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LPS Hobby 1/72 Republic P-47 Thunderbolt Decals

By Chris Banyai-Riepl

Overview

The Tamiya 1/72 P-47 Thunderbolt remains the best in this scale, being both accurate and a joy to build. Given that, we really cannot have too many aftermarket decal sheets for the kit. Since the P-47 was a very popular aircraft during the Second World War, there is no shortage of markings, either. LPS Hobby has jumped into military subjects with three new decal sheets covering the P-47.

The Decals

Since all of these showed up at the same time, and they're all designed for the Tamiya P-47 kit, I thought it would be easier to just cover them in one batch. Each sheet provides markings for three aircraft, covering both razorback and bubbletop versions as well as US and RAF examples.

Starting with the first sheet, this one is LPM72-04, "Gabreski's Razorbacks". As can be ascertained from the title, this sheet contains three razorback P-47s, all flown by Francis Gabreski in the 61st FS, 56th FG. The first is HV-F from November 1943 and the second is HV-A from December 1943, both camouflaged in olive drab and neutral gray. HV-F has a white cowl front and white tail stripes, with the national insignia outlined in red. HV-A has a red cowl front and red rudder. Both of these aircraft have the Curtiss Electric propeller and operated out of Halesworth, England. The third option is HV-Z, a natural metal option with a red cowl front and red rudder from May 1944. This plane has a name written on the side and a crown painted on the cowling, and has the Hamilton Standard propeller and flew from Boxted, England.

The second sheet, LPM72-05, is "8th Air Force Thunderbolts". This sheet has two razorbacks and one bubbletop, all camouflaged. The first aircraft is "Mary", IV-L, from the 369th FS, 359th FG, which has a green cowl front and white stripes on the tailplanes. The invasion stripes have been crudely overpainted. The second option is a very colorful war-weary aircraft, 5F-A, from the 5th Emergency Rescue Squadron. The cowl is striped red, white and blue, and there are full invasion stripes on the fuselage and wings. Yellow stripes are on the tail and wings. Finally, there is the bubbletop MX-E from the 82nd FS, 78th FG, which is camouflaged in RAF colors, dark green over sky. It has a checkerboard cowling, invasion stripes, and a top hat under the windscreen.

The third sheet, LPM72-06, is "British Thunderbolts". This sheet has one razorback and two bubbletop options, all three from 73 OTU out of Fayid, Egypt. One of the bubbletop options is quite striking, finished in overall black with a red lightning bolt running down the fuselage side from the red cowl front. The other two options are camouflaged in dark green and sea gray over light gray. One is a razorback and the other is a bubbletop, and both have the squadron Ace of Spades playing card on the cowl. The razorback is HD176, white 36, while the bubbletop is KJ159, white 30.

The decals in all three sheets are very nicely printed by Microscale and include stenciling and national markings for one aircraft. While I can understand limiting the stenciling to just one aircraft due to space constraints, I do wish these sheets had the national markings for all three options, especially for the British sheet, as often times the kit decals won't quite match the other decals in terms of color and thickness.

Conclusion

Despite the small nit about the national insignia, these sheets really are quite nice, and provide some very interesting options for the P-47 fan. In fact, since these are all interesting schemes, I would recommend picking up nine kits and build them all. You'd have a lot of fun building nine Tamiya Thunderbolts, and you'd have some very colorful and interesting markings at the end. My thanks to LPS Hobby for the review samples.