B-25J Mitchell

[Mike]

B-25J Mitchell
1:32 HK Models

The Mitchell was a twin-engined medium bomber that served with distinction during WWII, with over 10,000 being produced by war's end. Named after General Billy Mitchell, the type reached prominence early on in America's entry to the war, as it was used in the famous carrier launched Doolittle raid on mainland Japan, leaving USS Hornet and attempting to land on fields in East China after the mission.

It was a good aircraft to fly, and was liked by its crews, as well as being able to soak up a tremendous amount of punishment from the enemy and still remain flyable. These traits led to the Mitchell being used in almost every theatre of war, and as well as bombing duties it was also converted to a "gun-truck" for ground attack, and fitted with various armaments, including cheek mounted guns, and sometimes the 75mm cannon from a Sherman tank in a solid nose cone, as well as four .50cal brownings in the nose (B-25G), and the turret guns. The J-model was the last production variant of the long line of improvements, and although built with glass noses, many were converted in the field to the solid nose for ground attack duties.

The kit arrives from HK Models in a large box, with a painting of a Mitchell in action on the front, the scale in large silver letters, and the promise of over half a million rivets on the skin of the model. I for one am certainly not proposing to test that hypothesis. Under the box lid is another cardboard lid built into the base, which hinges open to reveal the contents. That is when you realise that this model is not only large, but the box is full… 514 parts according to the instructions. If stats are your thing, the wing span is 643mm, with an overall length of 546.7mm, so you'd better have somewhere quite large to display it once finished.

First Impressions
Did I mention that this is a big model? Good, because it is. A quick flick through the individually bagged sprues shows that there is detail everywhere, and plenty of use of slide moulding has been made to improve detail and make construction that little bit easier. Inside the box are twenty six sprues of medium grey styrene, two of clear parts, a small sheet of Photo-Etched (PE) brass, decals and a thick instruction booklet. There is a distinct air of quality to the whole affair, from the sprues and parts to the layout of the box to prevent movement and thereby chaffing of parts.

The Kit
The instructions state that the build sequence has been created by an experienced modeller, so we're hopefully in for a rare treat and actually be able to follow the instructions! The build begins with the interior, building up the upper turret and tail gun assemblies, with some rather nicely moulded .50cal bodies that have slide-moulded slots in the front of the breech to facilitate adding the barrels later in the build. What a godsend that will be. It's not long before work is going on in the cockpit, and detail here is excellent. The central control panel is festooned with knobs ad levers, all of which are separate, with the pilot and co-pilot's seats being placed on their bases, with a pair of lightening holes in the bottom, and bracing detail added to the rear. There are a couple of ejector pin marks on the backs of the seat that you may want to deal with if you think they'll be seen once the rear bulkhead is in place. A full set of PE seatbelts are included, although their positioning in the instructions looks a little posed, so you might want to alter them to add a little candid touch. The twin control columns have separate wheels, which you can pose angled to one side if you're planning on offsetting the controls. The cockpit is finished later with the addition of the rear bulkhead, and the multi-part instrument panel, which has quite an interesting approach to achieving a realistic set of instruments. The main panel has lots of cut-outs for the dials, and a flat backing part affixes behind it. There is a decal that you can apply to the backing part, which should then line up all the instrument faces with their corresponding holes once installed. That also allows you to paint the instrument panel without worry about making a mess of the dials. Just leave them out until the job is done.

Oddly, the bombs are next, but that makes sense once you construct the bomb bay in which to mount them. There are parts for six bombs included, with the main body built up from two halves, as are the rear stabilising fins. Before joining the two, a small and nicely detailed spinner that arms the bomb as it falls is added, which improves the realism somewhat. Detail on the fins is nice, because of slide-moulding again, allowing rivet detail to be added where it wouldn't otherwise be possible with traditional moulding. Each trio of bombs attaches to a highly detailed ladder style rack with two pins, which in turn affixes to the inside skin of the bomb bay, along with a few additional detail parts to busy the area up. The bay roof and some really nicely detailed bulkheads finish off the assembly along with a few PE parts, resulting in a really well appointed bomb bay. This is set aside for a few steps while the interior of the fuselage is decked out.

