Roden 1/48 scale OV-1A/JOV-1A Mohawk

Kit: No. 406
Scale: 1/48
Manufacturer: Roden, available from Squadron Mail Order, 1115 Crowley Drive, Carrollton, TX 75011-5010, 979-242-8663, www.squadron.com
Price: $29.98
Comments: Injection-molded, 182 parts, decals
Pros: Overall shapes look correct, fine detail, most parts fit well
Cons: Fit of canopy parts is poor, ordnance attachment is poor, small yellow decals are translucent

The U.S. Army Mohawk was a light-attack/observation aircraft powered by two turboprop engines. Its distinctive shape includes aspects of other Grumman aircraft: multiple fins like the Hawkeye and a canopy similar to the Intruder.

Roden's is the first injection-molded kit of the Mohawk in 1/48 scale. A look at the parts reveals finely molded detail parts, especially the landing gear and ordnance sway braces. The large parts have good detail, but a slightly rough surface texture.

Roden's instructions include exploded views with locating arrows that are sometimes vague. The color callouts are accurate, but there was no mention of installing weight in the nose to keep the tail of the model off the table.

The instrument panel is clear, and you apply a decal on the back that shows through the clear dial faces. It's an interesting idea, but not a realistic effect. The nine-piece seats require careful assembly but look good. I test-fitted the finished cockpit into the fuselage and found the rear bulkhead did not meet evenly with the fuselage sides. When I test-fitted the clear parts, the center instrument console prevented the top of the canopy from sitting flush. I dealt with the poorly fitting windscreen later.

Most of the remainder of the kit parts matched up well, but the fit of the underwing rocket pods was rough, and the external fuel tanks were slightly out of round; the raised bands around them faded away at the edges. The three-part wingtips were not a tight fit and required some adjusting.

The ends of the main landing gear struts needed some trimming in order to fit into the detailed wells molded into the lower wing halves.

The only trouble I had with final assembly was establishing the dihedral of the horizontal stabilizers. The mounting tabs don't automatically set this, so I had to shave the tabs and use a bit of filler.

Then it was on to fixing the windscreen. Forcing the bottom edges onto the nose might crack the windscreen, so I ended up with about a 1/16" shim under the right corner to close the gap.

Roden provides markings for four Mohawks, two in the early gloss olive drab scheme, and two later ones with low-visibility markings and flat olive drab paint. I picked an early version using Xtracolor X28 gloss enamel overall. The decals presented no problems, but the translucent yellow markings for the tail didn't have the white undercoating of the large "U.S. ARMY" marks on the wings.

The last step was adding the underwing stores. The petite sway braces look great, but they are the only interfaces for the ordnance. I beefed up the attachments by drilling holes in the stores and pylons and pinning them together with short pieces of thin styrene rod.

After 33 hours, the finished model looks like a short-winged Mohawk. Some of the unused parts on the sprues and the separately molded wing tips indicate that a longer-wing Mohawk might be coming.

- Pat Hawkey