Introduction

The Yamaha XT 660 was an enduro style bike that featured the most powerful single piston engine of its time back in the 80s. The kit was initially released in the 1980s and was developed by Protar from Italy. Protar had a series of 1/9 bikes as well as a series of Formula One cars in 1/12 and 1/20.

Construction

The kit comes on five sprues and has rubber tires, vinyl hoses, springs and a LOT of screws. The only chrome is the wheels and those need to be painted black anyway. The molds are from the 1980s and it shows a bit with large sprue gates and some tool marks here and there, but it’s surprisingly clean and crisp. The overall level of detail is good and the model looks great in the box.

Pen and Sword’s Car Craft Series focuses on some of the more exotic cars and covers both their history and the variants. This volume covers the iconic Porsche 911. My personal first experience with the 911 came when my roommate bought a used 911 and we tooled around in it (plus I got to drive it). Even used, it was a thrill with the acceleration of a rocket and the brakes to stop a freight train. When this book came up for review, I had to jump at it. The book is soft cover and is lavishly illustrated with pictures and drawings. One thing that makes this series of special interest to modelers is that it has two specific modeling sections. This is shown in the table of contents:

This kit is the second release in 2020 of the Benz Patent-Motorwagen 1886. This release includes three figures of Mrs. Benz and her two sons in addition to the Motorwagen vehicle. The vehicle was previously reviewed by IPMS so this review will focus on the three figures included in the second release.

Mrs. Benz is posed sitting on the Motorwagen with her hands on the tiller, and the two sons are alongside the vehicle, maybe pushing to get it started? The poses look realistic and natural, but the detail is a little soft for a 1/24 scale figure.

Round 2 has reissued the 1/25^th scale Milk Trike kit and it is great to see it again. MPC was a very popular model company in the 1960’s and 70’s and thankfully, Round 2 has saved their molds. The Milk Trike was one of six trike kits which came with different window colors and extensive decals to customize your build.

Inside the box, there are 57 easy to build parts molded in white, chrome and three colors of windows- clear, transparent purple and transparent orange. There are preprinted black tires and a large decals sheet giving many options. I decided up front to stick with the Milk Trike theme and try to duplicate the purple color in Alclad Candy colors.

The Audi R8 GT3 is a mid-mounted V10 engine sports car produced by Audi to compete in the GT3 touring car racing series. This series is based on a vehicle that must be available for sale to regular consumers with minimal changes. Due to the low cost for entry to the GT3 race series, many teams have taken part and the Audi R8 LMS GT3 version has been delivered to many racing teams around the world. It is very active in both endurance and GT races. This new kit from PLATZ reproduces the AUDI R8 LMS GT3 from the 24-hour Spa race in 2015 in 1/24 scale. My example also included the Detail Up set specifically for this kit from NuNu.