The fuselage halves are rather large, and as well as all that detail on the outer surface, there is moulded in cockpit detail in the forward part, and lots of strengthening ribs throughout the rear of the fuselage. It appears that the central portion of the fuselage away from the bomb bay has been left rather Spartan in order to keep the retail price down, but this area can be completed by the ardent scratch builder, and I feel sure that aftermarket companies will leap in to fill the gap before too long. Some boxes adorn the cockpit area on each side, and the waist stations with their .50cal guns and ammo feed chutes are supplied, as well as the ammo boxes. These parts are very nicely moulded, and thankfully the detail will be seen through the window once construction is completed. If you are planning on using the cheek gun packs, a couple of holes will need drilling in the fuselage to accommodate them before closing up the fuselage.

In order to finally close the fuselage, the cockpit area, with the nose gear leg attached to the underside, the upper turret mechanism, the bomb bay and the rear gunner's position all have to be placed in one fuselage half, and a staggering 80 grams of nose weight to ensure that she doesn't sit on her tail once she's done. Personally, I'd try adding a bit more, as I've heard a few folks mention that the balance is still pretty fine, even with all that on board. The completion of the rear-gunner's position includes the long lines of ammo that feed from the rear, and a little stool for the gunner to perch during the active part of the mission.

The large H-tail is next, which spans the full length, and incorporates the top of the rear fuselage, including the conical bulge to accommodate the rear gunner. The rudder parts attach using traditional slots and tabs, and the rudders and elevators can be left unglued if you wish so that they can be posed at will. Personally, I'd prefer to glue them in place, so little fingers aren't tempted to play with them. Separate trim tab actuators are included to add detail to this area, and once complete it is installed on the top of the rear fuselage along with the glazing and the rear gun's flexible mounting cover. Moving forward, the cockpit glazing is installed here too, and a choice of both the nicely detailed turret interior and glazing for the upper turret, or the blanking plate is made. Aft of the turret a pair of bullet fairings are present, and a choice can be made as to which type to use based upon your references. The next step is to add all of the bay doors and fairings to the underside of the fuselage, but some of this is probably best left of until near the finish of the build. The bomb bay doors are nicely portrayed, with an inner skin perforated with lightening holes sitting within each door to add depth and interest. If you're closing the bomb bay doors, the un-skinned outers are used to cover the area. The crew access ladders can be posed open or closed, although if choosing to leave them open, it invites the viewer to peer inside, which might expose the slightly barren interior.

The wings have a full set of poseable flying surfaces, with spoilers and actuator rams includes, which gives plenty of options for posing them at a candid angle, as if the crew have just switched off and left the aircraft after a long mission. The leading edge of the wing has a landing light and intake installed, with a clear cover for the landing light that will need careful gluing to avoid fogging of the crystal clear part.

The engines are a model in their own right, and are made up of a large number of parts. To do them justice, you'll need to research the colour of each part, as it would be a sin not to paint them well. The Wright R-2600 Cyclones are radial engines, and all 14 pistons are depicted in a very crisp moulding with separate push-rod covers for each one. Once both banks of cylinders are installer, the exhaust manifold and wiring looms are installed, then the aforementioned push-rod covers, where you'll have to be careful to get them correctly oriented. The whole engine then slots inside the skeletal cowling, to which the cowling front is added, and then the individual exhaust stacks are fitted, some of which projected the thunder of the engine into the fuselage, deafening many a crew member. The cowling panels are then installed, again in a specific pattern, and then the props are added, which are supplied as separate blades that glue into a 2-part central boss. The blades are keyed, which is good news, so construction will be fairly straight forward. I'd leave these off until later however, in case you break them during handling.

