Kits

The first thing to realize when building a resin kit is you have to read and reread the instructions. Paul Fisher does an excellent job of not only writing the instructions but also adding tips, painting instructions, and any other needed information for the build.

First, the main wheel well bays needed to be cleaned and the openings trued up. The gear bays were then glued in place. The detail on the wheel wells is phenomenal. The engine face was also painted and glued in place. The exhaust was also painted and added at this point. Once done, the inside of one scoop was glued in place and the top and bottom were sealed. The best way I found to do this was to use thin super glue, letting it flow into the seam an inch or two at a time and immediately accelerating it. This took a little time but it made a difference in the need to fill later. All the seams need to be filled and then sanded and repeated until smooth. This takes a little time, as the leading edges and wing tips require multiple sessions. The beaver tail was added to the back and even with careful clamping, it took several iterations to get clean. The exhaust cone was left out until after final painting.

The Tiger II "Königstiger" (Bengal Tiger) was the most powerful combat tank produced and deployed during World War II. Up to the end of the war, the Allies did not introduce anything that could effectively counter it on the battlefield. The Tiger II combined a powerful and effective gun with thick, sloped armor that was virtually impervious to any Allied tank or anti-tank gun. The Tiger II was armed with a long-barreled 88mm L/71 gun and had 150mm frontal armor and 80mm side armor. Front and side plates were sloped and interlocked, which created a strong defense against Allied firepower. This tank was known as the King Tiger and Royal Tiger.

This kit is of the last production models, so the Henschel/Krupp turret is used. There are nine sprues of yellow plastic, two of black plastic for the tracks, and a small photo etch sheet of mostly engine screens. The sprues are packaged two to a plastic bag, so I had some broken pieces where the sprues rubbed together. The photo etch is a light metal and is some of the finest engines screens I have seen.

This is a most unusual kit to review. It is of PSP – Pierced Steel Planking used during WW II to build runways quickly. It was also called Marsden Mat.

These runways were used mostly in the Pacific theatre of the war. They were assembled quickly by Seabees on the islands of the Pacific as the Allied forces got closer to Japan. They were usually painted olive or black and the steel showed thru as wear took its toll.

This kit consists of a 9.25 by 13 inch base molded in light grey plastic. Most of the base of PSP has some ground cover to show the accessories. The accessories are a lookout tower, sandbags, extra PSP, 55 gal. oil drums, and several petrol cans.

I first sprayed the whole base with a dark grey/black primer. I then drybrushed OD over the PSP and then lightly drybrushed steel to show the wear. I painted the ground surfaces several shades of sand. I used Vallejo acrylic paints on the painted surfaces.

History Brief

This is a “Special Edition” version of the AH-64 as seen during the Iraqi War in 2003. The aircraft was named after the North American Indian nation, the Apache from the southern Great Plains and beyond. Originally manufactured by Hughes Helicopters(1975-1984), then by McDonnell Douglas(1984-1997) and Boeing(1997-present), it was first flown on 30 September 1975, entered service with the US Army in April 1986, and is still on active duty today. The AH-64A features a 4-blade main rotor powered by twin turbine engines, a tandem cockpit, nose mounted sensor suite, upgraded electronic missile equipment system, and a state of the art 30mm (1.2 in) M230 Chain Gun weapon system. When compared to its contemporaries, the Apache is hands-down and by far the most powerful, robust, and sophisticated combat-proven attack helicopter ever devised by man.

The Product:

Plusmodel is expanding their super line and branching out!  This is good news.  Along with their EASY Line of simple resin kits, they are starting to release all-wood kits.  This is a fine example of the art.  This is designed to represent a simple wooden guard stand.  Wood is always handy, and making a guard stand to keep the guards dry is something every soldier looks forward to doing – staying dry!

The kit consists of nine small laser-cut wooden “sprues”.  The rear and side supports are made of a single unit and thicker than the sides, floor, roof, and accessories.  The three outside walls all have nail stud marks in them.  The roof. However. is missing this feature.  The instructions are a simple two-picture diagram and are pretty simple to follow.

Dragon Models has released the Marder II in 1/35 scale, another in an impressive line of German Marder (“Martin”) Tank Destroyer kits.  Based on the venerable Pz.Kpfw. II chassis, this version of the Marder was phased out in 1943 for the Wespe self-propelled gun.  The Marder name lived on, however, being coupled with the excellent Czech 38t chassis in the Marder III, which came in several different forms.

Ultracast’s line of miniature figures now includes a 1/48 scale Russian fighter pilot in the flight gear typical of the early years of WWII.  He obviously is attired for summertime service, decked out in a smart-looking lightweight khaki tunic with decorative embroidery, and blue dress trousers tucked into non-insulated leather boots.  He also appears to be ready to climb into the cockpit because he is wearing his helmet, goggles, and parachute. The original figure was sculpted by Mike Good.  It is a nicely proportioned figure with extremely fine detail and very realistic facial features.

History

What more can be said about the P-40? The P-40 was made famous by the AVG “Flying Tigers”, but was utilized by almost all of the American allies during World War II. The Warhawk was also used in almost every theater of operation during the war.

Every county involved during the war evaluated captured aircraft in some form or another, even with pressing them into service due to the lack of spare parts, such as the example of his kit.

Kit

This is a Limited Edition kit from Hasegawa, and compliments the rest of Hasegawa’s P-40 line. The kit is produced in light grey plastic. It features recessed panel lines with a minimum of flash.

As with most aircraft kits, you start with the cockpit. When complete, you have a nice representation of a P-40 cockpit. One downside is that there are no seatbelts on the seat. You will have to go aftermarket for these.

According to Dragon Model’s web site, this model represents “a vehicle whose main function was combat supply on land and in water. It could tow an amphibious trailer, or alternatively it could work in tandem with another Panzerfahre as a floating ferry platform capable of carrying a 24-ton load.”  However, other than the prototypes, no other vehicles were manufactured.  Yet we get a lovely injection-molded kit of this weird vehicle!!  The Golden Age of Modeling, indeed!

The Kit

Thanks to the fact that this vehicle was basically a floating box, there aren’t many parts to it: just over 90, the largest by far being the upper and lower hull parts, D & Z.  The majority of the remainder is for the Panzer IV-based road wheels, drive sprockets, and idler wheels, and the track return rollers.  And speaking of track, there are two track pieces, one per side, and manufactured out of Dragon’s DS 100 “rubber” material.  Detail on all the parts is very good for the scale, and there were no ejection pin marks or sink marks on any of the parts in my kit.

The old adage Things get better with age may old true to a number of items but this is definitely not one of them.  This kit started life way back in the old days!  It was part of the Max Peerless line and was hitched to their 15CWT and released as kit 3508.  Then, Italeri released the gun as a 6 lb.