THANK YOU to our friends and suppliers at Aires for another improvement set, in this case for the Roden He 51b series biplane (which was also released by Eduard in a double set along with their ME-109 for the 1936 Spanish civil war. And thanks also to the reviewer corps leaders for making this set available to me to review….

This set provides two gun barrels with a center web for directly replacing the kit items. The detail provided is an improvement in that the gun barrels are (1) more scale in size than the kit items, and (2) have microscopic holes drilled in the front of the barrels, as well as cooling holes, so they look like functional gun barrels.

Quick installation: Remove the parts from their pour stub, clean up with a sanding stick, and superglue the barrels in place. I had to clean out the gun deck holes in the upper cowling of a small amount of flash, but it worked out ok. Not much to say here other than paint and move on!

The Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress is a four-engine heavy bomber developed in the 1930s for the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC). The B-17 was primarily employed by the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) in the daylight strategic bombing campaign of World War II against German industrial and military targets. The United States Eighth Air Force, based at many airfields in central and southern England, and the Fifteenth Air Force, based in Italy, complemented the RAF Bomber Command's nighttime area bombing in the Combined Bomber Offensive to help secure air superiority over the cities, factories and battlefields of Western Europe in preparation for the invasion of France in 1944. The B-17 also participated to a lesser extent in the War in the Pacific, early in World War II, where it conducted raids against Japanese shipping and airfields.

I will be honest, I have not heard of Resin2Detail until about two months ago. I think they are about 1-yr old company and certainly they specialize in aftermarket details for aircraft (32^nd, 48^th and 72^nd) , but visiting their website I’ve found at least one armor item.

This particular item gives you 4 exhausts of the 5-tube plus Siamese connection for the Mosquito engine. Being an airplane made of wood, the 6^th tube needed to be moved away from the engine side and it was connected with the 5^th tube.

All parts are perfectly casted without any imperfection, bubbles or partially molded parts.

As you can see in the pictures, the exhaust tubes are hollow; they have a lip and also have a more oblong and “flatter” shape than the plastic ones. It also includes the Siamese connection for the 6^th tube, which is completely missing in the original plastic part.

Kinetics’ 1/48^th scale F/A-18C is a great kit and comes with a good representation of the SJU17A ejection seat. The kit even provides a photoetch generic seat belt. Eduard ups the ante a ton with its release of a color photoetch steel set of belts specifically designed for the Kinetic seat.

The set has one small colorized steel fret with nine pieces for the shoulder/seat belts and two pieces for the leg restraints. All made with multicolor parts. As you can see in the photo, the kit provides a basic lap belt and shoulder harness.

Addition to the seat is easy. There are four sets of lap belts so those get added first. The seat is pretty flat so they slide right into place. Next, add the adjustment straps on top of the four lap belts. Lastly, bend the shoulder harness to fir and glue in place.

To finish, I added a black wash to the seat and then wiped off. A few dry brushed and a flat coat and its done.

Masking sets first started making their appearance a while back and have been made in several materials including vinyl and tape. Eduard has settled on the kabuki style thin yellow tape for their masking material and makes a wide assortment of masks for many different subjects. I think tape is the best item as it is thin, conforms to the shapes well and provides a good seal.