The Hasegawa X-29 in 1/72 scale has been around since the mid1980's and, as far as I know, is the only injection-molded kit of this interesting aircraft. Though accurate in outline, it is a very basic kit lacking detail in the wheel wells and cockpit. As was the norm with Hasegawa kits of that era, cockpit detail only consists of decals for the instrument and side panels, and a simplified ejection seat. However, RES-IM fills this void with their beautiful, full color, photo-etched set. If this set has a familiar look to you, that’s because Eduard produces it. Their logo is prominently displayed on the bottom of the fret.

Thanks again to our steadfast IPMS supporter, Ross at SAC… and to IPMS leadership for providing it to me for review. Metal gear rule!

This set simply replaces the main and nose gear for the new Airfix 1/48 Folland Gnat. This is an excellent little kit, and the kit gear will serve the purpose out of the box, but the simplicity of installing metal gear on the assembled airframe is too good to pass up.

Parts include two main gear struts with extension and drag arms incorporated, and a nose gear. All three parts are one-piece castings, which justifies their use in my mind. Airfix is on a roll, and their kits just slide together with little fuss. The only complaint I personally have is the plastic is a bit soft, so small things like landing gear, pitot tubes, etc., tend to be very “bendy” and flexible. The Gnat may be miniscule, but the landing gear is still vulnerable.

Furball Aero Design is a new decal company. They have teamed with Detail & Scale who I have admired and trusted for many years, to turn out interesting and correct decals and marking schemes for 1/48 modern US aircraft. They also have vinyl mask sets for those kits.

This decal sheet consists of all of the markings you would need to do two Blue Angels aircraft, either two TF-9s or two F9Fs, or one of each.

The Blue Angels flew the Cougar from 1954 to 1957, when it was replaced with the F11F Tiger.

The decals are printed by Cartograf of Italy. I put Cartograf as the industry standard for quality decals. My basis for this is toughness of the decal film and the fact that it only takes about 15 seconds in the water for even the largest decal to come loose from the backing. Even I can get a decent looking set of markings using Cartograf.

Thanks to Hataka Hobby and Steven International for sending samples of this new line of acrylic model paint. Thank you to the IPMS Reviewer Corps for letting me review them! I am very appreciative of the chance to contribute back to the scale-modeling community.

I’ve built three of the Eduard Bf-109s and absolutely loved the finished product. Is it over-scaled? Slightly. Get over it. It is a nice 1/47th scale model. I can’t wait for their reengineered one too.

That said there are a lot of really nice things to do with the kit. The rear bulkhead is a separate item added when the fuselage halves go together. This little gem of resin has the bulkhead with the access door closed. This part is properly proportioned and has the proper relief of the door. Adding it to the model will be easy enough and the part is a direct replacement for the kit part.

Highly recommended

Thanks to Aires and IPMS/USA for the review copy. You can get yours directly from Aires at https://www.aires.cz/en/ or at your local hobby shop or online retailer.

The Panzer III Ausf.M was an improvement of the previous J through L versions, with extra superstructure front and mantlet of 20 mm of armor. It also was equipped with fording exhaust which allowed deeper river crossings. The gun was the standard long barrel 50 mm (1.97 in) KwK 39 L60. It also had six 90 mm NbK smoke dischargers, three mounted on each side of the turret. The Ausf.M could also be equipped with protective steel plates, called Schurzen, designed to protect the turret area from enemy anti-tank weapons. Further armor protection were large steel plate skirts suspended from either side of the chassis. A total of 1000 were ordered, but only 250 were completed. The Panzer III Ausf.M took part in the greatest tank battle of all time, the Battle of Kursk in July 1943. It is the Kursk Panzers that are depicted in this Dragon’s 1/72 Armor Pro series.

This kit is a re-boxing of an earlier kit, with a photo etch fret, vinyl tracks, and decals. According to the website: "Cyber-Hobby is well known for its fantastic Orange Box tank and figure set combos in 1/35 scale. These special sets provide updated Dragon kits that have not been available for some time and at competitive prices."

