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BAe Hawk T.2 (03852) 1:32 Revell Originally designed as a replacement to the Gnat advanced trainer by Hawker Siddeley, the Hawk first flew in 1974, and started life as a private venture, much like a number of other widely known and loved aircraft. It was designed from the beginning for the training arena with two seats, but the ability to carry offensive armament was also important both for weapons training, and for the improvement of export sales to developing nations that couldn't perhaps justify or afford a single-roled aircraft. It entered service with the RAF in 1976, only two years after its maiden flight, and has remained in service with many updates ever since. A number of variants have been developed since then, mostly for export, including single-seat light-weight fighter Mark 200, and the highly adapted T-45 Goshawk that is used by the US Navy for carrier training. The T1A was a modified version of the original Hawk that can carry weapons such as a gun-pod on the centreline, and a pair of Sidewinder Air-to-Air missiles. This type is also used by the Red Arrows with some minor modifications to carry a smoke pod instead of the gun pod. The T.2 is currently now in service in small numbers with the RAF, with a glass cockpit and improved Adour 915 engine, based on the specification of the Mk.120 and 127 used by the South Africans and Australians respectively. The T.1 is intended to leave service in 2030, but in the meantime, it still serves alongside the more modern T.2. The Kit This is a not a rebox of the earlier T.1 and Red Arrows boxing that we reviewed a mind-boggling 10 years ago, but is instead a rebox of the 1:32 Kinetic plastic, which if you’ve not seen that kit before (and I haven’t), it’s not immediately obvious. The kit arrives in one of Revell’s deeper end-opening boxes, which seems to be made of thicker cardboard to hopefully avoid the dreaded collapse in the stash. Inside are five sprues in a grey styrene, a sprue of clear parts, a fret of Photo-Etch (PE) brass, decal sheet, instruction booklet and one of those annoying safety sheets. The first thing that strikes you as you peruse the sprues is that the tail section of the fuselage is heavily riveted, a feature that was missed off from the earlier kits native Revell. The shape of the tail “hump” looks better too, although whether it will meet the approval of the purists, but a quick Google makes me think it looks OK. The inclusion of PE parts is also novel from Revell, and very welcome as the usual alternative is decals, which are two-dimensional at best. Construction begins with the instrument panels and their coamings, which are well-detailed and have decals for the various screens and buttons, which should settle down over the raised details nicely with some strong decal solution, and has a PE HUD frame into which the two clear parts fit, and a lens part drops into the coaming. The rear seater’s panel is without the HUD, and has one of the MFD screens in a black cowling where the HUD would be. The canopy is made next, which is a fairly unusual step, and this version has the det-cord canopy breakers moulded-in, but as they are raised, you won’t be able to flood them with white acrylic paint like you could the old 1:48 Airfix kit. You do get a blast screen for between the pilots, and a pair of styrene rear-view mirrors for the front of the canopy. The crew seats are identical, and made up from two halves into which the seat pad is inserted, and the headbox top with the drogue-pack moulded-in slips into the top. Then the PE belts are shown being folded and installed over a few steps, including the short groin-belt that has the push-release buckle at the top end. The two ejection seats are added to the cockpit tub after removing a small area of raised detail in the starboard rear-seater’s side console, then the HOTAS duo and some rudder pedals are added to both cockpits and finally the rear bulkhead is glued behind the rear seat using a slot and tab to align it well. A full set of intakes are included on the sprues, replicating the Y-shaped trunking seen on the real thing, stopped-up at the rear by a representation of the front fan and bullet of the Adour engine. The two trunks are joined together at the rear, and each side has half of the starter exhaust moulded into the top, which will exit through the hole on the spine later on. At the rear the exhaust trunk is fitted with a rear face of the engine and has a very slender lip, thanks to some careful moulding. These two assemblies go into the fuselage on large sturdy pegs to ensure a secure fit and minimise any movement of the parts. Before the fuselage can be closed up, the single-part nose gear bay should be painted up and inserted, and this too has some decent detail moulded-in, although little will be seen once the leg is in there and the doors have been applied. Once the fuselage halves are together and the seams dealt with, an insert is slotted in under the rear with the strakes moulded into it, and the outer halves of the intakes can be joined to the inner sections that are moulded into the trunking. The spine behind the cockpit that has separate “bunny ears” for the ram-air intakes that feed the crew air-conditioning unit is also made up, but installed much later in the build to give you adequate chance to lose it under the clutter on your desk. With the addition of a few PE aerials under the rear of the fuselage, attention