1/35 CH-47A Chinook from Trumpeter By Glen Martin IPMS #38082

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Initial Impressions: The kit is the Trumpeter CH-47A Chinook. The kit retails I think for around $129.00 at our local hobby store, Chesterfield Hobbies. If you get this kit, there are some things to consider and to remember. First and foremost is that this kit is huge!!!! This injection, molded kits comes with some photo etched in seat belts and mesh screens, white metal landing gear and real rubber tires. Fit: The fit is really not all that bad. The fuselage comes in four halves, two for the front half (just before the front of the engines, the hull is two pieces on either side. So, you have to join the two side pieces together for the front and back and then join the two fuselage halves together. I used Ambroid Pro-weld (liberally) on that joint and let them setup over night. The next day, she was good to go. There are a few issues with a few holes you have to open in the nose of the fore-rotor housing, right above the pilot and co-pilot seats. Don't forget to open them.

The rear of the helo where the access ramp is located, the "tongue" (that's the part that slides down into the access ramp is not meant to recess down into the ramp) is not meant to retract into the ramp which is in error on Trumpeter’s part. I have verified this with an Army Captain that has spent many hours in one of these helicopters. There is a strip of plastic that blocks that. There are I-beam pieces to simulate steel channels that the tongue slides along on for a rail system when the tongue is retracted and those I-beam pieces are only one inch in length so you'll have to modify the tongue if you want it to be correct. I just elected to pose the

tongue in the "up" position.

The halves of the fuselage do not fit properly and some gentle test fitting, and gluing, a little at a time

will make this go easier. Some places touch in the seam area, some had about a 1/16 inch of a gap. But to get to this point where you join the halves together to seal up the fuselage, you have to build out the flight deck.

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Cockpit: The cockpit comes with Photo-Etched seat belts (about 8 pieces for two seats). These are beautifully detailed. The seats are a job, not bad, just tedious. The instrument panel is the real beauty. You get an acetate film part with the instrument dials and you have to paint the clear glass part black so the acetate dials can be viewed through the dials. What I did was to take Elmer’s white glue and a small pointed brush to deliver white glue into those dial faces on the clear part, painting on a mask to cover the openings that would not be painted when I spray painted the instrument panel clear part. Paint the base part of the instrument panel part gloss white, allow to dry and then put the acetate file down followed by the now black painted instrument panel. When you are finished doing that, hit each dial with future and you will be amazed at how well it looks. The instrument console between the pilot and co-pilot is richly

detailed with raised surfaces that beg to be highlighted with gel writer pens. The cyclic and

control sticks are nice and the foot pedals are awesome when you look through the clear part of the canopy flooring. Rest of the cabin and flight deck: This was the chore. Behind the pilot's head lies a shelf of instruments and electronics that are painted black. If you paint these and dry brush them, they can only be seen through the rear end of the loading ramp. Paint the insides of the fuselage medium grey BEFORE installing the clear circular cabin windows. Add color by doing the fire extinguishers in red and putting them on the bulkhead in the front of the cabin and at the rear. As for the cabin

itself, it's not bad. The floor mounts to the bottom of the fuselage. I installed the circular cabin windows with Ambroid pro-weld (carefully I might add because this stuff crazes clear parts awfully bad). I just lay in a clear window and let some capillary action take effect by applying a small amount of Ambroid with a brush. Resist the temptation to press the window into the mount. If you do, melted plastic will ooze out the other side

at the window fairing. In hindsight, I wished I had pre-painted the window fairings (The outside window circle frames in the fuselage) Olive Drab first before putting in the windows. Because I didn't do this, I had to hand paint the inside of the fairings with the clear parts in place and this was difficult to not get sloppy with the paint.

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With the windows in place, install the completed cabin floor, the ceiling and put the fuselage halves together. This will leave you with a nasty seam right underneath the rear rotor transmission housing to deal with. I added a one inch strip of sheet stock from the end of the crew ramp ceiling to the hole for the Auxiliary Hydraulic exhaust hole. These Chinooks had a transmission drip pan and you can "hide" the seam this way and add realism to the inside. But take care in painting this area. Pre-paint the crew area first before you join the halves of the fuselage because you can't get your airbrush up in there to paint! Sure, you can

paint what you can hit but the recessed area at the end of the helicopter is difficult to hit with an airbrush. There are photo etched screens, five of them if memory serves me correctly. They have to be

installed and the area inside of these screens painted before you join the fuselage halves together. If not, you'll look inside through the screens and see bare plastic! Join the fuselage halves together with a liquid cement and let set overnight. Once you do this, the next day, fill the remaining gaps with gap filling super glue. You'll have to do this because the seams will not touch each other. After doing this, fill with a filler agent and sand flush. I used Orange Bondo body glazing putty. Rotors: Oh boy. These are very delicate in nature with lots of parts and are a real challenge. The top of the rotor heads do not accept the rotor pins all that well. The rotor pins come in two halves. It is best to set the rotors, at the rotor head and apply some Ambroid. Let this set overnight to rock hard. Then, come back, add the other half of the rotor pin with

Ambroid, let this set overnight. Then, 48 hours later, dry fit the top portion of the rotor head on the bottom portion.

