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René Hieronymus
23 articles

Grumman XF6F-1 Hellcat, the "Copycat" 1:72

July 10, 2016 · in Aviation · · 6 · 2.5K

Hi there,

this week I will start with a little series of one of my favorite aircraft, the Grumman .
During the years I have built several versions of this aircraft and I will show you a few of them, that is if you like. And which one would be better suited to start with than the Hellcat prototype. Due to its great resemblance to its predecessor the F4F Wildcat it was sometimes referred to as the “Copycat”. The main difference between this early version and later Hellcats: this one features a slightly modified cowling, cuffed propeller with a spinner as well as different main gear doors as well as few other minor details.
I started this from an Hellcat kit, perhaps the best kit in 1:72 available at the moment. Until today I have built over 40 Hellcats, mostly in different versions and I will show you quite a few of them during the next week

Have fun with this little beauty and if there are any questions, just let me know.

Cheers

René

Reader reactions:
4  Awesome

12 additional images. Click to enlarge.


6 responses

  1. A beautiful build, Rene...I admire anyone who can create such detail in a rather small-ish scale (at least for me). Nicely done, sir - and we look forward to others.

  2. Great job, 40 'cats ? that's love.

  3. An excellent selection of subjects and one not often seen modeled. You did a fine job on her.

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    P.k said on July 11, 2016

    good prototype coverzion

    LIKE!

  5. As soon as I saw the name René I knew I was in for a treat - and was not disappointed! I look forward to the seeing more of the 'Cats!

  6. Nice work, particularly on the prop. The cowling is different because the XF6F-1 was powered by an R-2600. It actually wasn't much better than a Wildcat, only some 20mph faster. They were really lucky they talked the Navy into putting an R-2800 into the XF6F-3 - those extra 400 horses really mattered.

    I haven't seen anyone do the first prototype before, so you've really done something very original.

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