What is up with the Hasegawa 1/32 Mustang?

i got nothing to say apart from - thanks ! cos i was pretty close to getting that kit.

......typical Hog-a-sawa.....
fineite detail......terrible fit.........
aaaaaahhhhh......the modeller's blues.....

That kit is actaully older than sin!
Hase have started to re tool their 1/32nd scale stuff with the 109's and 190's first.
with no other decent 32nd kits available I would imagine the 51 may be next.
I recently bought a Spit Mk II to find that the fuselage had raised panel lines with the wings engraved - so the 51 if re-tooled may be a 50/50 affair

No, Rik.........
It's NOT typical of Hasegawa (note the spelling, you silly little man)........in my experience, I've found their kits better than most......but the molds for the braille scale models may very well have been cut many years ago - before the advent of seriously accurate CNC mills that can make all the difference between a great model and a waste of money.
I've got a fair number of fairly late release Hasegawa kits and have found them to fit quite well - not quite Tamiya type fit, but definately not a waste of money.

The Hasegawa P-51D is an old tool that has been reissued several times. Fit wasn't that great when it was new & wear & tear has probably made it worse. With the resurgence of 1/32, it's only a matter of time before Hasegawa or Trumpeter release a new tool version. Modern tooled kits from Hasegawa mostly feature very good fit and detail.

Regards, Rick

Check- Thanks for the Heads UP! Ie got that kit sitting in the inventory with Verlindin aftermarket resin details and a Squadron Klear Conopy waiting for build. I was considering attempting to practice Bare Metal Foil applictaion on that one in prep for my F86 and Mig 15 builds. Theres a nice checker tail finished hee on the forum very nice. I hate hearing about bad fits, putty and filling ! I have a Revel P40E with a elclertic motor I installed inside the allison engine, works nice, buts its semi-permently stalled waiting seam smoothing, filling, sanding and filling too.

This is one of those kits:


I decided not to do the checkertail version though. Yes, most of the seams needed work. Especially around the nose. Put the back half together and let it dry fully. Then put the wings on, let set fully, then put the nose together without the engine or it's cover on. You'll need to cut off the cover braces. Then, put engine in and put cover on. This procedure worked well for me. You'll need some filler shim's infront of the manifold behind the spinner. But with patance you'll get a great looking bird.

P.S. I also drilled out the holes in the nose screen's.

Hey Tim,

Interesting technique on the engine installation. What I did was assemble the engine and firewall/oil tank per the instructions. I scratch built a lot of detail in the engine compartment. I added micro shims to the engine cover to fill all the gaps, the engine cover drops on now and fits like a glove, and yes I shimmed behind the spinner as well. I used Tenax on the upper wings, installing them first, then installed the lowers working around with the Tenax. Finally, blending in the lower wing and fiselage joiner (HUGE FIT UP ISSUES HERE). I'll post some progress pics next weekend. I used PE for the nose screens. MGTAYLOR, this would not be a good project for BMF application unless you are an expert. Swanees checkertail you are referring to is not the 1/32nd kit.

crockett - if this is the checkertail you mean, it was mine. Swanny's NMF aircraft, posted at about the same time, was a P-47.
http://www.finescale.com/fsm/community/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=28427

Hey Steve,

I used a resin cockpit interior. I wasn't happy with the kits. It added alot of detail, and I was able to narrow enough to allow a good fit. I started with the kits firewall/oil tank, but wound up not worrying about the fit. I'm more concerned about the exterior fit rather than the interior fit. I did try to keep the engine bay "whole" by just setting the motor in the bay loose while fitting the nose bottom together. I wound up having to use a piece of styrene on the inside of the bottom nose seam. That was very weak!!!!

But I do think the kit should be redone to "modern" standards. It could be an awesome showpiece then.

This kit is almost 30 years old! Can you remember what you were doing 30 years ago? People were driving Ford Pintos remember. Well it is true that it is a shame that hasegawa did not retool it yet and has been remolding it constantly since the 70's. As I remember it it fit ok back then but 800,000 units later the mold is probably shot. Or maybe I was not picky about the fit when I was a kid. I hope Hasegawa or Trumpeter is prepairing a new mold. If you want a very accurate p-51 in large scale go for the 1/24 Trumpeter kit, it's big but nice. I got one after playing around with the 1/32 revell P-51 and the Hasegawa and even purchased the otaki (it has scribed lines but still sucks) I gave up and went 1/24. Same with the spitfire. Maybe Panda will get off it's a** and do the one they announced 2 yrs ago. Ha ha ha ha

Tim,

Good info in your post. Don't get me wrong, I am enjoying the build, you know, thinking out of the box and coming up with workable solutions to all the issues, even though I am whining a lot. When I get done, it will be a nice horse. I too had to use styrene to tie the engine in place, there is no mounting gusset molded into the fuselage to secure the engine. I decided to go all out on the interior detail. I used the resin cocpit also. I ordered the placard cockpit detail set and used it with the resin set, to add realism. I've heard other guys struggle with the width of the resin cockpit, as far as joining the fuselage halves. It was weird, but I didn't have to narrow it on this build. Oh well on to the gun bays!

Steve

The Hasegawa kit ain’t bad for its time.Verlinden has a resin cockpit set for it.The rest can be modified by scratchbuilding.The Aries engine set fits the kit w/ little surgery.I wiped out the tamiya 1/32 P-51d at a contest one time.Tamiya took 3rd place .It can be done.A 1/32 Tamiya f4u cosair went down against my Trumpeter f4u-1d.All older models can be great again.