This is another kit designed for Zvezda's war-game "Art of Tactic". This time it is a Vickers K machine-gun with a crew of 4, used by the BEF in France in 1940.

There are 25 parts including the gun, 4 crewmen, a base, and a flag piece for the game, as well as a movement card. Most of the parts make up the crew, with only 4 parts for the gun, and one of these includes the arm of the gunner. It is the usual snap-together kit made out of their usual softer plastic. The parts can be trimmed with a sharp knife but cleaning up the mold line on the figures is difficult. Tamiya liquid glue was used to help keep things together.

Great Wall is a company new to me. I have seen their wonderful P-61 in a much larger scale and was impressed. This kit of the Avro Vulcan B.2 is equally impressive, especially considering the small scale.

Upon opening the box, I was Impressed with the packaging. Everything was either wrapped in plastic or foam paper. The fuselage is broken in half horizontally. I really liked the one-piece intakes that fit perfectly. In fact, every piece on this kit fits beautifully. No filler was needed at all.

Due to locating pins in the wings, they snapped together perfectly. This was the best fitting kit I have ever built.

I didn’t forget to add a nose weight before closing the fuselage. The kit includes an instrument panel and two pilots which I didn’t put in, as they cannot be seen thru the tiny windscreen.

1/24th scale, molded in “WRX” mica blue, black, clear and chrome; includes window masking templates, photo etched parts on an adhesive backing, and metal hood brace. The kit makes one version.

History and Research

The Subaru BRZ (B=boxer enginer, R=rear wheel drive, Z=last letter in the alphabet) is a result of a joint collaboration between Toyota and Subaru. It was designed as a world car and is known by the names Subaru BRZ, Toyota GT86, and the Scion FR-S. They are all powered by a flat “boxer”-style 4-cylinder engines in all models and is engineered by Subaru. Most of the rest of the development of the car was the work of Toyota.