Hobbyboss 1/72 UH-60A Blackhawk
KIT #: 87216
PRICE: 60 RMB
DECALS: Two US Army options
REVIEWER: Richard F
NOTES:  

HISTORY

Whukka-whukka-whukka here comes another Huey in another movie. Didn't they get the memo? The Huey's out, man. The Blackhawk's been carrying the US Army around since 1979. As Jake Gyllenhaal says in "Jarhead" as a Huey flies overhead playing the Doors: "that's Vietnam music, can't we get our own music?!" How about our own helicopter, too, nineties and noughties movies?
Well, fair enough, they still use a few Hueys too but there are nearly 1,500 Blackhawks flying for the USA alone, and another 2500 or so serving at least 23 other countries. You'd think producers could scrape a couple up for their helicopter scenes.
THE KIT

Like the Hobbyboss SH-60F Oceanhawk I've already built, this Blackhawk is nicely moulded with finely engraved lines. Nothing to complain about there! 

On the inside, there are some prominent sink marks which are probably visible if you pose your model with doors open. The main cabin has a floor, ceiling and rear wall. Up front are two pretty soft looking flightcrew seats, cyclics but not collectives, and no decals or moulding for the big instrument panel. In the rear there's basically detailed seating for 15 - three rows of four and three individual seats, two of which are for the windows just ahead of the main doors. Test fitting shows that those seats are not directly aligned with those windows (not sure if that's correct or not) and also that the main seating, if installed, would make it pretty hard to get in and out of the helicopter.

Though not shown on the box art, this kit comes with the cool-looking high-slung fuel tanks, one on either side. From pictures of the real thing on the internet, it seems like there are a couple of types of set up for these high-slung tanks. This kit has the kind where the supporting arm points upwards, rather than hangs downwards (as on Australian S-70A-9s.

No armament is included.

Decals are simple and there are two versions, one in green and the other in desert tan.
CONCLUSIONS

I like it and I got it for a reasonable price. I don't know if it is the best 1/72 Blackhawk - probably not - but it'll make up a decent model of a somewhat forgotten helicopter.
REFERENCES

wikipedia
Jarhead

Richard F

December 2012

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