Minicraft recently released a second decal scheme for their Beech Bonanza F-33 kit. Along with the Bonanza model, this display stand was looking for a home and a kind word on the IPMS Review Corps list.

This stand is packaged in an industrial strength clear plastic bag with a cardboard fold-over label stapled to the bag top. There are four parts of clear plastic, attached to the sprue with somewhat discrete attachment stubs. With care the parts can be removed with minimal stub marks left. These can be polished out, or the base can be painted.

The parts fit easily together. The vertical shaft slides into the round base and fits securely without glue. This shaft can be cut down to any desired length. Make sure you insert the solid end of the shaft into the base. The top has a hole drilled for the ball joint. Remember this also if shortening the shaft. I left mine as is.

This product is a premade diorama grass mat that represents the steppe region of Russia. A steppe is a vast area which is usually a level grassy, treeless tract of land. This mat’s measurement are 5 inches by 9 inches, or 130mm by 230mm to our metric speaking friends.

The mat is packaged nicely in a plastic, hanging container with a paper backing slid in and stapled. There is some grass and stones that came lose in shipping that make it look a little messy. This loose debris can be glued back onto the mat with a little white glue with very little effort. There are two colors of grasses represented, plus what looks like little tuffs of cactus needle fuzz. The different sizes of rocks look like the walnut kitty litter my cat uses but represents rocks very well. There also are some areas of little, light green speckles that appear to be moss.

This is a new tooled kit first issued in 2017. It is an excellent kit in the Hasegawa range and is very easy to build as long as you watch the instruction details carefully.

In the box is:

• 2 x orange sprues
• 1 clear sprue
• 1 light grey sprue
• 3 x dark grey sprues
• 1 length of hose
• 1 decal sheet
• 4 x poly caps
• 1 instruction booklet

The sprues are extremely well molded with no flash and great detail. The parts are all molded in the correct colors so if the build is done well there is no need to do much painting.