The engine nacelles are next, and they were of a clean design, being very streamlined, even when the gear was down. This is a really odd construction step, which would have you install the landing gear strut directly into a slot in the underside of the wing, and then build up the nacelle, after which the two are brought together in a rotating manner, to enable the strut to pass through the small opening in the nacelle. The larger doors that open during the landing gear cycle are moulded closed, which shouldn't be an issue as it both saves fiddling trying to get the doors on closed, and also saved HK Models from having to detail the wheel bay that would most likely rarely be seen. The small doors are supplied separately, and have nice strengthening detail on the inside skin, and a scale thickness edge to add realism. The sprue gates have been cleverly placed inboard of the thin edge on a flat area of the panel, so that it can be easily be removed without marring the delicate edge of the part. Thanks again, slide moulding!

Although adding the landing gear before painting is a little odd in my limited experience, the fact that the parts are sufficiently large to mask properly without risk of breakage makes sense, and also gives you something to perch the model on during painting without scuffing the fresh paintwork. The wheels are provided as halves, with nicely defined diamond tread patterns, which with careful gluing and alignment should survive the seam clean-up process. The main wheels have two inner hub parts that can be seen behind the outer hubs that are moulded into the tyres, and a central boss is applied to the outer hub face. The nose gear wheel is made up from two parts with the hubs moulded in, and an outer hub-cap is added to the assembly once glued together.

The wings attach to the fuselage by mating with a large stub spar that is moulded into the fuselage sides, before completing the join you have to capture the inner flap section in its pivot points so that it can remain poseable once installed. The joints should be very strong, but I would be tempted to brace the fuselage sides against splitting the fuselage seam under the constant weight of the wings by inserting some rod between the two halves. This might not be necessary if the bomb bay adds sufficient strength to the area, so I would leave any decision until you're at that point of the build.

The nose of the B-25J in this guise is glazed, and consequently there is plenty of detail added in this area to please the viewer. Big ammo bins and three .50cal brownings are installed in the cramped area, one of which is flexibly mounted to be operated by a crew member and stands on a bipod to the left of the ammo feeds for the pair of fixed .50cals. Again, the barrels are separate, which makes installing the glazing a lot easier. The glazing is in two parts, with the large framed top section affixing to the fuselage sides, while the nose cone attaches directly to the front. Take care with the joining of the two parts, to ensure a smooth profile.

As the final coup de grâce, all of the machine gun barrels are installed, with slide-moulded muzzles doing a good impression of a hollow barrel. They could stand some additional drilling out however, unless you fancy treating yourself to some turned barrels that will doubtless become available soon, if not already.

Decals are supplied for only one aircraft, in olive drab over grey, and sporting a large red shark's mouth emblem on the lower nose. The decal sheet is small for the size of the kit, and contains only national markings, unit and tail code markings, plus prop markings and the aforementioned instrument panel decal.

Colour density looks good, as does registration, but the carrier film seems rather thick and glossy, and there is an awful lot of it between the white tail code decals. The decals were protected by a transparent plastic sheet, which is unusual too. It goes without saying that there will be a raft of aftermarket decal sets being released before too long, as the Mitchell is a popular aircraft to say the least, and this is the first injection moulded kit of it in this scale.

Conclusion
Overall the kit is a stunner, and should build into an excellent replica of this important aircraft. There are of course a few minor gripes, as with every kit, and I believe that the prop blades have come in for a little criticism for their shaper already. Don't let any of the negatives put you off though - it's a corker of a model, with bags of potential for super-detailing as it's bound to be jumped on by the aftermarket companies immediately.

For me it's what I call a "scale breaker". I'm a 1:48 guy by choice, but some aircraft appeal in the bigger scales, and this is one of them. I understand that HK Models are preparing a number of editions of the basic kit, and look forward to those in due course. If they kit a G with the 75mm cannon, I'll be there in an instant, as quirky variants float my boat.

I believe that they also have a B-17 and a Meteor F.4 planned for later release, as well as a Lancaster III (can you believe that???) and if this is anything to go by, they should be good. It really is a golden age for the large scale aircraft modeller.

The kit can be bought worldwide online, and in the UK from Hannants.

