Trumpeter has seen fit to scale down its recent 1/72 scale Badger kit to the more manageable 1/144 scale.
The kit includes a nice interior and petite panel lines, and all the clear parts fit like a glove. There are two painting options shown for Russian and Chinese jets, but the drawings are so poor they are almost unusable. By contrast, the decals are very nice and seem to offer many more options than those detailed in the instructions.
When starting, be aware that Step 1 wrongly shows the front observer's seat mounted at the very front of the cockpit floor - it is shown in its correct position in Step 2. I left off all the probes and other small details until after painting. The nature of the Badger means that Trumpeter has split the fuselage into three main sections - nose, center section with wing, and tail. These sections are well molded and, with care, fit well. I found you must assemble the tail, and then assemble the wing sections around it to capture the exhaust fairings. The complicated center-section molding needs a little filler around the landing-gear bullet fairings, but otherwise it fits well. I attached the nose section after adding some nose weight.
Trumpeter includes a full set of armament for your Badger, including an AS-6 Kingfish missile under each wing and a single AS-2 Kipper missile for the centerline. The usual load was one Kipper on the centerline or one Kingfish under the left wing. Sometimes a Kingfish was carried under each wing, but it was rare for all three missiles to be carried simultaneously.
Unfortunately, Trumpeter brought forward the incorrect carriage of the AS-2 from its 1/72 scale kit. The carriage should be mounted in a centerline fuselage recess, not on a pylon as provided. I used plastic strip to seal the pylon slot on my kit and just mounted the Kingfish missiles under the wings. (There is a great photo of this configuration in
International Airpower Review, Vol. 9, my primary reference.) According to the photos I have seen, the large main-gear doors for the Badger remain up unless they're being serviced. So, I cut the tabs off and mounted them closed. They fit fine with no further effort.
After sanding the many fuselage joints and adding the main and nose canopies, my Badger was ready for paint. The painting instructions are very unclear: They show the upper surfaces of the Russian jet as light gray, and silver for the Chinese version, with white for the lower surfaces on both, but the demarcation between colors is completely indecipherable. Luckily, the photos mentioned above are very clear. However, there are several detail differences between the jets; pay close attention to any photos you can find.
Once I had masked and painted my Badger, the decals went on without a fuss. I added a quick oil-color wash and a flat coat, unmasked the canopies, and had a very nice Badger for my shelf.
Even beginners with a just a few kits built can get the most out of Trumpeter's Badger if they have some reference photos for painting and can spend some time smoothing the seams.
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