Here's my recently (March '05) completed Fujimi A-4M. I had a great time building this model, with a few minor exceptions. First, the good stuff. The kit goes together very well with enough detail at 1/72 to make a nice display piece. The exterior details are all finely engraved and, from what I can tell, fairly accurate. The wheel wells and landing gear were especially nice for a model this size. The kit decals were very nice and laid down easily without solvent.

Now for the not-so-good stuff:

The cockpit is the only part of the kit that's lacking in detail. The panels are nicely done, but the seat and side/back walls are sorely lacking. In this scale, that's not so bad, since you can't see most of the cockpit anyway. I decided detailing a cockpit this size was not going to make a contest winner, so I left it as-is.

Because the model is so small (see the underside pic with the MM paint jars for comparison), it can be difficult to work with the detail bits. In fact, most of them are molded onto the fuselage, making it very easy to snap them off. This happened with the radio mast on the hump and the arrestor hook on the underside. I left the mast off but replaced the hook with a modified finishing nail. The front landing gear snapped as well, but a little CA had it back in working order in no time.

Photos and text © 2005 by Sean Carter

June 20, 2005

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