Academy HH-46D

Yeah, I got mine the other day.

It has the same rotor heads and blades (which I suspect have some shape issues) as the E. It comes with two types of  engine intake screens, the "witches tit" style and the longer style which were essentially long cylindrical screens covered with a porous foam type material which were designed to filter out sand and small debris, These were used prior to the EAPS systems as used on some Ds and Fs.

The fuselage is NOT that of a CH-46D though, it has the cooling vents for the avionics shelf on the forward end of the left hand side of the fuselage just under the forward pylon,(this feature first appeared on CH-46Fs) The guns are bogus as are the brass and link collection bags for each gun (the semi circular blob of plastic that the instructions would have you place under each gun) The interior needs to be reworked and there aren't any provisions for the set up of the cargo hook. I haven't seen the Cobra interior set up close but from the photos on their web site it looks like this set will help immensely especially if a person wanted to put  M-2s in it.

It is a good kit, but could have been great, and could have been built in a wider range of markings had earlier rotor heads and blades been tooled for it. In order to model any of the CH-46Ds or CH-46Fs as used by the Marine Corps in the 60s and 70s into the early 80s some modification will be required to get the shape of the blades and rotor heads right.

Basically what you have with this kit is a CH-46F that comes with fiberglass blades and accompanying rotor heads plus an external rescue hoist.

Jonathan Primm

I'm not worrying about what I call "minor stuff". I am just looking forward to building one of the few NICE helicopters in that scale!

Just compared it and the E towards the Italeri SH-60B, and they are FAR superior, even with minor issues.

Just like that F-16 from Academy I suppose. I'm just in it for the enjoyment of the build anyways!

But cheers.

Winnie;

I didn't intend discourage you from building this kit. Also, it was not my intent to "slam" the kit as being anything less than what it is. As I mentioned, this is a GOOD kit and a subject that has been long neglected in this scale. I was very pleasantly surprised when the "E" was released as tandem rotor helicopters aren't  generally considered to have the "cool" factor (i.e. something with guns, bombs, missles or rockets can be piled onto it) that many modelers are looking for.

My intent was to offer an honest, accurate assessment of what comes in the box based on the experience I have on this type of aircraft.

Jonathan Primm

I guess I jumped the gun too. Apologies.

Anyways, I find that most of the time (I go to some other forums as well) there seems to be ravings about what I generally refer to as substandard kits, and slammings of the newly released kits of wanted subject matter. I know, I should not put anything into it, but there we go!

I thought it was a fine model (we agree on that!) and I particularily enjoy the colorful paint schemes of the two base-flight birds. I originally built hobby crafts HH-46 D as the base rescue from Whidbey Islan, Engine gray and red/orange! Very nice, just glad they have them out now in the larger scale.

Now if only eduard would catch on sooner...

Yes they are good kits, I have two of the Es and just got a pair of the Ds through Squadron. The Fujimi kits were light years ahead of the old Airfix release (Even the Lee knock off of the Fujimi was better than the Airfix bowser) and can result in some very nice representations even for 1/72nd scale.

I've got plans to try to coerce an F and a D out of the two Ds that I have...Bu Nos 154831 a CH-46D that I crewed while with HMM-164 and 157703 a CH-46F that I crewed while with HMM-162

Jonathan Primm