Reviews : Academy P51B Mustang Fighter

The Academy P-51B is my first model in 8 years. That being said, I was a bit rusty, but this Academy kit was a good choice to start modeling again. Overall, kit has very good detail, engraved lines are very crisp and the cockpit detail is surprisingly good. Sprues were fairly clean except for some minor ejector pin marks. I decided to build a open canopy model after i saw how nice the cockpit came out. I had minor fit problems through out that required filing most seams. Fit was close but just missed. My main problem was the cockpit assembly pushed out the fuselage, I never could find where it was misaligned. Definitely dry fit all your parts. Very good quality for the price, Highly recommend!

The separate tail section is the only curious aspect of this kit, which is excellent in every other way. The fit is superb, as it is with every other Academy model I've built, and the detail is terrific, especially for the scale. The wooden floor of the Mustang's cockpit is recreated, as is the tread on the tires. The box comes with two types of exhaust stacks, bombs, drop-tanks, and rockets, and a choice of standard or Malcolm hoods, which can both be posed open. There might be some issues with the shape of the wings being incorrect for the P51B, but if you can overlook that minor shortcoming, this is a wonderful, hassle-free build.

I have built three of these, I am hoping to build about five more as I am useing them for a scale airfield. The kit is fairly clean minus some alignment issues. The parts don't require a whole bunch of sanding though. The instructions are pretty straight forward and simple to read. I have had an issue on two that I have made with the decals, no matter what I do, they wont soften that much. I have tried decal setting and softening solution along with heat. I think it is a problem with them being a bit thick.

It builds well with little in the way of fit problems. There are essentially 4 halves of the plane. Each side is split into two sections, and when pairing them together there can be some alignment problems. There is a good number of decal markings available on the sheet, it has several optional loads and the kit has good detail to it. The price is reasonable for a kit of this type and the huge majority of builders are not that concerned with the finer details of things and be very happy with the results.

This is a very good model of an early P-51, for its price, is very well molded, great details. It comes with air-ground rockets and fuel tanks, which are nice additions. The decals were a problem, in my case, especially the Normandy-invasion black and white stripes and the propeller nose cone, i saw that they were too fragile, so i decided to do them with the airbrush instead, with nice results in this case. The assemble work was in general smooth. I liked the way the kit ended up being.

This Model kit from Academy was a wonderful build. Not only did the parts go together very well, I only had to fill in some very small areas with putty and no issues with fitting. I used after market decals from Cartograph and Photo etching from Eduard. I so pleased with the instructions and painting schemes. I am going to build another 5 more with the same decals and paint scheme for a flight of six on an airfield diorama.

The kit went together well. I enjoyed building and painting it. The decals for the invasion stripes were a bit difficult for me. I used micro sol and set for the first time. Needless to say, I should have done more small decals before jumping to big ones.

Great kit! The quality and attention to details is great. There are 3 painting scheme options but unfortunately they not include a Tuskegee one, but it is not hard to make it yourself if needed.