Detail is excellent for this scale, and goes together without any glitches. You get decals for 3 tanks dated 1944-1945 located in Andler, the Eastern Front, and Germany. 2 tanks are three tone camo, one is two tone. The kit went together without a glitch, there's only 8 total steps:

Aires, as part of their Aerobonus line, has started issuing 90mm figures of mascots for popular planes or units. These have included the stinging bee for the Skyraider of VA-176 and the tomcat from VFA-31 for the F-14. They continue this with a mascot for the Mig-21 which is a caricature of a Mig-21 pilot in a full flight suit. I could find no further information about what unit it might represent or what specific pilot is featured.

The Kit

The parts break down is simple - the body and the head. Take your time separating the casting blocks - they are beefy. Once separated, there are some seams on the inner legs that need sanded and you’re ready for some paint. I primed the kit with Alclad gray primer and set it aside to dry.

Neil Robinson takes his second go around as interim editor and comes up with a second great issue. While the previous formats have been consistent, this interim issue is a collections of great articles and two aviation in profile and all the expected news on new releases and current in stock materials. There is also a really nice review of the Nuremberg Show Report.

The first article is an excellent upgrade of Revell's 1/72 Halifax built as a 6 group RCAF Halifax B.II Series IA built by Tony O'Toole. Changes include filling in some windows and reconfiguring others along with using a Freightdog set. The results are superb. Bonus real pictures and a history of the plane were included.

Andy Scott builds Revell's wonderful 1/48 Ventura as a Mark II. Alley Cats OOP blistered canopy was used to replicate this mark. Other changes include his method to fill the correct lines and Ultracast wheels were used.

The Heller Mirage IV is a slightly older kit, but still the only option in town. The Mirage IV has its refueling boom off of the nose so it sits out there just waiting to be knocked off or bent. Enter Master from Poland.

Why do would you want to use the Master turned metal part? Well there are numerous reasons. The first, and most important, is that turned metal is stronger. Another reason is that you don’t have to worry about the mold line or keeping the round cross section all the time worried about losing detail. These reasons are enough for me to use the metal parts.

Packaged in a Ziploc bag, this set is a single piece of machined aluminum. The refueling boom is perfectly rendered and captures the shape of the tube and probe. This set is simply a replacement of the kit boom. You may not even have to drill the hole unless you accidentally filled it with slurry of plastic while gluing the nose.

Delta One has been producing some unique decals, especially for the Bf-109. So that means that I had to check them out. This particular sheet covers the Yugoslav Air Force Bf-109s in service from 1945-53.

This sheet comes in a ziplock baggie that contains an eight page booklet with history and line drawings for the subject aircraft. There is a little history on the 109 in Yugoslavia. There is also a brief description of each aircraft including the colors and historical use.

Decals are provided for six aircraft, four G-6 aircraft and two UMe-109, which is a version of the G-12. The profiles have both side views, top view and a partial bottom view. The aircraft are interesting with some unique paint schemes. The actual decals are on 3 x 3 inch sheet. They are printed in perfect register, thin and with good color saturation.

Are you familiar with Japanese Puzzle boxes, sometimes called “trick boxes” or “secret boxes”? A Puzzle box is a box that can only be opened through some “obscure or complicated series of manipulations”. The boxes contain a good luck charm and are designed to trick or confuse the person attempting to open them. Some require only a handful of movements in order to slide the various parts of the box into an “open” configuration, and some require hundreds of manipulations. Indeed, Japanese Puzzle Boxes are known for their complex and challenging design but they are also known for their intricate geometric patterns and their exquisite engineering and construction.

The Berlin Airlift and the beginning of the “Cold War” placed new emphasis on the US postwar tank program. The result was the emergence of three basic designs; the T41 light tank, the T42 medium tank and the T43 heavy tank With the start of the Korean War in 1950, T43 production was authorized. Continual testing and slight modifications resulted in the T43E1 which in turn became the M103. Many small defects were found but with the existence of a state of war it was felt justified to begin production of 200 heavy tanks. Most of these defects were corrected and the modified vehicles became the M103A1. The US Army placed their tanks in Europe to serve along side the M48s. However, with the rise of anti-tank guided missiles even the thick armor of the M103A1 was becoming obsolete, so in 1963 they withdrew the heavy tank force from Europe and offered these tanks to the Marine Corps.

