Outside the US, the YS-11 is a well known turboprop airliner/transport. I have seen a few of them here in the States, but those were flying for cargo companies and in Hawaii they flew for Air Pacific. In Japan there are versions flying for both the Japanese Air Force and Navy. Commercially, they are used by a number of smaller airlines flying short shuttle flights between airports. This used to be the purvey of the DC-3 and C-46 back in the 'good old days'. 

The YS-11 was built to specifications similar to that for the Fokker F.27 and the turboprop Convair CV-580 for a short to medium range transport. 182 examples were eventually built with production starting in 1962. Many are still flying as operators have found it and its Rolls-Royce Dart engines to be a perfect package.

If you have seen the latest and greatest of Hasegawa's airliner offerings, then this kit should be no surprise to you. It is fully up to the latest standards with nicely engraved panel lines and all the bits and pieces one expects from Hasegawa. This includes a rudimentary one piece cockpit on the back of which is a holder for the metal weights that are included to prevent tail sitting. Nice touch. One also gets an in-flight display stand for those wishing to display their YS-11 in flight. Both open and closed gear doors are included for this purpose. There is a single transparency for the cockpit windows. This kit has no window openings along the fuselage, those being supplied by decal. This is the way an airliner kit should be done! Now if we can only talk Hasegawa into not putting all the sprues into one bag.....

Instructions are typical of Hasegawa in their completeness and logical building steps. Paint color callouts are for Gunze paints, which is typical for them. The decal sheet is a real beauty and done by Liveries Unlimited. It is quite complete and allows the building of any one of five aircraft in either of two different markings for pre or post name change for AIr Nippon. The sheet includes de-icer boots, cockpit windows, wing walkways, and the prop blade deicers and tip markings. Another nice addition to the sheet are squares of the primary colors to fill in goofs.

This appears to be another great airliner kit from Hasegawa and I anticipate no problems building it. It would be great to see them get into some of the larger scales like this kit rather than concentrating on 1/200. It would also be nice to see some other airlines rather than Japanese on their kits, but that is what aftermarket sheets are for. Now, if Hasegawa could do a C-46 and C-47 in 1/144 to go along with this aircraft, that would be really neat!!
 

This kit courtesy of me and my wallet!  

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