Hobby Boss 1/48 Fw 190D-9 Kit First Look

By Michael Benolkin

First Look

The Fw 190D series was a development of the successful Fw 190A/F series powered by the air-cooled BMW 801 radial engine. To answer a requirement for a high altitude interceptor, Kurt Tank realized that the radial engine was going to have cooling problems operating at combat power in thin air. The answer was to adapt a liquid-cooled engine and his first choice was the Daimler Benz DB603, but was forced to use the Jumo 213 instead. While retaining the appearance of an air-cooled engine (and a long one at that), the new cowling housed the V-12 engine with a round radiator occupying the entire face of the cowling intake.

The first full-production of the 'Dora' series was the Fw 190D-9, armed with a pair of MG131 13mm machine guns above the engine and two MG151 20mm cannons in the wing roots. The Dora was a formidable fighter, though it came too late in the war to make a significant impact. Many of these aircraft were lost to pilot inexperience coupled with the aircraft's stability in certain flight regimes (especially at take-off and landing).

When Trumpeter released their 1/24 Fw 190D-9 nine years ago, the kit had some nice detailing and provided a number possibilities for a kit of this size. Unfortunately, the kit did have a few detail problems that were called out by those more familiar with the aircraft at the time and Trumpeter went no further with other variants of the Dora in this scale.

HobbyBoss has scaled down the Dora tooling to 1/48 scale and has made some changes in the layout and complexity of the kit. Let's take a closer look. The kit is molded in light gray styrene and presented on nine parts trees plus one tree of clear parts and a small fret of photo-etched details.

Among the features and options in this box:

• Decent cockpit
• Positionable canopy
• Rear engine details visible through the open main wheel wells
• Choice of open or closed cowl flaps
• Positionable flaps
• Positionable ailerons
• Positionable rudder
• Optional centerline drop tank
• Optional underwing bomb load

The instruments in the cockpit are rendered as decals but an aftermarket photo-etch set with color-printed details would really dress up the instrument panel as well as provide the missing seat belt/shoulder harness. The one option not provided in this kit are positionable elevators which are okay as-is if you're posing the aircraft with the controls locked (the ailerons would also be neutral).

Markings are provided for two examples:

• Fw 190D-9, W.Nr. 400208, 7./JG 301, 1945
• Fw 190D-9, W.Nr. 500570, II./JG 6, Black 12, 1945

The decal sheet provides essential airframe stenciling as well as walkway striping.

This is a nice kit that should be a simple build and has a really nice retail price as well. With the variety of aftermarket decal options on the market, you can certainly have some fun with this gem.

My sincere thanks to Squadron Mail Order for this review sample!