History

This is a review of the SBS T-72 M early turret, for the Tamiya T-72 M1 kit. As such, the model requires the Tamiya kit for almost all parts needed in this build (aside from the basic turret itself).

Kit

This box contains 11 resin cast parts, a sheet of decals, 55 separate photo-etched parts, as well as a printed outline of where all the P-E should go’

Though I have a limited amount of experience with PE and resin, I volunteered to undertake this review because I have acquired a ‘taste’ for the Soviet bloc armor and thought this would help expand my modeling knowledge and enjoyment. On second thought, my ambitions may have exceeded my grasp of the undertaking at hand.

Eduard’s partnership with fellow Czech company HGW continues with their release of these pre-cut printed fabric seat belts. The belts themselves are made from very thin, elastic like fabric onto which the details and colors are printed. The belts are printed in the standard Luftwaffe light tan for this set, with the late war Orlon green available in a separate set.

The hardware is typical Eduard, rendered beautifully and precisely. Three types of mounting brackets are included for the shoulder harnesses, so check your references to the type used specific to your model.

Assembly is straight forward, if not a tad fiddly. The belts re very thin, and thread well through the photo-etched buckles and parts. As noted in other reviews here, they work best if you do not crumple them up before threading them as the instructions states.

Thank you to MRC and Gallery Models for providing another example of an iconic USN helicopter, this time in the distinctive Operation Deep Freeze color scheme. The kit was a very pleasant and enjoyable build. Thank you also to the IPMS Reviewer Corps staff members who do the hard work behind the scenes, getting us kits to review and publishing our work.

This kit is the latest in a series of H-34 variants by Gallery. Excellent reviews of the H-34 Choctaw (by William Nichols), the H-34 U. S. Navy Rescue version (by Rod Lees), and the HH-34J (by Dave Morrissette) may be found on the IPMS site. I suggest consulting these reviews as there are many great ideas and suggestions that are pertinent to the UH-34D reviewed here. All three of these reviewers found items I would’ve missed.

What you get in the package is a full gear replacement in white metal for both main gear legs and the tail gear. In many cases SAC will assemble some of the kit parts prior to casting. In this case the replacement parts number is the same as the kit parts. They have cleaned up the gear and filled any imperfections that were present on the original plastic parts. They also have enhanced the level of detail on the gear well above that of the plastic parts

The gear in the kit consists of five plastic parts. The metal replacement parts make up five pieces, two for each main gear and a single piece for the tail gear.

Detail is crisper on the metal gear than on the kit’s plastic parts. One can also tell from the photos that the SAC gear is much beefier, especially on the main gear retraction arms. The replacement parts are a drop fit with no issues what so ever. The overall appearance of the replacement gear is vastly superior to the kit parts.

Background

The 10.5cm SK C/32 (SK - Schnelladekanone (quick loading cannon) C - Construktionsjahr (year of design) was a German naval gun used in World War II. This was the standard unshielded low-angle deck gun mounted forward of the conning tower in Type I, Type IX and Type X U-boats. The guns were also used in shielded high-angle mountings aboard type 35 and type 43 minesweepers, Elbing class torpedo boats, cruiser Emden, and old battleships Schlesien and Schleswig-Holstein. The LC/32 mounting used in Type I and early Type IX U-boats weighed about 5 tons and could be elevated from -10° to +35°. Later Type IX and Type XB U-boats used the LC/36 mounting reducing weight by 10 percent by restricting elevation from -10° to +30°. During the early war years, these guns were used to encourage surrender of independently routed merchant ships or to sink ships damaged by torpedoes. The rate of fire with a good crew was 15 to 18 rounds per minute.

Meng has released a second version of their excellent T-90A, this one with newly designed track and two optional front ends: a self-entrenching device, or a TBS-86 Tank Dozer blade. The twin electro-optical/IR ‘dazzler’ lights come complete with all electronic bits to make them light up, and a layer of nylon turret (composite armor) ‘skin’ add to an already interesting build.

The T-90 tank is protected by both conventional armor-plating and explosive reactive armor, and fitted with the Shtora-1 defensive-aids suite which includes an infrared jammer, a laser warning system with four laser warning receivers, a grenade discharging system which produces an aerosol screen and a computerized control system. It is also fitted with NBC (nuclear, biological and chemical) protection equipment. Altogether, the T-90 represents state-of-the-art Russian armor, and Meng has produced a masterpiece representing it in scale.

