Sunday, January 15, 2012

HASEGAWA 1/48 Scale SH-3H Seaking

This is the completed model of the Hasegawa 1/48 scale SH-3H Sea King.
The kit took me about 6 months to complete, working only on weekends.



Some scratch building was done, mainly to the cockpit area, antenna wirings, and some plumbing on the rotor head. Decals used are for the HS-12 squadron, the Wyverns of the US Navy.








The red fire extinguisher was made from sprue, and filed and sanded to shape. I glued it to the back wall, just next to the window and behind the pilot's seat, although I'm probably wrong about the actual position of the extinguisher. I just wanted to put it in a place where it can be easily seen from the outside.







Below is the rotor head, with scrtach built plumbing using flexible wire, then sprayed with black, and dry brushed with silver.



Model helicopter cockpits are quite visible from the outside, so some effort should be spent in putting some level of detail into it. Here very fine copper wire was coiled around the smallest drill bit used for my pin vise, and then stretched out a little bit and super glued into the cockpit area to simulate intercom cables. I also created a little fire extinguisher from plastic sprue, as can be seen from some of the other photos.
The cockpit looks interesting and busy from the outside.



I like the main rotor blades. They come already bended to simulate the weight, so there's no need to bend it yourself.










Scale Modeling Books