HobbyBoss TBD-1 Devastator (81783) 1:48

[Mike]

TBD-1 Devastator (81783)

1:48 HobbyBoss via Creative Models Ltd

 

 

The TBD-1 Devastator was an interwar design for a torpedo bomber that first flew in 1935 and entered service two years later during the “Yellow wing” phase of American Naval aviation, and although a capable aircraft when it first arrived, it was outclassed almost as soon as the Americans entered WWII with only around 130 being procured for use by the US Navy. It was a slow-moving target, and not the most manoeuvrable, which although it performed quite well in its first uses against the Japanese at the Battle of Coral Sea, subsequent attacks during the Battle of Midway suffered heavy losses with no torpedo hits, reducing a force of forty-one aircraft to only six that landed back on deck after the attack, and after that sad but heroic sacrifice of squadron VT-8 during Midway, the Devastator was soon withdrawn from active duty with fewer than 40 airframes still left in existence by that time, none of which survive today.

 

The design was modern at a time when most of its competitors were biplanes, and it won its competition against several such designs that look incredibly archaic by comparison.  The Devastator had an all-metal construction using corrugated sheets to add strength whilst keeping weight down, with monoplane wings that could be folded to save stowage space below deck.  It also had retractable landing gear to reduce drag, and was crewed by three – the pilot, radio operator/rear gunner, and the bombardier in the centre, his seat allowing him to slide into the prone position under the pilot’s location that allowed him to aim via a window in the floor.  Crew protection was poor for the time, which was magnified by its low speed and lack of agility to evade incoming fire, thanks in part to the low power output of the Twin Wasp engine and its high all-up weight.  Their successors, the TBF Avenger suffered similar high-levels of attrition until air superiority was achieved, by which time the remaining crews had gained sufficient experience to properly coordinate their attacks against a weakened enemy.

 

 

The Kit

This is a new tooling from HobbyBoss, and is the newest kit of the type by a decade or more at time of writing.  It arrives in a top-opening box with a painting of a yellow-wing era Devastator on the lid, and inside are six sprues of differing sizes in grey styrene, a clear sprue, a fret of Photo-Etch (PE), a sheet of masking material, decal sheet, instruction booklet in grey-scale, with a glossy sheet of colour printed profiles for the decal options slipped between the pages.  Detail is good, with finely engraved panel lines and riveting, plus raised and recessed features where appropriate, a well-detailed cockpit, full depiction of the Twin Wasp engine, open or closed wings, and open or closed canopy elements, with a monolithic canopy part for the closed option.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Construction begins with the cockpit, the floor of which is a long part that has a lower tier with ribbed floor, supports and control panel added underneath.  The pilot’s position is detailed with rudder pedals and a bulkhead with various details added that separate him from the bombardier, who also has a bulkhead fitted to the rear of his section.  Another shorter bulkhead with radio gear and a D/F loop is slotted into the floor behind the two forward stations, turning the assembly around to fit crew seats to the front compartments that both have PE lap-belts applied to them, and a frame glued to the rear of the pilot’s seat before it is installed.  A stack of equipment is built from two parts and placed at the very rear of the cockpit floor, acting as the aft support for the frame that is fixed over the rear two seats, fitting a control column into the pilot’s floor along with a cylindrical part, and a roll-over A-frame with PE side skins just behind his bulkhead, plus a V-shaped brace, a square panel in the very front, a fire extinguisher behind the bombardier’s seat, and two small ribs to the sides of the machine gun recess at the rear.  The gunner’s position is finally made, starting with a recessed seat-pan with PE lap-belts and a back-rest on vertical struts, fixing a two-layer pivot to the front of the crewman, completing the circular frame around the gunner’s position.  The gun with separate twin grips is mounted to the front of the operator on a triangular fitting, setting it to one side while the starboard fuselage half is detailed.  There is substantial ribbing and other detail inside the extensive cockpit, adding a small window in the side, a hose that rises out to the sill, a small tapering wall panel under the engine cowling, then drilling two holes under the rear of the fuselage for the arrestor hook.  The port fuselage is detailed in the same manner, adding a quadrant in the pilot’s area, then creating a pair of instrument panel sections that have eight decals applied after painting, mounting them in the starboard fuselage half along with two panels (one clear window) that are fitted into the nose to create the lower view cut-out.  As the fuselage halves are brought together, a tiny tail-wheel is trapped between two pins in a fairing under the tail, taking time to wait for the glue to cure before dealing with the seams in your preferred manner.

 

The lower inner wing panels are presented as a single part that has two bays inserted before the upper inner wing halves are glued over them, both upper and lower halves partially ribbed on the outer portions.  Flipping the assembly over, an intake is made by trapping a PE mesh insert between two barrel-shaped halves, before embedding it into a recess under the starboard wing.  The main gear is made at this stage too, although most will probably leave them off until later, as this is simple to do, because they are single struts with one retraction jack moulded-in, adding another at an angle, and mounting the two-part wheels on the axles at the bottom ends.  These assemblies plug directly into sockets in the lower wing.  The inner wing is then detailed with a set of flaps that can be posed deployed or retracted by using different parts, ribs on the outer ends of the assemblies, with a choice of a two-part option for folded wings, or a simple flat part with holes in it for the in-flight option, installing the completed inner wing assembly into the underside of the fuselage.

