Yefim Gordon was born in 1950 in Vilnius, Lithuania (then part of the Soviet Union) and graduated from the Kaunas Polytechnic Institute in 1972. He has been researching Soviet and Russian aviation history for more than 40 years. A professional photographer, Yefim Gordon has published hundreds of features and photographs in Russian and foreign aviation magazines. He has authored and co-authored more than 120 books on Soviet and Russian aviation.

Dmitriy Komissarov was born in 1968 in Moscow and graduated from the Moscow State Linguistics University in 1992. He has worked as a translator ever since, with the most of his work associated with his interest in aviation. Dmitriy Komissarov has authored two books and translated or co-authored more than 50 others. He has also written numerous magazine features in two languages on Soviet and Russian aviation.

It’s an all too rare treat in modeling to stumble across a kit whose subject matter seems truly unique. Even with the wide variety of aircraft, armor, and automobiles available in kit form, the basic points of construction can remain rather similar. Happily, hidden gems are still unearthed from time-to-time among newly released kits, and Hasegawa’s ASTACO Neo is one of these gems.

THANK YOU to our friends and suppliers at Aires/Quickboost (“QB”) for this excellent improvement set for the Academy F-4C/D! And thanks also to the reviewer corps leaders for making them available to me to review….

This set takes the kit components and improves them in the usual “Quickboost” manner … in this set, we are presented with all undercarriage doors to improve the Academy F-4C/D. Included in this 10-part set are all the doors for an F-4C/D, including the main gear doors, the main wheel follow-up doors, the main gear follow-up doors, two different Nose gear forward doors with two clear light lens covers, and the nose gear sideways-opening door. As usual with Quickboost, these items are more refined and defined than the kit bits. Check the side-by-side photos for comparison.