Furball Aero-Design 1/48 Top Gun Tigers and Talons Decal First Look

By Michael Benolkin

First Look

Furball Aero-Design has released their latest decal set in 1/48 scale, this one covering 23 colorful Top Gun adversary camouflage schemes. This set will work nicely with your favorite 1/48 F-5E, F-5F, and T-38A kits. The instructions walk you through the aircraft configuations including the F-5's early or later wing LEX, standard or sharknose radome, etc.

The examples presented here include:

1. F-5E, 159882, 540, Top Gun, 1982
2. F-5E, 159881, 543, Top Gun, 1982
3. F-5E, 160793, 544, Top Gun, 1986
4. F-5E, 160794, 545, Top Gun, 1986
5. F-5E, 159881, 543, Top Gun, 1985
6. F-5E, 159880, 542, Top Gun, 1985
7. F-5E, 159882, 540, Top Gun, 1977
8. F-5F, 160964, 546, Top Gun, 1977
9. F-5E, 162307, 541, Top Gun, 1986
10. F-5E, 159882, 544, Top Gun, 1984
11. F-5E, 159880, 542, Top Gun, 1980
12. F-5F, 160966, 550, Top Gun, 1987
13. F-5F, 160966, 550, Top Gun, 1978
14. F-5E, 159878, 544, Top Gun, 1976
15. F-5F, 160965, 547, Top Gun, 1981
16. F-5E, unknown, -, Top Gun, 1987, 'MiG-28'
17. F-5E, unknown, -, Top Gun, 1984, 'MiG-28'
18. T-38A, 61-0855, 552, Top Gun, 1976
19. T-38A, 59-1604, 12, Top Gun, 1978
20. T-38A, 59-1604, 11, Top Gun, 1976
21. T-38A, 59-1603, 13, Top Gun, 1976
22. T-38A, 61-0851, 551, Top Gun, 1976
23. T-38A, 59-1603, 15, Top Gun, 1976

The sheet is printed by Cartograf and the printing is very well done. What's more, none of these decals require the modeler to stack multiple layers of markings atop one another to recreate artwork. This trend by some other decal companies of producing multiple-layer decals is unfortunate as it puts the burden on you to do the work of what should have been done by the decal maker.

Grab your favorite Northrop kits, it is time to build one (or many) of these!

My sincere thanks to Furball Aero-Design for this review sample!