FCM Decals | 32018: N.A. T-6 Texan
Reviewed by Rato Marczak
FCM Decals is a well known decal manufacturer from Brazil. Being printed by Microscale from USA, they are on par with the best decals on the market. Although many decal sets from FCM are understandably about Brazilian Air Force aircraft, they also have an interesting range of sets for modern and vintage military aircraft, and we will be reviewing some of them here at LSP.
This particular sheet, 32018, is very specific for Brazilian AF NA T-6/SNJ Texans. Brazilian AF was a great user of these birds in liaison, reconnaissance, and ground attack roles well up to 1970s.
The set is very well printed, as you would expect from Microscale. The artwork is signed by Felipe Miranda, the man behind FCM decals.
The sheet allows you to decorate 3 aircraft. Version 1 is a T-6D 1559 of the Brazilian Demonstration Squadron (“Smoke Squadron”), and exemplifies perfectly the last livery of the squadron in 1977, in white/blue finish with the red bolt, prior to its conversion to the Embraer T-27 Tucano. Version 2 is an all yellow SNJ-5C (BAF sn 1702) used by the 2nd Liaison and Observation Sqdn, circa 1962. Version three is a beautifully Green/Brown/Gray camouflaged T-6D (1667) of the 41 Reconnaissance & Attack squadron during 1962.
The sheet was in perfect register and saturation. As for the kit, you don’t have many choices here other than the good Kitty Hawk T-6 offering. The instructions are easy to read, and there are very few stencils to apply. Federal Standard color calls are used.
The T-6 was used by many countries during its 50+ years of active service, so you have a lot of painting schemes to choose from. On the other hand, my personal impression is that decal manufacturers are not really paying much attention to the Texan in our beloved scale. This sheet will provide you with three quite colorful schemes, in Microscale/FCM quality.
Recommended.
© Rato Marczak 2019
This review was published on Friday, January 11 2019; Last modified on Friday, January 11 2019