This is all superb, but the Eduard windshield and canopy remains uncorrected. I doubt the Eduard fuselage could take a "real" canopy without further surgery, or nose deck replacement parts, as the discrepancy is large, but it is marginally possible... From a logical point of view, a quicker path to a better result would have been to offer an open engine/nose guns set to the Hasegawa 1/48th kit, with a separate kit for opening the wingroot gun panels maybe... Judging from the amount of builds online, the popularity of the Eduard kit seems to exceed that of the Hasegawa kit by a ratio of 20 to 30 to one, so this release does make sense from that point of view... Whether an easier to build kit that is 20 to 30 times better, and yet is 20 to 30 times less popular, makes sense, I'll leave that to your appreciation... Gaston

or maybe that the eduard kit usually costs 20-30% less and is 20-30 times easier to find (yes these stats are a joke)

I just looked at the amounts of builds online and in several site "galleries"... For over two years after its release there was not a SINGLE built 1/48th Hasegawa A-5+ FW-190 to be found anywhere on the web... The 30:1 ratio I cite is probably an understatement... This is probably in part because of the (deserved) poor reputation of Hasegawa's A-3/A-4s, which by association effectively ruined the "perception" of those later-war kits that came out a year later in 2008... In fact, from the A-5 onward, the clear parts were completely re-worked into real masterpieces, and they are still the only accurate FW-190 canopies ever offered by some margin, this especially so for the blown version... See how the Tamiya effort compares, having a similar width excess of 20%(!), just like the Eduard kit, compared to the real windshield (the acual thing being identical to Hasegawa on the left) as measured on a relic at 250 mm wide per 480 mm long(the Eduard windshield is longer and thus better than the much too short Tamiya windshield here, which also sits far to vertical on the model): To be fair to Karaya's effort, it is easier to make an open-engine model using the Eduard FW-190A because the Hasegawa kit is full of thick, hard brittle plastic in all the openable areas, so it would be a real bear to do an open wing root gun bay kit or even just an open engine kit because of the huge solid square plastic "cube" moulded in there to support the engine... Despite its accuracy excellence, I did not find the superior Hasegawa kit to be pleasant to build, and it might be even less so if a lot of heavy-duty cutting and sawing needs to be done to open panels... This is so much so, I am considering purchasing the Karaya correction kit to see if I could not adapt the Hasegawa canopy to the Eduard kit... The only thing holding me back is that, like all FW-190 kits, Eduard did not bother replicating the "wingtip washout" feature of the FW-190 wing, neither did Hasegawa, and this is very difficult to do neatly on this aircraft type because there is a complicated panel line with heavy rivets going right into the most heavily re-worked wing leading edge area (unlike the Spitfire, which shares this washout feature, but in a smoother area)... So far only 2 Tamiya kits have ever tried to replicate this important aerodynamic feature in 1/48th scale kits: The P-47 and the A6M... Note that the P-51, Me-109, Ki-43, P-39, P-40, P-38 are all among the many fighter types that did NOT have the leading edge washout feature, and probably none of the bombers and transport did either. Note again that the lack of this feature is very severe on the Spitfire which underlines the leading edge with a yellow line to very obvious effect... Not so obvious under the 190s camouflage but still... No doubt the Karaya set makes the Eduard kit a much more attractive option, and the replacement resin cowl gun throughs are apparently longer and more accurate than the Hasegawa cowl gun throughs... Come to think of it, I might even look them up... Gaston

Dear All, The canopy and windscreen problems were widely discussed here some time ago when we have published first "in progress" photos. Gaston made a good point with windscreen and I have explained why it remains unamended. Just to make long story short: to correct the windscreen means to reshape whole nose and also kit parts as the fuselage halves. The canopies as such were also foreseen for this kit, unfortunately the clear resin casting went out bad. The results were not satisfactory. Maybe next time with improved technology we will be able to cast both flat and bulged canopies. Maybe some vacuform with PE parts. We'll see. Currently we're working with the same kit but for the A-5/A-6 variants. More details will follow. Kind regards, Jakub Plewka

I am sorry to hear your clear resin parts did not work out Jakub... But all is not lost, as it might be possible for modellers to adapt the Hasegawa clear parts to the Eduard kit for an all-open build... I have tried to build the Hasegawa kit, and did not find it a pleasant experience: The plastic is hard and brittle, the panel lines super fine and shallow. Most annoying, the wings have a continuous uppper and lower profile curve which makes sharpening the trailing edges very difficult without causing a "transition step" because of the sharpness I add, inside and outside, near the edge... (I always try for in-scale trailing edges, which is often a source of trouble) The Hasegawa tailplanes are very thick also, with heavy elevator details. I might try to salvage my Hasegawa build, but it was not easy with the way I like to sharpen the wings, plus creating the leading edge washout with those shallow panel lines in the way, and with the heavy detail Hasegawa has put on the ailerons and tailplanes... That being said, the Eduard is not reputed to be easy either, but the trailing edges might be easier to deal with, and I will probably try one with the Karaya set... I especially like the longer, more accurate Karaya nose gun openings... A big plus in my book... Your captured Butcherbird decals are amazing by the way... Gaston