KTH80103 1:48 Kitty Hawk F-35A Lightning II MODEL KIT

Let me start by stating this kit requires a lot of experience and a tremendous amount of patience. If you have both you will be absolutely pleased with the finished product. As with other Kitty Hawk models the surface detailing is amazing. KH did especially well with the amount of detail paid to the engine, weapons bay, ejection seat and cockpit. The kit includes photo-etched parts, external pylons, position-able canopy, as well as positional-able trailing / leading edge flaps. Now for the bad news. The instructions are woeful. Some of the directions are confusing to read or missing altogether. The illustrations are somewhat accurate but there are steps where the diagram displays parts you need to attach without any labels. There was a low-quality insert loosely placed in the instruction booklet that corrected a step constructing the weapons bay - make sure you look at all the information in the box. The instruction booklet is also not in color (which wouldn't be a big deal if all the instructions were actually there). The decal instructions are in color but some of the decals are labelled incorrectly. An experienced modeler should be ok using only the illustrations printed in the instructions - just don't expect the descriptions to be always be there when you need them. I had two major issues with mold. The first was some attachment pins were the same (male to male or female to female), I have not seen that happen on any kit I've assembled. Secondly, the sprues are THICK and the persistent need to sand every part you take off the sprue gets old real quick. I realize my comments are harsh but I am only trying to emphasize how difficult this build could be for an amateur builder. I plan on building the KH B and C versions of the F-35 too. I just need some time to pass so I can forget what building this was like for me.

I had no idea just how much of a superb and well thought out compromises in design this fighter really is until I went hands on with the model kit. When I say "compromise" I don't mean it in a bad way either! The balancing act rests between agility, speed, stealth, range,payload and overall size. The F-35 has a very good balance in all categories. I think a lot of doubters will be very surprised when the F-35 is ready for combat. Lets not forget that this is not made to be an airshow plane, it's a war machine!The parts fit very well, 99% of the time, but the parts that are a bit "difficult" are fairly easy to overcome so no big deal. I can't wait for the 1/32nd scale to come out. Same for the other 2 F-35 models as well as the F-22 Raptor.