 

 

The Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp has both banks of pistons depicted, each row made from front and rear halves, fitting a two-part intake spider at the rear, plus a cylindrical spacer at the very rear.  The exhausts have a hollow lip thanks to an insert at the tip, slotting the forward ends into holes in the back of the cylinders, attaching it to the front of the fuselage on a pair of pins, ensuring that the exhausts correspond with cut-outs in the nose bulkhead.  You then have a choice of two cowlings, one with the cooling gills open, the other closed, both moulded as single parts by using sliding moulds, so watch out for almost invisible seam-lines where the moulds join, usually on or around panel lines.  The model is inverted to add an arrestor hook under the tail on the two holes drilled out earlier, a small antenna under the trailing edge of the wing, and two doors for the bombardier’s aiming window, the two parts having lightening holes moulded into their inner faces.  The prop is moulded as one, consisting of three blades and a hole in the centre that accepts the boss to finish off the assembly, which can be slotted into a hole in the bell-housing at the front of the engine.

 

Righting the model to finish off the cockpit by installing the canopy and other detail parts has you deciding whether to open the canopy’s segments or portraying them closed.  The simplest option is the closed version, which consists of just one clear part that you insert a tubular gunsight through a hole in the windscreen, adding an eye-cup to the inside once it is in position.  The instructions are a little confused here, as it shows the forward aerial mast mounted on the nose, two PE parts added to the coaming in front of the pilot, two layers of glazing between the bombardier and gunner’s positions, and the gun compartment doors either closed, or open using two parts.  It doesn’t mention that if you opt for a closed cockpit, those two glazing panels will interfere with the fit of the canopy and the open gun doors, so bear that in mind and test-fit everything before you apply glue.  For the open option, the separate windscreen has the tubular sight inserted before it is glued to the front of the cockpit opening, fitting another four sections over the front two seats, but you’ll need to check your references if you aren’t sure how they should look.  The rear canopy part is slid forward over the two sections glued earlier, so you’ll probably want to have the gun compartment doors open to make your model ready for action.

 

 

HobbyBoss have included a sheet of pre-cut masks that are numbered on the sheet, and there is a diagram showing their locations on the instructions at this point, which will help you paint the canopy frames neatly with less effort.  I’ve not yet used these masks myself, but other than appearing a little thick, they should do the job.

 

Choices keep coming, deciding whether to deploy the wings for flight, or folded for storage.  The outer wing panels are each made from top and bottom halves, adding an aileron to the trailing edge of each one, then either fitting a simple rib with pins to the inner ends for un-folded wings, or a detailed rib with lightening holes plus two wing-fold armatures that hook into the inner wings to hold them at the correct angle.  The elevators are made from two halves, the undersides including the complete flying surface to achieve a thin trailing edge, creating a ribbed surface for the panel without the risk of sink marks that would ruin the ribbed surfaces.  Laying the model on its back again, the first option is to fit an insert in the belly that conforms to the curvature of the torpedo that is included with the model.  The torpedo is made from two halves with a two-part screw at the rear, and additional fins perpendicular to those that are moulded-in.  A box-tail is made from four PE panels that slot into each other, and fit on the rear to retard the speed of entry into the water, which could pre-detonate or destroy the Mk.13 torpedo, which was already experiencing problems that proved difficult to remedy.  The torp is lashed into the fixture by two PE straps, but it is also held in place by a pair of pins that insert into corresponding holes in the fairing.  The last part is a PE tip to the styrene pitot probe in the leading edge of the starboard wing, which gives it a three-pronged tip, with an enlarged diagram showing how it should be bent to shape.  To load your Devastator with bombs, a flat insert is installed in the belly instead, slinging three-part bombs on either side of the insert on short shackles.  The diagram for this option shows the model with folded wings, in case you needed extra information on how the folded wings should look.

 

 

Markings

There are two decal options on the sheet, but as usual with HobbyBoss there is no information offered on the location, period or pilots of the options, but the fuselage codes should allow the intrepid modeller to find out the back-story if you feel the need.  From the box you can build one of the following:

 

 

 

Decals aren’t always the strongest part of HobbyBoss’s kits, but here the register, sharpness and colour density seem to be of good quality, although there aren’t many stencils.  There are however multi-coloured tip decals for the prop blades to make that task easier if you opt for the yellow-wing decal choice.

 

 

Conclusion

From the box this looks to be a good-looking model of the type, and the detail is certainly present, as are the options for open or closed canopy and wings that should show off your work.  The open bombardier’s window is a nice option that isn’t always present on models of this aircraft.

 

Highly recommended.

 

 

Review sample courtesy of

 

 

[georgeusa]

Excellent review of this kit.  However, I can't really see if it is an improvement over the Great Wall kit of the Devastator floatplane that came out a few years ago.  It looks very nice.  Thanks for the review.

[Mike]

1 hour ago, georgeusa said:

However, I can't really see if it is an improvement over the Great Wall kit of the Devastator floatplane that came out a few years ago.  It looks very nice

I wish I could find my GWH kit, for the exact same reason, but it's buried somewhere near me, and I can't see it for looking.  I'm of the same impression of this kit too, so it's a conundrum wrapped in an enigma

[georgeusa]

I'll try and break it out tonight and compare the sprues to what you show online and give you an update.

[georgeusa]

I do know the cost of the Great Walls kit was higher than what is currently being asked for the Hobby Boss version.  There is about $10.00 difference.

[k7rkx]

Just to chime in (and I'm by no means an expert), I would think the box structure on the torpedow on the VT-6 option would n/a as I "think" that is a wartime modification.

 

Also, if modelling a VT-8 aircraft at Midway, then an SBD type twin mg mount would be required (again, I "think"!)

Edited September 25 by k7rkx

[Matt B]

I was curious to see Hobby Boss drop this after I stocked up on GWH TBDs earlier this year.  In the process of building a GWH kit right now I'm not sure I see much improvement either (just looking at the sprues), but the main thing Hobby Boss has going for it is availability.  The GWH kits are getting hard to come by, especially the non float versions.  You can still find them if you look hard enough, but most major retailers and hobby shops have been out of stock for awhile, so for those wanting a modern kit of a 1/48 TBD, Hobby Boss has the most readily available kit right now.