Tamiya 1/32 F-16C Thunderbirds kit

[Dave Williams]

Got the kit yesterday, and here are some in-the-box thoughts, for those who are interested.

 

Pretty much as the previews hinted at. Block 32, Thunderbirds markings only, no full engine, and all weapons sprues deleted from the kit. You DO get all of the pylons, the LAU-129 missile rails, the underwing and centerline tanks, the HTS, and the ALQ-184 pod in the kit, all marked not for use. If you want to do a regular Block 32 from the kit, you'll just need to find the actual A-A and A-G ordnance elsewhere. You also get the complete Vulcan cannon in the box, just marked "not for use". In the "not in the box" category, besides all of the weapons, you also don't get the PE fret with the radar antenna and the chaff/flare dispensers, nor do you get the Block 50 MLG and nose gear doors.

 

The release includes a full set of scab plates. These are printed in thick white ink on clear adhesive film. They did the rivets by just not printing the ink in circular patterns on the sheet. You get a full set, including those used for Block 40/42, however only four of the plates are called out for use (two large rectangular plates over the top wing roots, and two small zig-zag plates in front of the tail). The other plates are "not for use". All of these plates will have to be cut out individually from the sheet as they are NOT precut.

 

The new sprues are P, Q, and R. You get two sprues "R" in the kit, which has the burner sections, exhaust nozzles, and wingtip Sidewinder rails. Sprue "Q" is a small sprue attached to Sprue "P", and contains specific T-birds parts like the smoke pipe, wheel chocks, and boarding ladder. Sprue "P" contains the small-mouth intake, new side consoles (the IP itself is reused from the CJ kit), a couple of new bulkheads for the MLG bay, flat main gear doors, MLG strut lights, and a new nose gear door.

 

Also, the nose and main tires are shown as new part numbers, as well as the metal nose and MLG struts. The new S sprue is for the stand

 

Parts numbers for the new sprues are:

 

R sprue (you need 2) - 0006452

P/Q sprue (one part number)- 9116024

S sprue (stand) - 0446176 [you'll also need a bag of screws and nuts for the stand - 9486006]

 

The engine/stand options are interesting. You get two burner cans, one with a proper afterburner flame ring, and one with a hole for the stand rod. You also get two complete exhaust nozzles, one with the petals closed, and one with them open. Both the cans and the nozzles are attached through the rear engine "donut" panel by bayonet mounts, so you can swap around the cans and burners after the kit is assembled.

 

Finally, they seem to have corrected the one "nit" in the previous CJ release by providing decals for most of the missing analog instrument faces.

 

Have to give a big shout out to Rainbow Ten for getting the kit to me so quickly! I think the kit was only released in Japan last Thursday or Friday.

[Habu]

Hey Dave!

 

I'll also add that the NSI intake mouth shape is spot on.