For ship modelers looking to improve the appearance of their German WWI battleship or cruiser, Master Model has released three sets that will replace the gun barrels from the kit with their beautifully produced brass alternatives. The sets in this review will replace the 30.5 cm, 10.5 cm, and 8.8 cm gun barrels used by the German Navy. Modelers with some experience with aftermarket parts should have little issue in replacing the kit parts with the brass barrels.

For this review, I compared the Master Model barrels with those included in the ICM kit of the König in 1/700 scale (kit S.014), which was armed with 10 of the 30.5 cm guns, 14 of the 10.5 cm guns, and 4 of the 8.8 cm guns. The Master Model barrels are a tremendous upgrade as they brass is turned to better mimic the actual barrels, and they are hollow, which is rather amazing for the two smaller calibers. Installing the replacement barrels only involves the removal of the kit barrel and drilling a small hole, then adding the brass barrel. The directions provide the appropriate drill size to use, which is 0.60 mm for both the 8.8 and 10.5 cm barrels and 0.5 mm for the 30.5 cm barrel. The sets provide 16 of the 8.8 cm barrels, 14 of the 10.5 cm barrels, and 12 of the 30.5 cm barrels, so there are more than enough for a ship like the König.

My hits are that once again, the folks at Master Model have released some very finely detailed replacement parts for the 1/700 scale ship modeler. The fine steps in the barrel diameters are present as are the openings in the business end (if you are an aging modeler like myself, you will need some magnification to see this). I have no miss for any of the three detail sets.

Overall, I would highly recommend these detail sets to anyone wanting to improve his or her 1/700 scale WWI German battleship or cruiser. The installation of the gun barrels requires minimal preparation of the kit part to accept the replacement barrel. As you can see in the photographs, the replacement parts are a great improvement over the plastic items molded in the kit.

I would like to thank the folks at Master Model for providing this set to the IPMS-USA for review, to John Noack, who runs the review corps, for selecting me to assess this detail set, and to you for taking the time to read my comments.