This is the Ibex T-6 kit in 1/48, which is a decent kit, similar very much to a limited run kit, the panel lines in many areas are not as crisp as one would like, small parts okay, but the sprue attachments are rather large compared to the part. The decal sheet is really nice, and some of the important parts are provided in resin. The nose, seats and wheels being the most prominent resin pieces.
As usual I started with the cockpit, the instrument panels repersent the ones on the T-6A, so that kind of dictated the markings I used. The kit panels were detailed with a combination of the kit decals and ones from Air Scale. A large nut/bolt/washer casting was added to the center leg of the panels for the climate control vent.
The resin seats look good all painted up. I added the brace between the canopy breakers on the front seat, the crotch pull rings from streached sprue, and the leg restraints from Tamyia tape panted blue.
The canopy is vacuformed, and once trimmed up fits quite well. I chose to place it closed as the canopy is so large that it contributes alot to the shape / contour of the aircraft. Plus it is large enough that the cockpit is still qiute visible.
Before the canopy was added the last of the cockpit details were added, including the landing gear leavers to the instrument panels,and parking brake lock to the front panel only.
Color going on, Model Master Gloss Sea Blue.
Markings going on, from the Two Bob's sheet for the T-6A/B
The nose checkers were all individual strips, and singular checkers. The anti glare panel seemed to be the datum for these. The difficult thing was to get it masked symmetrically, and sized correctly. Unfortunately, some of the panel lines shown on the decal instructions are not on the model. Ultimately, it came down to best guess and luck to get the anti glare panel dimensioned and masked. It seems to correct though as in the end, all the checks seem to line up as they should.
This was as far as I got before my break from it. so first thing was to finish the decals.
The final gloss was applied, and the masking from the canopy was removed. There was some touch up required here as the masking had been on so long. Nothing too serious, but annoying non the less. So now the final construction starts...
The kit is still avaliable from Isracast, Spruebros did have some, and the kit has been upgraded so you can build a "B" model as well, main differences are the instrument panels and the "B" has a HUD in the front cockpit.
