Minute Details: Resin Replacements or Go With the Kit Bits?

 

 I was working on the Hasegawa 1:48 F-104C and found myself thinking what great engineering it features. So many options, so much detail! The recessed surface detail is incredible, and the five-part wings boggle the mind when you’re used to those thin, thin Starfighter wings having been single-part castings in (probably) every kit before. What really made me stop and think was when I was assembling the 13-part ejector seat. The seat itself fits back against the fixed guide assembly, and until you add glue, it actually slides on the very rails which in the real thing constitute the ramp to guide the rocket projectile (the seat) out of the cockpit. I find myself asking, why would I bother going to the expense of replacing this seat with a single block of molded resin?  

 Sure, I have the Black Box conversion set to modify the kit to Canadian standard, and the resin cockpit is fantastic, with molded in seat and harness and such. The proportions do look rather different when you compare the tubs, and the knee-jerk is to say the resin one must be the accurate one, because, well, it’s an aftermarket resin! (Ever tried stuffing a Verlinden transmission and final drives into a Panzer IV hull? I’ve heard it can reduce a seasoned pro to tears, which suggests either the hull or the AMs are inaccurate: they can’t both be right, or they’d fit.) But unless you’re building an open cockpit to show off all that detail, it does tend to get lost in the gloom. There’s satisfaction in knowing all the details are there, but frustration in spending a long time creating it, only to have it disappear when the project is finished. For a closed cockpit I would most definitely go with the kit parts, and for open ones too under most circumstances. I will certainly be building more Hasegawa Starfighters in the years ahead, the subject is just too appealing to ignore! The kit itself has such a wealth of detail that sometimes resin is ‘gilding the lilley,’ as it were, while older (and more affordable kits) which cry out for a resin helping hand, are almost universally ignored, which doesn’t seem fair... This is a theme for another post.