HobbyBoss

1/72 A-7A Corsair II

Kit Number: HY87201

Reviewed by  Jim Pearsall, IPMS# 2209

MSRP: $28.99 Imported by Squadron/MMD ( www.squadron.com ) Background: Our chapter (IPMS Craig Hewitt, Phoenix) is helping out the Commemorative Air Force in Mesa, AZ by building display models for their hangar. The idea is that the club will provide built models, the CAF will provide a place to display them, give us some publicity, and we get to have our annual ModelZona contest in a really spiffy location. Larry Grapentine bought the HobbyBoss A-7 for the project, then got into the process of moving, trying to sell a house, go to work, and see his family occasionally. So he asked if I would build the kit. I asked Dave Morrissette if he'd like a review. Dave said he'd love to see one, so here we go. The Kit: The kit contains 6 grey sprues and 2 clear, plus decals. There are electronics bays and a pretty complete weapons load, but the CAF wants the models kept simple to reduce maintenance, so these weren't done. The cockpit is nice, with decals for panel and consoles, and the wheel wells have good detail. The intake trunk looks good. The panel lines are clean and recessed, as you would expect from a 21st Century plastic kit. Accuracy: I did some research for this review, and read a review that said that the HobbyBoss A-7 has different fuselage shape and length from the Fujimi kit. Yes, it does. It also differs in both from the Hasegawa A-7 and the Italeri A-7. And none of these agree with the other three. In a further attempt to figure this out, I scanned drawings from Scale Aircraft Modeling, Profile 239, the Squadron/Signal A-7 and the Aircam Sharkmouth Special. None of THESE agreed on length or shape either.

Fujimi vs Hasegawa                   HobbyBoss vs Hasegawa

At this juncture, I gave up. It looks much more like an A-7A than any other aircraft you care to name, including the F-8 Crusader. In a display case, no one will get within 2 feet of it anyway. Build: The parts were flash-free, and came off the sprues pretty well. I had to use the fine grit sanding stick to get the little nubs off from the sprue connections, but this is to be expected. Parts fit pretty well, with the exception of the wing top and bottom. The parts fit together well, but when I attached the wings to the fuselage I found that the tight fit of the wing bottom forced the wing top to not mate with the fuselage, leaving a considerable gap. I tried cutting the mating surface back on the bottom, but wound up just puttying the joint. The wheels and landing gear fit well, and the result is a strong joint. Even when I hit the top of the plane during decaling, all I did was knock one of the wheels off, easily fixed. Painting and Markings: Painting was greatly simplified by the 4-view drawings. The other side of the sheet shown is the marking scheme I used. Color callouts were with Mr. Color, but the instructions had an addendum giving Testors Humbrol, and FS 595 callouts.

Decals went on nicely, even with the large tail markings. I did have a problem with the intake warnings, as they didn't want to fit over the A-7A's openings for the twin nose guns. Letting them set up some and then slitting the decal with a #11 blade, followed by decal solvent took care of this. I also was a little miffed that I missed the fact that the under wing "star & bar" is covered at both ends by the under wing pylons. Again the #11 blade made it good. Overall Evaluation: A good kit for the money. There was a fit issue, but you can now bypass this, since you can learn from my problem. Additionally, I wasn't always in tune with the instructions, which give you 3 steps for the entire build. The detail stuff was better than anyone else's, unless you want to pay for an add-on electronics bay. If there are shape issues, I'm not going there. The only way to really tell is to personally take a photo of a real A-7A, and take a photo of your model from the same angle, and compare them on a light table. Thanks to Larry for providing the model.

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