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PREVIEW
Italeri's 1/72 F-14A 'Bombcat'
(Kit # 1202)
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Here's a quick peek in the box at Italeri's F-14a Bombcat in 1/72 scale. The kit is molded in gray plastic, and contains a mixture of raised and recessed surface details. The cockpit in the kit is fairly well represented for a 1/72 kit, and is molded with raised detail rather than the decal options we see so often in 1/72. Marking are provided for two aircraft, one from VF-102, and the other from VF-103. This appears to be a modified re-issue of an earlier kit, as the kit also contains a TARPS pod which would not be used on the Bombcat version. Also, the kit states that this is an F-14A, but the decals represent an F-14B in either case, so I'm not entirely sure which is correct here.
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This sprue contains most of the parts for the fuselage, as well as the landing gear and afterburners. Molding is fairly crisp on this kit, with the only area in need of attention is around the exhausts, where the molding is a little on the pebbly side.
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This sprue contains the remainder of the parts, including the wings, tail, some of the ordnance, and the TARPS pod I mentioned above. The wings on this kit operate, but not in the typical interlocking gear fashion found on many other kits of this type. Instead, the wings are kept in sync by means of a cam, which allows the wings to be opened through the full sweep. The laser guided bombs and LANTIRN targeting pod are also provided on a smaller sprue.
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The clear parts show a little bit of minor distortion, but the nice thing here is that there is no seam to remove, so you can start with your superfine grits, dip it in Future, and it's ready to go.
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And here is the weapons sprue. Molding on these little LGBs and the LANTIRN targeting pod is pretty nice for 1/72 scale. Note: The above image is thumbnailed, so to see a larger image of this sprue, click on the image.
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And here are the decals, again providing markings for either of two aircraft. Everything is printed nice and clearly, and in perfect register. All in all, this looks like a neat little kit to build, and if I built 1/72 jets, I'd have this one on my shelf already!