Saab Draken – Eduard vision for Hasegawa kit

Saab Draken is a very special aircraft for me. It was one of the first built model kits that I’ve seen in my childhood. The version I saw was 1/100 and I cannot tell who was the manufacturer of it. What I remember was poorly painted airplane, with extremely attractive design /that was mid 1980s/ and fogged canopy. Whatever the case was, I was fascinated by the model, by the plane and even by the assembly. Looking back now, I understand that it was less than mediocre built, but it was my first view of such a thing.

In 2008 Hasegawa announced their new-tooling Draken and I was very fast buying one, but just before I started building it, one fellow fighter pilot begged me for it, and I parted with it. I made a good choice, because after a while Hasegawa started flooding the market with numerous versions of it, each one better that the previous one. They featured nice schemes, bright colors and everything that you might think of in terms of “fashion”.

Well, I haven’t bought any of them since, but this summer Eduard was pleased to announce their own view of what a perfect Saab Draken should look like. They got the Draken from Hasegawa and repacked the thing, adding their own spices. Masks are the first thing to notice of course. Then photo-etched cockpit and engine parts comes around. After that, the necessary cockpit details and wheels from resin, which are the best add-on to the kit in my opinion. And lastly are the decals from Cartograf. This is one of the add-ons which will be among the most welcomed.

The Saab Draken kit is going to be a Limited Edition of course, but we cannot be certain is it going to be the last Draken on the line. However, it’s not worth risking and missing this kit, so knowing what we have in the Hasegawa box, and knowing the usual high quality of Eduard’s stuff, I can highly recommend it even before I got my own piece!