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Pavla 1/48 Sea Vixen Cockpit Set

By Chris Banyai-Riepl

Overview

Quite a few were excited to see Airfix come out with a 1/48 de Havilland Sea Vixen, and now that it is out the more detail-oriented are already looking for aftermarket upgrade sets. Pavla has stepped up with this cockpit set, providing the front office with an impressive upgrade.

The Parts

This set comes with just about everything you need to detail up the cockpit of your Sea Vixen. There is a one-piece cockpit tub that has quite a bit of molded in detail, two seats, instrument panels, and a clear vacuformed canopy to show it all off.

Starting with the seats, this set accurately captures the differences between the pilot and navigator seats. Both seats come as one piece, with everything molded in place. This includes the complex seat harness and seat eject pull handles. Moving on to the cockpit tub itself, this will have the modeler busy for some time, painting all the molded-in detailing. There is a separate insert to divide the pilot's compartment from the navigator, and there are separate rudder pedals, throttle controls, and control stick.

Moving on to the various instrument panels, these are very nicely done. The pilot's instrument panel includes the upper coaming and gunsight. This slides into the one-piece tub via large and positive attachments, so there won't be any problem with alignment. The navigator's instrument panel is in two parts, and has similar detailing to the pilot's panel (even though it will be very difficult to see through the small opening.

The completed cockpit will fit into the kit without any modification to the kit parts, making this a great upgrade. The vacuformed canopy provides both the windscreen and sliding portion, with a separate splitter for the windscreen. The navigator's canopy comes in a resin frame, with the modeler left to provide the thin clear part.

Conclusion

This is a great upgrade for the Airfix Sea Vixen, both highly detailed and simple to implement. My thanks to Pavla for the review sample.