Hasegawa 1/32 Ki-84 Hayate 47th Sentai

[mconnelley]

Hello:

   As I recall, the black switch panel to the right of the pilot's right foot wouldn't have been there on a service aircraft.  It was added when the plane was restored to airworthy condition.  I believe that this is pointed out in the Aero-detail book on the ki-84.

 

Mike

 

[scvrobeson]

Spectacular looking cockpit John. I hope that it remains visible in the end.

 

 

 

Matt 

[Thunnus]

On 5/23/2025 at 10:50 AM, Troy Molitor said:

That looks wonderful.  Thanks for sharing your builds with us John.   

Thank you for stopping by, Troy!

 

 

On 5/23/2025 at 11:00 AM, tomg said:

Great work, looking forward to the next update.

Thank you!  Hope you didn't wait too long!

 

 

On 5/23/2025 at 4:29 PM, mconnelley said:

Hello:

   As I recall, the black switch panel to the right of the pilot's right foot wouldn't have been there on a service aircraft.  It was added when the plane was restored to airworthy condition.  I believe that this is pointed out in the Aero-detail book on the ki-84.

 

Mike

 

Thanks Mike!  Be that as it may, I am electing to keep the right hand electrical box in place.  Not only was it a pain in the butt to hand paint but I didn't think the comments in  Aero Detail 24 rules it out conclusively.  It says, "The electrical box visible to the lower right of the panel, as well as the foot bar, are not original equipment."  If we assume that there was some sort of foot bar on the original aircraft, we can also assume that an electrical box may have been there also. 

 

 

On 5/23/2025 at 10:27 PM, scvrobeson said:

Spectacular looking cockpit John. I hope that it remains visible in the end.

 

 

 

Matt 

Thanks Matt!  The sidewalls pinch in from bottom to top so view into the cockpit will be somewhat limited..

 

 After the passing the milestone of getting the cockpit painted, I've kinda stalled on the build, not looking forward to the next major step, which would be applying rivets.  Unlike German aircraft, Japanese aircraft seem to have a more complicated and random pattern to their rivet lines.  I'll get there eventually but it takes some discipline and momentum to get that done.  So... in the meantime, I've been fiddling with little things here and there.


The four prop blades are separate and plug into a prop hub that houses a plastic grommet to hold the prop in place.  The surface of the prop blades had some irregularities and needed some sanding.



The attachment peg of the blades is keyed so the pitch angle of each blade is uniform.



The back of the some of the blades had a sink mark that needed to be filled with black CA glue.



Looking forward to the Homare radial engine, I'm looking at the view into the engine from the front.  The Eduard Exterior set has a bunch of detail parts but the majority of them are on the top of the cylinders and I don't think these additions will be visible so I'm leaning towards leaving those off.



The view into the engine compartment is even more limited with the prop in place.  I may simplify things further by only doing half of the ignition wires (to the fronts of each cylinder only).



The barrel openings for the engine mounted guns are deep depressions (not actual holes).



I decided to drill out the openings and place short sections of brass tubing to represent the gun barrels.



Next I jumped over to the landing gear.  The Eduard Exterior provides etched faces for the interior sides of the landing gear covers.  Probably won't be very visible but its a very easy addition.




The exterior sides have been riveted.  I blew out a hole in one of the covers trying to restore a circular fastener, which has since been repaired.



The inner landing gear doors has a similar PE option.



But I decided to keep the molded detail in place and just add the u-channels to the kit part.



The Eduard Exterior set also includes brake lines for the landing gear legs but being flat PE pieces, I doubt that I could get an acceptable result.  Instead, I made my own brake lines using copper wire attached to the leg using little sections of brass tubing and thin strips of aluminum tape.



The landing gear components were then given a coat of primer (Mr Primer Surfacer 1000).  Although I had a couple of resin options for the main wheels (MasterCasters and Kopecky), I thought the kit wheels looked the best so I went with them.



You can see the repaired hole on the exterior side, which have been riveted.

[geedubelyer]

Those little detail additions look so crisp and neat John. 

 

Admirable job. 

[amurray]

Black CA glue?!?!  Didn't know such existed.   Can think of numerous uses for it.  What brand and where purchased? 

Thanks!

[LSP_Kevin]

Fantastic work as always, John!

 

Kev

[dennismcc]

I am always impressed by the neatness of your work, really impressive stuff.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

[Biggles87]

Great work on the undercarriage parts. I’m a big fan of ‘ if it won’t be seen leave it off ‘, but also of ‘ if there should be a hole, make one ‘.

This is really making me want to start mine, but I really need to finish something before I start anything new.

But then again I have the willpower of a dead rabbit according to one of my friends.

