GOOD KIT,PARTS FIT WELL, NICE DECALS DETAILED, BUT THERE IS SO MUCH YOU CAN DO DETAILING TO MAKE THIS KIT STAND OUT

This is an average Hasegawa kit, for better or worse. The pros: it fits together beautifully; the decals settle down very well, even the big D-Day stripes; and it will result in an accurate-looking little P-47. The cons: there is barely any detail in the cockpit, just an instrument panel and a pilot; the surface detail is shallow; there's no detail in the wheel wells either; and the single-piece canopy fits rather vaguely atop the fuselage with nary a clue to where it's meant to be. Tamiya and Academy both offer a variety of Thunderbolts with greater detail and more options, but Hasegawa's version is cleanly molded and easy to build, making it marginally less fun but slightly more relaxing.

I recently acquired a 1985 box of this kit. Scalemates says it is from the same molds. The cockpit has next to no detail, just a pilot in a seat. The one piece canopy does block the view, so it is not a big deal. The kit went together very well, a joy to build. I am hand painting for now. I used white glue for masking, that was a mistake. After getting the glue off, I ended up doing alternating stripes of green and olive drab with a line of black. Its not historically accurate to anything, but I enjoyed doing it.