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Tamiya SH-60 Seahawk - Interesting kit from the Tamiya works...


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Hello Chaps,

          Fresh off the back of the Merlin, I've now started a 1/72 SH-60 Seahawk with the aspiration of making a shelf of ASW helicopters - perhaps the most exciting, dynamic and cinematic of all the world's aircraft...

 

          Anyhow, I found a brand new Tamiya SH-60 Seahawk for around £8 including p+p. I checked elsewhere and saw that this wasn't the sale of the century but was actually the going rate. I certainly don't want to start whining and getting negative, but I was under the impression that Tamiya were a well respected name in the industry and so this must be a good model. It arrived, it's a bit simplistic but no real problems, but the model on the box cover is not well put together at all. The doors not fitting the cockpit is just one thing which seems a little odd for a premier league company employing a professional model maker to put their best foot forwards on the box cover. There are also some pretty huge errors, well above the forgivable little things, such as the famous Blackhawk family tail rotor being at an obvious angle somehow ending up as a completely conventionally aligned tail rotor on this model. Anyhow, I set to work (doing my normal job of making a complete hash of the pre-shading!) and then got to assembling the cockpit. The picture below sums up what I'm trying to say!

 

wVAOJ7Z.jpg

 

     I'm normally happy enough to turn a blind eye to a misaligned piece here and there, but the gaps between the pieces are big enough to drive a bus through! I'm still very new to getting back into this as an adult - is this normal? Should there be a 2-3mm gap between pieces requiring modelling putty to fix, from a company like Tamiya? I appreciate that this is a very cheap and cheerful kit - it doesn't even give the aircraft's designator, so I'm left to assume it's an SH-60B - so being this cheap, I'm perfectly happy to stop whining and just get on with it, but thought I'd see what you guys think. I'd be much happier if somebody corrected me on the errors mentioned here so I could carry on being happier with the model, rather than finding out I'm right and this model is a bit naff!

Edited by wafu_vasco
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10 hours ago, Dads203 said:

The 72nd scale Tamiya aircraft are re boxed Italeri kits not Tamiya's own products, something to do with 

Tamiya distribute Italeri kits to the Japanese market I think?

 

Not 100% correct, Tamiya has a number of their own tool kits in 1/72, Spitfire, Mustang, and F-16 comes to mind. There are a lot of re-boxed Italeri kits as well, some of these will also have the Italeri logo on the box.

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26 minutes ago, S5 modeller said:

Nice work. 

Most of the italeri reboxed kits are under the Tamiya warbirds series. 

 

Matt

Thanks Matt, this one was indeed marketed under the warbirds series as you said. It's needing almost constant snips, nips and tucks with every piece. I'll get some more pictures up soon. 

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Small update on what I'm afraid is a really bad kit. I'm left wishing I'd done my research before impulse bidding site purchases! I'm still wrestling with every piece which rather than requiring filing down, normally needs glueing into place somewhere close and then adding putty in the cracks. In addition, the stock kit has a couple of problems:

 

- The instructions tell you to position the two pitot masts (only 2!?! See Merlin Mk.2 build) just forward of the main gearbox above the cockpit. This is true of some of the many, many variants of the H-60 Blackhawk/Seahawk family, but not this one. The pitot masts need cutting off and then the pitot tubes themselves are fixed to the chin windows. 

 

- The aerials along the tail boom are all incorrect, although it could be that this is an early SH-60B and some mid-life upgrade at some point resulted in the aerials moving. However, I doubt this as every picture I've found looks the same and HF aerials are very rarely moved. Five masts need to be fitted along the RHS of the fuselage and upper tail boom to facilitate the HF aerial, whilst the three aerials in the instructions need to be completely ignored.

 

- Also, ignore the model on the cover of the box which has a full 1/3 of the windscreen painted grey - the entire middle. Lookout is still as important today as it was in Orville and Wilbur's times, so funny old thing the real Seahawk allows you to look out of the window whilst flying.

 

She ain't pretty so far and I'm not optimistic for the future, but what do you expect for £8 new I guess!

 

agDTXR4.jpg

 

Edited by wafu_vasco
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11 minutes ago, Richard E said:

I've got to admire your commitment in not directing it into the nearest bin with considerable force before now.

 

 

I see all of you pros on the forums who spent literally months crafting works of art out of super expensive kits. I'm just some clueless chump with some glue and a paint brush, and a very short attention span, so I figured I might as well just see what I can come up with in a few days! 

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5 minutes ago, wafu_vasco said:

I see all of you pros on the forums who spent literally months crafting works of art out of super expensive kits. I'm just some clueless chump with some glue and a paint brush, and a very short attention span, so I figured I might as well just see what I can come up with in a few days! 

To eventually be displayed under the title "A Learning Opportunity" :) 

Edited by Richard E
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I've got the HobbyBoss Seahawk kit, #87231, which looks to be an ok kit. Never the less, if you persevere with this build I'll follow along to see how you do.  Not that many helo builds pop up on WIP.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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Quick update - apologies, not a very good photo. I'm persevering still, and have done another layer of pre-shading and base coat, followed by a dark ink wash. As another lesson to learn, I blindly followed the paint guide in the instructions and so have purchased the old US Navy paint colour rather than the current one. This is very disappointing, but perhaps the decals wouldn't have gone with the new, darker grey anyway.

 

Xdx1s28.jpg

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Doing a decent job, but that doesn't look a very good kit - is it just me, or does the nose look an odd shape?  

 

Even so, anyone who loves ASW helos MUST be a top bloke.  When do the Wessie 1 & 3 and Sea King 1, 2, 5 & 6 appear...?  German dipping Lynx?

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Thanks very much! I'm not sure on the Top Bloke accolade, but I'm very quickly having to find my feet in the pinging world after a career of dicing for pizzas and licking windows. My plan initially is to do a shelf of the world's current pingers, so with a Merlin 2 down and a Seahawk soon to be completed, I've got a Ka-27 in the post and my eye on an NH90 to complete shelf 1. There's room for a second shelf so I was wondering whether to do another four cabs, so whether that's SH, historics or boring boring AH I'm not sure yet. I never knew the Germans had a Lynx with dipping sonar! History has tragically shown just how difficult that aircraft is to hold a steady hover at night with poor references, so that's surprising to hear.

 

Right, here's where we are after today. I've added most of the rotor head and the decals. Still to go is the rotor blades, the SKASaC-esque MAD, and some more weathering/reduction of weathering in some areas. This kit has been a real battle, I wouldn't recommend it to anybody reading this! Looking at the photo below, FAAWAFU (not ex, once you're in you're always in! Unless you go crab...) I think you're right. The nose doesn't look quite Seahawk enough.It looks almost like there should be a more obvious angle between the top of the nose and the bottom of the windscreen.

 

8FfNEUa.jpg

Edited by wafu_vasco
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1 hour ago, wafu_vasco said:

...not ex-WAFU, once you're in you're always in! Unless you go crab...

Crab??  Wash your mouth out!

 

OK, let's stick to retired WAFU.  I assume the German pinging Lynx must have had a coupled auto-pilot a la Sea King / Merlin; I flew Lynx Mk.3s (as well as Sea King 5s & 6s) and there is no way I'd have even attempted a no references hover.

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Well, I reckon this is about the best I can do with sub par skills and a sub par kit. It'll do! But next time I'd rather go for a better model and a more modern USN paint scheme:

 

8PSRCrj.jpg

qPmxlwC.jpg

 

Final build in RFI:

 

Edited by wafu_vasco
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