Halberd Models 1/32 Curtiss SC-1 Seahawk

By John Cicchino

After an extended labor of love, here is my Halberd SC-1 Seahawk. Halberd have done a tremendous job with the kit and it was thoroughly enjoyable to build. There were for me; however, a fair share of unexpected starts and stops none which are the fault of the kit.

After assembling the airframe I thought all was good until I started noticing the alignment just did not look right. At this point, using some very agricultural means I sawed through and separated the main pylon and float, and removed both the stabilizers and wing floats. Then, out came the levels, 1-2-3 blocks and jigs to ensure every protuberance was square, plumb, symmetrical and and straight; something I should have done from the very start, and something I will always do moving forward. In fairness to Halberd, I no doubt rushed through my initial effort.

With everything reassembled, I now knew that the alignment of the SC-1 was correct and I could finally progress to finishing the kit. The last hurdle to clear was getting a replacement windscreen from Andrey at Halberd - mine had for some reason become cloudy and could not be sanded or polished out, The last and to me most tedious step in the entire build was attaching of the antenna mast and rigging the antenna wire. Fit of the mast to the windscreen is less than exact; I ended up sanding a flat on both the mast and the windscreen to create a viable mating surface. I added a scratch built life raft pack made out of Milliput to the cockpit to add some cover and liven things up.

Things were progressing nicely until I started to paint the airframe; at which point an unusually frigid Florida winter intervened and wreaked havoc with the paint job. I ultimately needed to strip and repaint the entire model. For the paint I used MRP lacquers weathered with various washes and oils - my intent was to really beat it up as evidenced in reference pics. This was my first time using oils as a significant part of the weathering process. So much still to learn, but I think I am hooked!

I used the kit decals for the fuselage insignia, the propeller warning strip on the float and the small USN aircraft bureau numbers; all other markings were cut in Silhouette and sprayed on. The fuselage insignia decals were extremely fragile to the point of needing to use all 8 of the kit’s included decals to get two to actually work. The wing insignia were painted from masks using the kit decals as a guide; they were actually undersized. I ended up resizing and repainting the upper wing insignia, but the lower wing remains undersized. The model depicts an SC-1 from the USS Guam in 1945.

I can’t emphasize enough on the quality of the Halberd kit and its molding. It is a very straightforward build, but the solid wings and float make for a very heavy model. I do wish Halberd had offered the SC-1 with just a couple of modifications namely providing open cowl and engine flaps to add some visual interest. I also would have preferred a clearer vacuform canopy to the clear resin parts included in the kit - I just think the finesse would have been that much better.

The finished model is not small, coming close to a P-47 in size; it make for a pretty impressive addition to the display shelf! All in all, this is the second Halberd kit I’ve built and there is nothing preventing me from happily building another. It's a little off the beaten path, but a really cool plane that was made obsolete by helicopters just a few years after it entered service.

Thanks for dropping by!

Halberd Models 1/32 Curtiss SC-1 Seahawk

By John Cicchino

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