Hasegawa 1/48 Junkers Ju-88A-4

HASEGAWA (DRAGON) 1:48 JUNKERS JU-88A-4
'INBOX Review'

Reviewer: Trevor Boxall (rec.models.scale)

I recently scored the Hasegawa Ju-88 A-4 in quarter scale and was looking forward to ripping the shrinkwrap off to expose Hasegawa tooling at its finest. Imagine my disappointment when the plastic looked... well short of new tooling standards... and that lead me to believe it was a reboxing of some sort. After some research I discovered it was indeed a reboxing of the Dragon kit. The whole box is in Japanese so I figured that it must have been reboxed for the Japanese market only and by some importing weird sequence of events I have managed to get my hands on it! Typical.

Boxart for the Dragon boxing

Inside the box are lots of small sprues inextricably linked by small sprue attachments, leading me to think it was only a few big sprues originally, broken down into smaller ones to fit inside the box? I am also inclined to believe that the couple of larger sprues are common to the Ju-88/188 family and the smaller ones are all included in the various boxings of different versions, so the same basic mold can be used and Hasegawa (Dragon) get their moneys worth from one set of tooling. Anyway the moldings are of good quality and it is clear this kit will keep you occupied for some time - not because of poor fit (which I haven't really tested) but there are quite a few parts and some fiddly small bits.

Instructions are what I can only describe as a combination between typical Hasegawa and Dragon - they fold out in the stock standard Hasegawa affair with all the notations etc you expect to see but the sketches are boxed and I assume copied from Dragon?

The main breakdown of components is pretty stock standard with main fuselage halves, gear doors, wheels and cockpit interior contained on the first main sprue. The cockpit is reasonable with seat, stick, instrument panel and raised instrumentation detail provided. The nose gunner/observer/bombadier is also given a bombsight and seat. Four small sprues cover the props, wheels, more gear covers and underwing pylons. Canopies for the cockpit and glazing are all separate and look well molded with the rear canopy section broken into halves. Forward fuselage halves, fin + rudder, tailplanes, airbrakes are contained on another sprue which appears to be specific for this particular version. There's not much in the way of stores other than a pair of SC500 bombs are provided for the underwing racks.

Version options are two and the decal sheet is produced by Hasegawa, thick and glossy and I would suspect will go on very well, with some stencilling provided. Both schemes wear RLM 70/71/65. The first example is 5K-FN 5. KG3 containing yellow fuselage bands, lower cowlings and red spinners, while the second is A6-HH I. KG30 with yellow wingtip undersides and white ship markings on the fin.

Looks good in the box and I am sure it will build into a nice model. On a separate note I have heard that Revell have released an A-4 in this scale and it is also reportedly a reboxing of this Dragon kit.

Related Reviews:-

Dragon 1/48 Ju-88G-1/10

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