 

John

 

[Juggernut]

On 5/27/2025 at 7:21 PM, amurray said:

Black CA glue?!?!  Didn't know such existed.   Can think of numerous uses for it.  What brand and where purchased? 

Thanks!

 

Several manufacturer's have  black CA, it's actually rubberized CA and was developed to repair RC car tires (so I'm told).  If you have a HobbyTown nearby, you can get it there.  Otherwise, Dave Smith Industries sells it to numerous hobby shops and I'm sure Amazon carries it in some form or another.  If you have an RC car hobby store nearby, check them too.

[Cycling Guy]

You've inspired me to restart mine. I hope you and you're family are well John! 

[Uncarina]

Just catching up here John, great work! Thank you for walking us down the path of building the kit, which I suspect many of us have in the stash.

 

Cheers,  Tom

[amurray]

15 hours ago, Juggernut said:

 

Several manufacturer's have  black CA, it's actually rubberized CA and was developed to repair RC car tires (so I'm told).  If you have a HobbyTown nearby, you can get it there.  Otherwise, Dave Smith Industries sells it to numerous hobby shops and I'm sure Amazon carries it in some form or another.  If you have an RC car hobby store nearby, check them too.

 

Many thanks!

[Dpgsbody55]

Another build shaping up into a work of art again.  

 

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[Thunnus]

On 5/27/2025 at 12:33 PM, geedubelyer said:

Those little detail additions look so crisp and neat John. 

 

Admirable job. 

Thank you sir!  Attention to detail is easier when I do things really slow and this build is going slow, due to other distractions at home.

 

 

On 5/27/2025 at 4:21 PM, amurray said:

Black CA glue?!?!  Didn't know such existed.   Can think of numerous uses for it.  What brand and where purchased? 

Thanks!

I use Bob Smith Industries (BSI) IC-2000 Tire Glue.

 

 

On 5/27/2025 at 7:39 PM, LSP_Kevin said:

Fantastic work as always, John!

 

Kev

Thank you Kevin!

 

 

On 5/28/2025 at 1:37 AM, dennismcc said:

I am always impressed by the neatness of your work, really impressive stuff.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

Thanks Dennis!  I try to be neat and tidy, especially when presenting progress on my builds.

 

 

 

On 5/29/2025 at 5:28 AM, Biggles87 said:

Great work on the undercarriage parts. I’m a big fan of ‘ if it won’t be seen leave it off ‘, but also of ‘ if there should be a hole, make one ‘.

This is really making me want to start mine, but I really need to finish something before I start anything new.

But then again I have the willpower of a dead rabbit according to one of my friends.

 

John

 

Thanks John!  Sometimes I'll build and paint stuff that ultimately gets covered.  Sometimes I don't.  Depends on how I feel!

 

 

On 5/29/2025 at 5:54 AM, Juggernut said:

 

Several manufacturer's have  black CA, it's actually rubberized CA and was developed to repair RC car tires (so I'm told).  If you have a HobbyTown nearby, you can get it there.  Otherwise, Dave Smith Industries sells it to numerous hobby shops and I'm sure Amazon carries it in some form or another.  If you have an RC car hobby store nearby, check them too.

See above!  

 

 

On 5/29/2025 at 6:23 AM, Cycling Guy said:

You've inspired me to restart mine. I hope you and you're family are well John! 

Thank you!  No dramas on this build, which speaks to the quality of this Hasegawa kit.  Can't really go wrong with any of the Hasegawa WW2 Japanese 1/32 subjects.

 

 

On 5/29/2025 at 7:16 AM, Uncarina said:

Just catching up here John, great work! Thank you for walking us down the path of building the kit, which I suspect many of us have in the stash.

 

Cheers,  Tom

Thanks Tom!

 

I worked on the engine this week. It's a not super-detailed out of the box but decent enough given the limited visibility from the front. The only thing I'm adding here is a hydraulic line at the bottom of the crankcase and some ignition wiring. In actuality, the 18-cylinder Homare engine had 36 ignition leads, two for each cylinder. I decided to forgo the leads that attach to the back of the cylinders.  Oh yeah, and I've added some spark plug connectors from Anyz to the front of each cylinder.

 

The engine components were painted separately.

 

After painting, the engine was glued together.

 

The wiring was carefully bent and attached to the spark plug connectors.

 

 

Even though the wires (which were lead) were primed with Mr Primer Surfacer, lots of paint cracked off during the bending process so the wires were touched up with paint.

 

Here is the view of the completed engine within the cowling.

 

Engine's done so I can now move on to something else.

 

[dennismcc]

That is so impressive, I have not long fitted and bent all the ignition wires on my Ki 44 but was not happy so I am starting over, so I can appreciate the skill (and patience) that went into youe engine.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis