Background

Arguably Germany’s premier fighter of World War I, the Fokker D.VII quickly won acceptance by its adoptive aircrews as it began to enter service in the summer of 1918. A well-balanced and stable gun platform with exceptional maneuverability and reliability, the D.VII demonstrated significant performance improvement over prior German types, including its famed older brother, the Fokker Dr.1 triplane.

In order to meet wartime demand, Fokker licensed production of the D.VII to Albatross. Albatross cranked out the D.VII at its Johannisthal (Alb) and Schneidemühl Ostdeutsche Albatros Werke (OAW) facilities. Multiple models were manufactured, incorporating running changes and three distinct powerplants – two of Mercedes origin and one from BMW.

By war’s end 2,800 D.VII’s had rolled off of the production lines.

What’s Inside

The interior set is comprised of 2 PE frets (one is pre-painted and has some self-adhesive parts), a small clear film, and a 5-page instruction sheet. There are just over 80 pieces to this set, and it is pretty nice if I say so myself! The instructions are broken down into manageable sections, starting with the cockpit floor. The radio operator’s seat support is replaced, along with the rudder pedals. They also give you the observation window between the rudder pedals (not sure why Italeri didn’t have this). Next are the side walls of the cockpit with 28 pieces. There is not a lot of cutting so far, which was nice, but, you should sand some of the raised detail off to help the self-adhesive parts stick better (notably the fuse panel and trim wheels). Not having used an Eduard set in a while, I was surprised there was no throttle quadrant, just some very small tabs to put on the levers.

Model builders who have plans to build Tamiya’s 1/48 Dewoitine D.520, Pacific Coast Models’ 1/32 Hawker Hurricane Mk.1 or Hobby Boss’ 1/32 Spitfire Mk. Vb should obtain a copy of Kagero’s SUPER MODEL INTERNATIONAL, No.3. before they remove many parts from the sprues. That’s because number 3 in this series devotes the whole issue to building and finishing these three models. Expert model builders Tomasz Chacewicz, Michał Rosiak and Tomek Wajnkaim combine their rather impressive skills to show what can be achieved with these three kits.

The 80 pages (including cover) of this all-color issue are divided into three sections in which each of these builders share how they created their respective masterpieces from these three kits in a modicum of text and a lot of photos…each one a high quality image that adds much to the value of each builder’s instructive chapter.