High Planes 1/72nd Grumman F8F-2 "Conquest 1" racer

 

“Conquest I” indeed conquered the World Speed Record in 1969. The plane was a highly modified Grumman F8F-2, the most visible changes being a different prop and spinner with a tightly-fitted cowl -basically obscuring the engine, clipped wings and a modified upper fuselage deck with a very small canopy. The same plane, registered N1111L, went trough a series of changes in his appearance, providing modelers with a wide array of decorations to choose from.

Here is the building saga:

https://wingsofintent.blogspot.com/2024/02/grumman-f8f-2-conquest-1-racer-high.html

High Planes has an extensive line of racers that includes modified parts, white metal items and pertinent decals. They have in general a good job regarding the panel lines, and in this case the research for the decals was excellent, and the images well-printed, but time had taken its toll and the decals were useless shattering into smithereens. Part of the nice panel lines are unfortunately obliterated due to the necessary putty and sandpaper work needed to fix the bad fit. Their early kits (of which at one point I had several in my hands) are crudely molded, ill-fitting and difficult to build, requiring modelers of experience and willing to invest the time, patience and skill to obtain a fair reproduction. This is not impossible: you will see nice examples on the Net (Alex Bigey, Patrice Roman and a few others’ models come to mind) but it’s certainly a challenge. I do not have at hand newer kits from High Planes, so can't comment on them. It's mentioned above that at one point I had several of their early kits on my hands -sent as a commission to be built- but they were all returned to the sender in horror, considering that nothing could make up for the time and frustration it would take to build them for another person. The present kit was a gift, so it was decided to build it to honor the kindness of the friend that sent it, but now High Planes is firmly written in my black list, together with Merlin, old Dujin kits, Delta 2 and Mach 2 (all of whom I have built kits from). Pity, because I truly love the subjects that High Planes produces and firmly support the cottage industry, but at this point in my long modeling life I rather build a nice kit, of which the cottage industry by the way has many excellent examples, unfortunately not being the case (at least the old releases) of High Planes. But besides my take on them, please look at reviews and builds online so you will see what other modelers think of them, and come to your own conclusions. There are kits for every type of modeler. And bear in mind that many times there are no other kits of the subjects they offer, unless you want to heavily modify or go scratch.

In any case, with no little harrumph and a lot of work, here is what I think came to be a fair representation of “Conquest I”, yet another racer for the growing stable. I hope this makes my friend Luis S., the gifter of the kit, happy 😉