-6 could be something for me ! Should be interesting how the Hobbyboss Intruders compare with the ones
from Kinetic

Thank you for the feed back gents.

Joes does it need the nose to be waited to avoid a tail sitter? I ask as I could not find any data in the instructions.

If you have any good reference for detail painting the interior other than 'paint it black', it will be most helpful.

Nice review Darren.

But £50 on a mainstream kit, allowing "wriggle-room" to add extras? - I may take issue with you there. £50 is a hefty investment, beyond the pockets of many of us these days (that's a lot of weeks' worth of food...). And to think, when I was a kid, this was a pocket-money hobby.

All the best

Rowan

Sorry Rowan I guess I got accustomed to 'target' kits running in this ball park figure and higher.

Daren,
I used more then a oz of weight glued in the radome. When I 1st tested for the balance point with just the fuselage and wings tacked on, it seemed like it needed just a little bit of weight. But as I taped the intakes and exhausts, and the pylon stations, it became a tail sitter. I'm pretty sure that the 1 oz is enough to keep it on it's gear.

As far as the color of the cockpit, it's a Darkish Gull Gray. I opted for a custom mix of Tamiya acrylics to make Gull gray, as I figured that with some oil washes, and the cockpit closed up or under glass, it will be a few shades darker.

Here's few pictures of the real deal, and my cockpit.

Joel

Thank you Joel

Hi Darren

Call me "old school", but I err a bit on the lower side. £50 remains a premium price for me - expected for some short run kits where it's marginal whether the producer will actually even manage to cover their costs - but for mainstream 1:48 kits of this size? It's a major outlay for many modellers.

Always at the back of my mind is my late-father's despairing reaction when I spent 10 shillings (50p) on the latest Airfix or Revell kit kit back in the early '70s: "You spent how much on six penny-worth of plastic!?"

All the best

Rowan

I also remember those days Rowen, but I was lucky as my Nan worked for Airfix and one of my Aunts worked for Hornby.

Hi Darren

I imagine you weren't short of friends at school - amongst the modellers for sure! I hope you managed to keep a test-shots and specials on one side for a rainy day...?

All the best

Rowan