dating back to 1994 these are hardly "latest releases"
Having hunted through the expanse of the internet to find a few of these kits at a reasonable price (which I am not about to state in case my wife reads this) I have finally collected enough of these to start a build. The fact that these are short-run kit means that I will be facing a lot of fitting, filling and sanding, but they are the last three aircraft I need to complete the Japanese for my Far East air combat game so I will just have to "power through" to the end. Wish me luck!
More Like a Cliff!
When I open one of these "limited run" kits I expect to find a relatively crude kit, lacking in the refinements available in high-end mass produced models. it is one of the trade-offs that you make when you want something truly unusual. But these models do violence to the idea. They are very roughly cast (although oddly possessed of some very fine surface detail) with lots of thick flash, badly warped and have simply massive flow-channels. Pretty much the only real upside is that the strange soft (almost mushy) plastic reacts well to liquid cement and sands very easily. This is going to be a real challenge.
it didn't look that bad at first
the massive extractor posts all over the inside were not fun to remove
flash was ever-present!
hilariously there is a etched brass fret of detail parts!
and these hyper-detailed instructions
after a bit of struggle caused by the two halves of the fuselage not agreeing
about the basic shape of the aircraft I got them together and installed the pilot
parts fit was less than optimal
casting left a lot to be desired as well
but I'm not shy about using putty if I have to!
and I had to, a lot
assembling the struts and upper wing was the source of much harsh language
the complete lack of locating holes didn't help
but in the end it came together pretty well
I am angry that the box-art showed spats but the kit does not contain any
to me the aircraft looks a LOT like a Curtiss P6-E
lessons learned made getting the next two started a great deal easier
Stick at it! I'm sure it will be worth it.
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