Welcome to the IPMS/USA Reviews site!

Introduction: The primary organization of the IPMS/USA Review website is by IPMS/USA National Contest Class. Within each Class there are sub-menus by kits, decals, books, etc. The Miscellaneous Class is for items that are not class specific or that cross two or more classes.

IPMS/USA Members: We encourage you to submit reviews, both here and to the Journal. To volunteer for membership in the IPMS/USA "Reviewers Corps" and submit your own reviews, please read the Guidelines For Submitting Product Reviews.

Manufacturers, publishers, and other industry members: IPMS/USA is pleased to offer your company the opportunity for product reviews. All product reviews are performed by IPMS/USA members, and are posted in the publicly-accessible section of our website. With very few exceptions, we perform full build reviews of new kit releases, aftermarket products, and supplies. If you would care to provide product samples for review, please contact John Noack, IPMS/USA 1st VP.

To learn more about IPMS/USA, please see our About Us page.

Review Author
Floyd S. Werner Jr.
Published on
Company
Furball Aero-Design
Scale
1/48
MSRP
$19.99

Who doesn’t like the bad guys? I’ve always had an affinity for them. I wanted to know who they were and how they operated. Well these decals from Furball Aero-Design highlight the ‘psuedo’ bad guys, the OPFOR or Aggressors as the Navy calls them. The F-5N and F-5F adversaries are some colorful aircraft used to replicate potential bad guys.

There are eight aircraft included on this sheet. They have markings that are sure to motivate you to build one of these. These are quite colorful and offer a variety of paint schemes.

The decals are packaged in a large ziplock bag with full color instructions for every aircraft. Inside you are treated to high quality paper printed on both sides in beautiful color. Each aircraft has it own page. There are five 8.5 x 11inch sheets. The cover shows the colorful selection. Then the aircraft are shown. There are seven F-5Ns and one F-5F. The back page contains the stencil instructions.

Review Author
Floyd S. Werner Jr.
Published on
Company
Master Model
Scale
1/48
MSRP
$7.00

The Do-335 has been well represented in 1/48th scale with the old, but venerable, Monogram kit and the more recent Tamiya one.

Master has had a long held reputation of producing some extremely accurate turned metal barrels and this set is no different. Packaged with a card stock protective backing inside a little ziplock bag are the five beautifully rendered pieces. The nose blast tube is in the front spinner, along with two 30mm cannon barrels on top of the fuselage is included. There is also a pitot tube and FuG-25 antenna. All of them are thin and have no mold lines and are perfectly round. Something I cant do in plastic. The best thing about these sets is that they are stronger and thinner than plastic.

The instructions are easy to understand and follow. You will have to drill some holes but the size and location are clearly shown.

Book Author(s)
Andy Evans
Review Author
Jim Pearsall
Published on
Company
SAM Publications
MSRP
$25.82

The Panavia Tornado started out as the MRCA (Multi Role Combat Aircraft). The idea was to apply the latest (1970s) technology to an aircraft which could do a number of jobs, replacing “older” aircraft like the Fiat G-91, the Blackburn Buccaneer, and the Lockheed F-104. The Tornado is a cooperative project, with Britain, Germany and Italy participating in design and production tasks. The only “foreign” user of the Tornado is the Royal Saudi Air Force.

This book covers the Tornado through development and most of its service life. The RAF plans to retire their Tornadoes in 2019, Italy retired theirs in 2004. The Luftwaffe may retire theirs in 2025. Or not. The Saudis plan to keep theirs until 2020 or so. All 4 of the users have had combat missions flown by their Tornadoes. A recce mission flown by the Luftwaffe over Bosnia in 1995 was the first combat mission flown by the Luftwaffe since 1945.

Review Author
Floyd S. Werner Jr.
Published on
Company
Eduard
Scale
1/48
MSRP
$15.00

The options for the Tamiya kit are plentiful. What more could you ask for? Well how about opened panels, such as the 20mm Gondola gun pods? Having built up both the Eduard and the Tamiya Bf-109G-6s I think the open gun pods on the wings adds visual interest. When accompanied with the positionable cowling arrangement on the Tamiya kit these little gems will set your kit apart.

Packaged in a typical Brassin blister pack with the contents protected by foam and cardboard are twelve pieces of grey resin and one fret of photo etch. The instructions are on two small double sided pages with line drawings that show everything you need to do and the order that you need to do it in.

The set is actually easy to use. Easier than you would have thought. Removing the parts from the pour blocks is simple enough and fitting the parts to the model is simple a matter of aligning and gluing them in place.

Review Author
Floyd S. Werner Jr.
Published on
Company
Eduard
Scale
148
MSRP
$7.95

The Tamiya Bf-109G-6 is an awesome kit. There are some areas that could use upgrading. One of those areas is the wheels.

Eduard supplies three light grey resin pieces and a mask set inside their typical blister pack. The detail is far superior to the kit offering. The one thing that you will notice is that the wheels have bulged sidewalls and flat bottoms. This is especially nice on the tail wheel which should have a distinct bulge. The bulge is not overdone and looks very convincing.

The instructions are included on a small sheet that points out exactly what needs to be done. The only thing that really needs to be done, other than remove and paint, is to drill a hole for the tail wheel strut in the appropriate tail wheel mount.

The wheels are keyed for the Tamiya kit so they will fit perfectly.

Masks are also provided to use on both the main and tail wheels. The instructions show you how to use them.