Eduard has come out with several photo etch sets for the 1/200 Scale, Merit, USS Hornet CV-8 (kit# 62001). This is Part 2 and includes several radar antennas to replace the kit parts. These new antennas simply step in and replace the undersize and under-detailed kit parts.

There are two sets to replace the forward- and aft-gun director antennas, one to replace the main search radar, and another to replace the main air search radar. You also get new doors, ladders and windows for the directors.

Assembly is straight forward but a tad fiddly. There are a bunch of tiny parts that need to be bent and shaped. The antennas for the directors require several complex bends that took a while to get the correct shape. Some of the small parts are hard to hold and glue at the same time.

Thanks to Aires for this excellent upgrade to the great Revell PV-1 Ventura model, and to IPMS leadership for providing it to me for review.

This set simply replaces the three-part kit cowling with a more detailed, one-piece cowling. Read on.

All you have to do is use a sharp knife, some quality CAREUL cutting time, and possibly a razor saw to remove the pour block from the back of the cowing. It uses gravity to ensure a full pour, and the resulting pour block might have utility in other places. I just used the multiple-cut pass method on the extreme-aft recessed panel line. A light draw of a sanding board on the back of the cowl when released, and I was done.

This set consists of six resin replacements for the gear doors of the recent Airfix A-4B Skyhawk kit. The new doors are one-for-one replacements of the kit parts.

The parts are cast in a tan colored resin and are delightfully thin. All six doors are attached to a single casting block, but the attachment points are very thin and easily removed. Once removed the only clean-up is to lightly sand the edge where the parts were connected to the casting block. I painted the parts with Tamiya paint which adhered with no problem and was pleased just how well the details popped out with a light black wash.

This set is highly recommended as a nice upgrade to a great little kit of the Scooter.

Thank you to Aires for the review sample and to IMPS/USA for the opportunity to review it.

Eduard has come out with several photo etch sets for the 1/200 Scale, Merit, USS Hornet CV-8 (kit# 62001) and this is one of them. Part 4 provides detail parts to upgrade the 20 mm Oerlikon AA Guns.

The set includes a large sheet of photo etch with a lot of little parts. You get new gun shields and brackets, sights, forward and aft ammo drum covers with handles, elevation wheels and a harness for the gunner. Also included is a new deck (nice looking non-skid) that the guns sit on. You get two options one with the expended ammo canister and one without.

Assembly is straight forward but extremely fiddly. There are a bunch of very tiny parts that need to be bent and shaped. Most of the small parts are hard to hold and glue at the same time. This makes for a time consuming and sometimes aggravating assembly. Thank you Eduard for providing extra parts. There are only 30 of these mounts so pace yourself accordingly.

Not too long ago, Trumpeter gave us a brand new, scribed 1/48th scale A-37 to play with and Scale Aircraft Conversions were not very far behind with a white metal landing gear to help support all of the added nose weight to prevent a tail sitter.

There are six total parts on two frets, with the nose gear being separate, The way they are cast makes cleanup of the parts much easier than the plastic kit parts. And, I must say they are every bit as clean and accurate as the kit parts. A cheap and welcome addition to the Trumpeter kit. I highly recommend this gear replacement.

My thanks to Scale Aircraft Conversions and IPMS for the review sample.

This is a masking set for the Hasegawa F-104G. The masks are cut from yellow tape, similar to Eduard masks and the set includes masks for all three sections of the Hasegawa F-104G as well as masks for each of the tires. There are three separate masks for the three windscreen panels and there are two masks for both of the other two sections of the canopy. As with Eduard’s masks, the masks for the larger portions of the canopy establish the borders or the canopy leaving an open section in the middle that will need to be filled with either liquid mask, scotch tape or some other materials to protect the center of the canopy section.

The set also includes masks for the wheel allowing the tires to be painted black, the masks applied and the for the wheel hubs to be painted. As with the mask for the larger portions of the canopy, the areas outside of mask will need to be covered with some other material to keep paint off of the rest of the wheel.