Bestfong 200001: 1/200 Taiwan C-130
PRICE: HK$65.00
KIT: Hasegawa 1/200 C-130
REVIEWER: Richard F
UNITS: 10 Squadron. 19 options. Also available in 1/144

Taiwan, also known as the Republic of China (don't say that in the People's Republic though, or you'll get a frosty reception...), started acquiring a total of 20 C-130s from late 1986. One of them was written off in a crash in 1997, but it seems the other 19 are still on the books. At least some of them are based at Pingtung which is in Taiwan's south. The 10th Tactical Airlift Group flies the Hercules there.
 
The decal set comes with a nice colour print on A4 paper with side views of two (essentially identical) aircraft and a single top view with a scrap view of an engine to show the way the green and grey paints interact. Little numbered arrows point to where the decals go, and the paint references are named and given Mr Color numbers. 

The decal sheet is pretty small, and the only critique I have is that the national insignia seem maybe just a little soft. The rest looks pretty good - there are legible serial numbers and various yellow and red markings for doors and warning lines, plus other labels. There are enough numbers to do every plane in the air force, and a little guide to which aircraft (1301, 1302 etc) get which serial numbers (85-0013, 85-0014 etc). 

All in all it's a neat little package and one I look forward to using with my Hasegawa C-130H kit.
By the different product number you can also get the same thing in 1/144 scale.
I bought mine from www.kitshobby.com, a small company in Hong Kong run by a dude named Kit Leung. Because their website is in Chinese, I wrote to them in my (pretty elementary) Mandarin. I was pleased to receive, very promptly, a friendly reply in fluent English. The deal was done over paypal the next day and the decals arrived from Hong Kong in a few days. I was very pleased with Kit's service and non-Chinese speakers can feel completely comfortable dealing with him by email.

Richard F

April 2015

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