MD-500 TOW Defender
Academy 1/48
We bought this kit about a year ago when we were just starting the hobby and also an addition for our collection of helicopters. It’s a cheap kit also! We could buy another one for other country marking, it cost around P225 pesos.
Short Description:
The MD Helicopters MD 500 series is an American family of light utility civilian and military helicopters. The MD 500 was developed from the Hughes 500, a civilian version of the US Army's OH-6A Cayuse/Loach. The series currently includes the MD 500E, MD 520N, and MD 530F.
Source: Wikipedia
About the kit:
When you open the box, it contains 3 sprues and 1 clear part. Although, it has recessed lines in some areas, you would want to rescribe. We have also the MH-6 Littlebird version from Academy. The noticeable difference between the two are the markings which the MH-6 doesn’t have, the MH-6 has a tinted yellowish canopy and windows, while the MD-500 is transparent. If you want to build the MH-6 Academy version, I would suggest buying another MD-500 kit as the MH-6 only calls for a black scheme with no markings, on a side comment. Four figures are also included. The markings are for Kenya, Israel and Paris Air Show. I have noticed that for the Israeli Air Force marking it doesn’t include the yellow V located beside the Israeli logo which is common for some Israeli helicopters. I started this kit after the internals. Before you start to build the kit you should know which painting scheme you like.
Construction and painting:
I chose the Kenyan Air Force, because I wanted to try a camouflage version. I started the construction with the cockpit. But you have to align part A5 properly; I dry fitted the fuselage and cockpit until I get the position properly for both cockpit and main rotor. I painted the figures, for the Negro look it was a mix of black and black grey for the tone, after that I attached the joystick last. I advise that you should cement the foot pedals and part D15 last before you cement the fuselage, because these are flimsy parts which can be easily broken, because, I broke it several times. The next step is the windows, these were dipped into future and I left it for a day. But I didn’t know I had to mask them first before attaching it to the fuselage. This was the advice to me. I attached this using white glue. After the fuselage was attached, I applied putty to remove the seam running in the fuselage these were sanded with 600-1000 grit. The whole interior is glossed and I washed it with black using soft pastel. I airbrushed smoke grey into the windows for a realistic effect.
The main rotor was drooped a little as what I view in pictures of the real thing. I did not detail much the main rotor because for me it was too small to be noticed. The blades were painted black grey, the central rotor is steel while the details (where the blades are attached) were painted metallic grey, and finally the rotor head is gloss black. I used Gunze Mr. Colors for painting.
After attaching the fuselage, I assembled the TOW pods, I had difficulty in aligning these, you might notice that it wasn’t properly aligned compared to the real chopper. The same goes with the skids.
This helicopter is a tail-sitter, which will break the hook under it. I lost this part and had to scratch-build it, and it was annoying because I had to do it more than once. After everything is assembled, the manual states sandy brown as the base color and khaki green for the camouflage. I compared it with my references and to me, it is incorrect. So I made my own mix. For the base color I used a mix of sandy brown, tan and white and for the camouflage I used a shade of green, mix with a little gray and white. After base coat, I masked the camouflage using blu-tack. For the antenna, I used stretch sprues (I followed the manual for the actual size). I washed black to all panel lines using chalk pastels. In pictures that I have for MD-500 helicopters there are hand rails located beside the passenger doors, the kit does not include this. For more detailed appearance you can scratch build this but be sure to have reference photo of it.
Decaling:
Before doing the decals, I sprayed future (wipe n shine) and cured it for a day. Upon attaching the decals I had accidentally torn the decals for the tail rotor tips, because the decals for the tail rotor were too thin. So the remedy for it is to paint it. I aligned the Kenyan insignia and other stencils, except for the danger stencil and the orange background because of the location it was very difficult to align. I used the decal of the kit for the main rotor, although you can have the option of painting it orange. I sprayed 3 coats of gloss to seal everything.
Conclusion:
Overall, I recommend this kit to those who want a series of the MD-500/OH-6/MH-6/AH-6 family and variations of this little helicopter. For the price of 225.00php, it was really worth the money. The detail is also good. There is minimal flash for a kit this old. The kit itself was based originally from the Dragon kit. I rate this from the scale of 8 over 10. This was a fun build for me, because this is the first time I’m doing a camouflage scheme.
Some pictures taken by me:
