1:48 UH-1N Formation Lights (Kitty Hawk)

The twin-engine Huey

The UH-1N was created in answer to a demand for a safer machine over water and in the mountains. Instead of a single turbine it received a coupled pair, which gave it a reserve of power and confidence if one failed. It served with the US Marine Corps and the US Air Force and still flies in many countries today. It was precisely on machines that work in pairs and threes after dark that the light panels dealt with here appeared.

What formation lights are

They are dull luminous patches stuck on the sides and the spine of the fuselage that glow with a faint greenish color. The crew of a neighboring machine can see them even with night vision goggles, but from the ground they are almost impossible to make out. By day they look like light rectangles with a fine border, and that is exactly how they have to be captured on a model. By hand that means cutting masking rectangles with sharp corners, which is hard to do in 1:48 scale.

• panels ready to shape, no cutting of tape
• the shade matches the daytime look of an unlit panel
• the dimensions are based on the mold given in the product name
• can also be used afterwards on a finished model

When it pays off

The return here is high: it is a few minutes of work and the result is visible from a distance, because the light rectangles break up the uniform dark finish of the fuselage. Anyone building a machine in its present-day form can hardly do without them. On older Huey versions from the 1960s, by contrast, they have no place on the fuselage, where they would be an anachronism.