Review sample is courtesy of

[Shar2]

Mine arrived today and agree, it is a fantastic looking kit, and BIG. Nice review Mike

[Mike]

Cheers Dave... I'm none to satisfied with the photos of the big sprues, but I had to use a bigger photo tent cos of the size of them, and couldn't get the light balance right

[Julien]

That is really an impressive model.

Julien

[AnonymousAA74]

........and couldn't get the light balance right

Looks great to me. Superb review and first class photography

[AndyC]

Must. Resist. Temptation.

[Basosz]

Must. Resist. Temptation.

Indeed! But I'm not sure it's going to work because that is a really gorgeous kit!

[Mike]

Guys... you might as well give in now. I'm normally a 1:48 guy, and I'm in love with this kit. When the aftermarket gets released that's bound to come, you'll be able to make a replica so detailed, that you'd struggle to decide whether it's small... or far away

[Shar2]

It is a fantastic kit and went down a storm when I took it to the West Middlesex club night last night. Andy, you might as well just give in mate. Now I've got this one, I can't wait for the straffer and gunship versions to be released.

[Radleigh]

I've give in, soon as I've got the cash one is mine. Nice review Mike.

[KoenL]

I understand that HK Models are preparing a number of editions of the basic kit, and look forward to those in due course. If they kit a G with the 75mm cannon, I'll be there in an instant, as quirky variants float my boat.

The B-25G would require a whole new fuselage but they are going to release the B-25H which also used a 75mm cannon so you'll probably like that one. ( http://www.hk-models.com/eng/p2_03.htm ) Wing XL on the other hand is going to release a 1/32 B-25C/D at some point so that could be converted to a B-25G if you really want that one.

Koen

[Mike]

The B-25G would require a whole new fuselage but they are going to release the B-25H which also used a 75mm cannon so you'll probably like that one. ( http://www.hk-models.com/eng/p2_03.htm )

Koen

That's good enough for me

[AndyC]

If they do a PBJ version I will probably succumb! A big brother to the 1/48 version I'm doing!

[tomprobert]

Fantastic review Mike... my dad has just bought one so Im going to hold off for now... but when the B-17 is available I'll not be able to resist!

[chrisrope]

Impressive, but i'm not even slightly tempted.

The Meteor on the other hand, maybe. If only it was going to be an F.8, much more interesting schemes available for that. The B-17 I would love but at nearly a metre long, I think the missus would object to it in the house

[Panzer Vor!!!]

ive allways wondered if modellers who buy BIG kits are like the guys who drive sports cars trying to make up for some deficiency

[Mike]

ive allways wondered if modellers who buy BIG kits are like the guys who drive sports cars trying to make up for some deficiency

A clear example of kit envy there, fella

(Diesel estate driver)

[Shar2]

ive allways wondered if modellers who buy BIG kits are like the guys who drive sports cars trying to make up for some deficiency

Do you want a lift to Newbury or what.

Buyer of big kits, driver of a big engined sports car, oh! a and diesel estate, but they're both Jaguars.

[Panzer Vor!!!]

for gawds sake girls calm down odid i HIT a nerve

Edited May 31, 2012 by hood

[gunpowder17]

Nice Review Mike. Youve captured the surface detail well in your photos. Im sad to say that even if you dont weight the nose , metal legs are essential on this one. They shoukld have been standard really...

Edited May 31, 2012 by gunpowder17

[spitfire]

That is one heck of an impressive kit, in 1/48 it's large but in 1/32 it will definately need an extension on the display cabinets ! Nice review Mike.

Cheers

Dennis

[Mike]

Thanks Den

[KeithBurrage]

Hmmm, it's a monster, far too big to be practical; way too expensive for me. Nowhere to store a kit of that size, absolutely ridiculous. Now, where did I put that credit card??

[Julien]

Hmmm, it's a monster, far too big to be practical; way too expensive for me. Nowhere to store a kit of that size, absolutely ridiculous. Now, where did I put that credit card??

When has "too big", or "impractical", or even "too expensive" ever stopped us buying kits before

Julien

[woody37]

Hmmm. Might start saving for the Lancaster when it comes out. At least I'll be able to sleep under the wing when she kicks me out shortly afterwards....