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You will see that there are no connections to support the rotor pins. I had to add sheet stock!!! Then, you have the business with the nasty seam to clean up; fill with putty, sand the paint. Be careful, they are fragile. Notice that the forefront rotor rotates in a counter-clockwise rotation and the rear-rotor rotates in a clockwise fashion. Leave the rotors out of the helicopter as you can add and remove these for transit. Besides, no one will be lifting up your Chinook if they are wise anyway. Canopy: The canopy is too wide by about a 16th of an inch: and it's one piece, a real green house of a canopy. I dipped mine in future before painting. That was tricky as the future kept settling on the bottom of the part and it wanted to stick to the surface it was sitting on to dry. I kept moving it around so it would not "freeze" in place on the table. Let this

set for at least three days because that amount of future will take a long time to setup rock hard.

Then, mask the panes of glass individually with bare metal foil. Cut them out with a number 11 blade and shoot medium grey as your base metal

primer coat that you can see by looking into the canopy from the outside, then shoot the olive drab on top of that. Once this dries, shoot with an acrylic flat coat. Let dry for 8 hours. Then, come back and remove the foil where the green house panes are located. Remove the bare metal foil glue residue with some “Goo-Gone” available at any local Lowe’s improvement center or Home Depot. Mask off with bits of Tamiya tape and shoot highly diluted Tamiya Clear Green to get the green effect. Let this set for awhile and then remove the tape. What you will have will be a beautifully done

canopy. Attach with Elmer’s white glue and fill as needed around the canopy edging where it touches the front of the fuselage. Decals: They are very fine decal and honestly set up in about 15 seconds so be careful in your alignment right off the bat when you slide it from the paper backing. I used the Micro-sol/set solution and I had about 15 seconds before these decals started to "melt" onto the surface. The rams head on the front above the canopy is a rather long decal. Be careful. I partially ripped mine but didn't tear it all the way through. Landing gear: This is a nice touch in being white metal and very sturdy. Trumpeter really called this one right. These parts have a seam that you can only clean up with a flexi-file. Assemble these with CA and when you have the wheel axles lined up so they are straight, hit with CA accelerator to set them. The wheels have a unique "5 line and 6 line" tread pattern. You have to count this out. These treads are actual rubber. Paint the hubs OD and then slide the treads on. It can't get any easier than that. Since you are dealing with 4 sets of landing gears, put 3 on first and set them in place with CA. The 4th, put on CA and set the copter down on a mirror flat base and adjust that last landing strut to touch the base. That's the only way to get something this large to where all the landing gear struts will be in position to allow all the wheels to touch.

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External framing on port side: None of the directions will give you a reference for a "joining" cross member piece unless you go to the internet to see reference photos. I simulated this with strips of sheet stock. Glue these in place once you have the extenders lined up by using Ambroid to give you time to align them. Once you have run the sheet sock to give the effect that all of them are connected, paint in place. You'll love the effect and it will add realism to the model. Painting: Tamiya Acrylics, OD paint straight from the bottle. Add a few drops of black to give scale effect darker color. Panel line highlight with black, panel paint with base color, add few drops of Neutral grey to base color to give faded panel effects and feel liberal to apply shading this way. Once completed, Panel streak with Windsor and Newton artist oils and Ronson lighter fluid to give a rained out streaky weather beaten effect. Engine nacelles: Beyond a doubt, the hardest part of the

build. Each engine had something like 5 or 6 pieces of photo-etched metal mesh screens to glue in. The leading part of the engine covering is especially tricky as you have very little plastic to glue together. Besides this, you have a fairing that comes out the fuselage that goes into the front of the mesh screen and that fit is awful. Use Mr. Surfacer to fill the gaps and remove excess with q-tip moistened with 91% alcohol. Add this in layers and remove as needed. Once you have the screens halfway built and not attached yet, build the engines. I used 4 different shades of Alclad. Magnesium, Steel on the engine body and burnt metal and jet exhaust on the exhaust cans. Those are tricky. Very thin and when you join the halves, you'll have a seam to get rid of and if you don't, have these seams show up under the Alclad for sure. Put the completed engine (minus the exhaust cans even though the directions show it otherwise) into the engine housing and put the top of the engine housing cover on them. You'll have to use a file if you do this with the housings attached to the fuselage first, my recommendation is to construct the engine housings with them off the fuselage and then add to the copter. Then carefully attach the screens on the front. Remember to pre-paint the screens before you join them or you will get overspray on the engines and then you can't do anything about this.

I recommend the kit or an advanced aircraft modelers due to the scale and complexity of the kit.

One last thing….. On the bottom of the front fuselage, there are two rotating search/approach lights that lower and swivel in real life. I put in MV lenses in each of these to add the effect of having real lights. They can be purchased from Chesterfield Hobbies in Midlothian, VA.

Have at it and have a good time. Time to build from cracking the box was a fast paced 18 days.

Overall Rating:

Molding: 5 Instructions: 5

Detail: 4 Decals: 4

Fit: 2 Clear Parts: 5

Accuracy: 3 Photo-etch Parts: 5

Ease of Assembly: 2

RATING SCALE Excellent 5

Very Good 4

Average 3

Fair 2

Poor 1 Value: 3.9

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