Aoshima 1/72 TA-152H1

AOSHIMA 1:72 TA-152H1

Reviewer: David Kirk (rec.models.scale)
Kit Review submitted: October 2000

Aircraft:
The Ta 152 was a derivative of the immensely successful Fw 190 family and featured a sleeker longer body, longer-span wings and pressurised cabin. Though the inline-engined Fw 190D offered considerable performance advantages over the radial-engined Fw 190A, especially at high altitude, it was clear that still greater performance enhancements could be derived from airframe revisions. Five Fw 190 prototypes were modified with Jumo 213E engines to evaluate various features of the planned Ta 152 high-altitude fighter, and in the fall of 1944 there followed four Ta 152 prototypes with the long span wing developed for the Ta 153. The production model was presaged by the Ta-152H-0 pre-production type, of which 20 were delivered from mainly Fw 190A-1 conversions, with a pressurised cockpit and provision for drop tanks.

The first of about 190 production Ta 152H-1 (the sole production model) fighters was delivered late 1944 and undertook service trials in early 1945. The type proved to have admirable performance, and early production aircraft were delivered to Jg301, a unit tasked mainly with the protection of the bases used by the Me 262 jet-powered fighter, which was particularly vulnerable to interception and destruction by Allied fighters during take-off and landing.

The Kit:
I picked this kit up at a swap meet last year, having never heard of the brand name before, the kit was second hand and very cheap, so I thought why not! The parts are broken down traditionally on the sprues with finely engraved panel lines and clean surface detail - no flash. Not a major amount of parts, but you do get a choice of a two piece or single piece canopy set - obviously depending on whether you wish to display open or closed.

Instructions:
Instructions are in Japanese but thankfully you do not need to know the language to follow the instructions, the assembly step graphics are adequate enough and straightforward to follow. I had to look at a couple of positioning bits a few times to properly work them out but nothing that got up my goat. The only downside of the instructions, as far as I could tell, is that they provide just one three view diagram for ALL the aircraft examples that the kit provides, that is, one (sideview) profile for each aircraft. Because of this also, not every decal is mentioned in the instruction sheet which has one believing they go on the other side or angle to the profile shown for the aircraft.

Construction:
Surprisingly straightforward for a kit manufacturer I hadn't even heard of before! You start in the office, which is essentially very basic - a seat, tub, control stick and instrument panel - with decals supplied for side and main console detail. Plenty of scope for the detailer to do some scratchbuilding.

Fuselage halves went together quite well and the main components fitted with straight forward ease, just a minor amount of filler and sanding called upon at the wing roots. Many of the smaller components are already molded onto the main parts, for instance the guns are included on the wings, so you need to be careful you don't knock anything off.

You are provided with - I must say - an extremely crude looking belly tank to hang on some even cruder attachment points. I rummaged around in my spares and replaced this tank with a better one, ditch the one in the kit, it is terrible.

The undercarriage is quite basic and very little detail in the wheel well, you will need to add in your own plumbing. The undercarriage was a little bit of a hassle to put on. Finally I added the two piece canopy set so I could display an open cockpit (you also get a one-piece version for a closed depiction) and found the windscreen would not fit flush against the fuselage. After a bit of fiddling around I managed to get it to sit okay but this is one point you might find a touch of frustration creeping in.

Versions & Decals:
Because the instructions are in Japanese, I am not fully sure how many examples can be produced by the kit, but in reference to my point about the three view diagram in the instructions above fulfilling different examples, one can only say there are three or more to produce. I chose a late war example with the traditionally RLM colors of 76, 81 & 83 and used the decals supplied in the kit to produce an unidentified example! The decals were soft and prone to disintegration so be careful, in particular the fuselage band which was an absolutely shit to put on.

Accuracy:
I won't profess to know much about the TA-152H, it's an aircraft that I am not really familiar with so I won't debate the accuracies of this kit to you, if anyone has any comments out there, perhaps feel free to email SMAKR and ask them to include your comments here. I could not really fault the kit, according to the very little reference material I have on the aircraft it was quite acceptable to scale in measurements (very slightly underscaled on length) and the profile looked convincing.

Overall:
For the intermediate modeller, who doesn't mind not being able to read the instructions (unless of course you are Japanese) then this kit was a surprisingly straightforward and pleasant build. I had gone into the project with a lot of hesitancy so I was pleasantly surprised at the outcome. I'd certainly give it the thumbs up!

Note: the following related reviews links have not been updated since early 2000's - more kit reviews of this aircraft may now be on SMAKR, not reflected below. Refer to the Index for other kits of this type.

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