diverts to the wings. The lower wing is full-span as you’d expect for a low-wing monoplane, and has a box around the gear bay apertures against which you glue the detail inserts, which removes a lot of the opportunities to get it wrong. A central insert goes over both inner bay halves, and the upper wings are glued in place, with the bay roof detail moulded into their inner surface. The completed wings are then offered up to the lower fuselage and glued in place, adding some nav-lights on the intakes, and more strakes on the fuselage beside the tail. The elevators have separate swash-plates that fit into recesses, with the tab going through them into the socket in the fuselage, then you get the option of an open or closed air-brake, being careful to check that it doesn’t prevent the aircraft from sitting square to the ground once finished. A skin attaches to the blank space over the exhaust, and some blade antennae are slotted into the fin, next to the avionics box that projects from the leading edge. The main landing gear legs are a single part, with the retraction jack added as they are inserted into the bays along with their two captive doors, and the three-part wheels, which have circumferential tread on the two-part tyres. A little link is fixed between the bottom door and the leg before they’re inserted into the bay, with the last inner bay door fitted along the centreline. The nose gear leg has a split yoke with the three-part tyre trapped between them, then it is installed with its three gear bay doors and landing light attached to the starboard door. The flaps are separate, and can be posed retracted or deployed by using the different actuator fairings, and for the extended flaps, adding the additional spacer parts that pop out to fill the gap. Another small blade antenna is glued into a recess in the trailing edge fairing on the wing underside, and a centreline tank fits into two pre-prepared holes between the main gear bays under the wing. With the model righted and standing on its own wheels, the front spine insert with the bunny-ears gets fitted, and behind it two PE grilles are inserted into recesses in the fuselage, which has a realistic centre support and twin recesses behind it to give it a 3D look. The wing is outfitted with twin fences each side, and the windscreen with canopy closed or open glues in over the cockpit. There are a ton of sensors, aerials and blade antennae around the fuselage and nose, which includes a few clear ligts, nose pitot and AoA sensors on the sides, plus a crew-step to get the crew in and out. A set of Sidewinders are included for the wingtip pylons, with the option of leaving them off and covering the mating surface with an aerodynamic cap. If you are going to use “live” Sidewinders, there are fins moulded in along the seamline, plus separate perpendicular fins to add, and an exhaust insert in the rear. For a training round the instructions tell you to remove all the fins after you make it, and the painting guide gives you painting schemes for both options. Markings The decals are printed in Italy by Cartograf, which is a guarantee of good registration, sharpness and colour density, with a thin matt carrier film cut close to the printed areas. As mentioned earlier, the seatbelts and instrument panels are also supplied as decals, although the belts are identical to each other, and will of course look a little flat once applied unless you apply them to a very thin substrate to give them some thickness. Why bother when there are some nice PE belts on the brass sheet? There are two schemes on the sheet, both in black, which is the standard scheme, although one has a special tail scheme. From the box you can build one of the following: No.4 Sqn., RAF Valley, May 2016 No.25 Sqn., RAF Valley, Mar 2020 The colours are named in a key at the front of the instruction booklet, which is handy if you don't use or have access to Revell paints, although the dreaded paint-mix requirement for the limited Revell paint range can be a little frustrating at times. The Sidewinders are mainly Barley Grey, which is a mix of two Revell colours, and is never an ideal solution, especially when so many paint manufacturers have that colour readily available from the tin. An odd faunish-orange colour is used on the lights on the intake cowling lights, which is a mixture of clear orange and clear blue. Strange. Check your references if there’s any doubt. Conclusion It’s nice to see the modern Advanced Jet Trainer (AJT) Hawk T.2 in big scale for all you big scale adherents, and the availability in a Revell box will help it reach a wider market than perhaps the Kinetic plastic would otherwise see. One workmanlike and one fancy scheme gives you a choice, but with only 28 airframes in service at time of writing, and gloss black being the standard scheme, the fancy bits are all that they have to differentiate between them. Finally, be prepared to do a little polishing of your black paint job, as that always gives a black surface more realism to my mind. Check out Ultimate’s Polishing System if you haven’t got some already. Highly recommended. Currently, Revell are unable to ship to the UK from their online shop due to recent changes in import regulations, but there are many shops stocking their products where you can pick up the kits either in the flesh or online. Revell model kits are available from all good toy and model retailers. 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