Cobra Company
1/72 OV-1A/B Mohawk Cockpit Detail Set

Cobra Company is back with another interesting detail set. You may recall that Cobra Company specializes in detail sets and conversions for rotary winged subjects, but sometimes the 'Head Snake' will venture into the world of the fixed wing and one of his favorite fixed wing subjects is the Grumman OV-1 Mohawk.

A year or so ago, Cobra Company released NINE different detail sets and conversions for the Roden 1/48 OV-1 series of kits. Well he's back again, this time with a comprehensive detail set for the Hasegawa 1/72 OV-1A/B Mohawk.

This detail is essentially a complete overhaul of the interior from the aft cockpit bulkhead forward. According to the instructions, you cut away the aft cockpit bulkhead molded into the inside of the fuselage sides as well as the mounting tabs for the cockpit.

In its place is a new resin nosewheel well, aft bulkhead and cockpit floor - all installed into the fuselage after the fuselage halves have beed modified as described above and then cemented together. Onto this goes the new instrument panel, one control stick (OV-1B) or two (OV-1A), two nice Martin Baker ejection seats, and a few other version-dependent details. There is an eyebrow panel and an overhead console also included. The set is rounded out with a replacement nose and nosegear strut. Best of all, with all of this resin in the front of the modified airframe, you may not need much ballast to keep this kit from sitting on its tail, and you can make those adjustments before installing the new nose cap for the last time.

This detail set is definitely not for the inexperienced modeler. The resin castings are thin to keep them as much in scale as possible, and are therefore brittle. An experienced modeler with the right tools will get these parts off of their molding blocks and ready for assembly with no problems.

Conclusions

This detail set will definitely dress up the Hasegawa kit and is highly recommended to experienced modelers.

This detail set is available directly from Cobra Company (www.cobracompany.com).

My sincere thanks to Cobra Company for this review sample!