Eduard has released a limited edition version of the L-39 release before. The main kit is the Special Hobby L-39 with the addition of resin, photoetch, masks and limited edition decals for two special version markings.

In the box is:

• 3 x light grey sprues (one varies from the illustration in the instructions)
• 1 clear sprue
• 1 film sheet
• 1 large decal sheet
• 1 mask sheet
• 1 photoetch detail set
• 22 x resin parts
• 1 instruction booklet

The kit consists of 3 main sprues; the sprues are very typical of Special Hobby product and are made from a soft plastic. The decals allow you to finish the aircraft in two different versions, L-39C RA1039K Aero Jet Club (Civilian version from Russia 2005) and L-39ZO Hungarian Air Force 2005. I decided that I would build the Aero Club one due to the nice looking Dragon decals.

Construction

First is the construction of the two-seat cockpit, which is well detailed. Photoetch and resin helps a lot to make this a very impressive cockpit. Now there are a few issues to be careful of here. I found during the install of the cockpit into the fuselage that the cockpit side walls, part numbers 31 and 30, need to be trimmed to match the photoetch parts. This is not mentioned in the instructions. The photoetch is shorter and is where you need to trim the cockpit walls. Also, I found that the pedal bar, part number 19, needs to me reduced in length.

When the cockpit parts are complete they are installed into one half of the fuselage before you joint the fuselage halves together. This is where I had the most problems and if this had not been a review kit I may have given up on this build at this point! I found it impossible to assemble the fuselage halves without splitting up the assembly in the instructions. I had to cut the front and rear sections in two and also trim the lower parts of part number 22 to the bottom point of the installed photoetch parts. Also, the resin exhaust needs some filling once installed. As I said this part of the build was very frustrating, but hang in there and it’s worth it in the end.

Next you assemble the wings, and these go together well. Now the wings and air intakes go on, these needed some work to install correctly and some of the forward mid-section of the wings needed trimming around 2mm to fit. Detail parts and tail of the aircraft are the next parts to be fitted with no issues.

The wheels are assembled next. These were easy, you just have to ensure that the angles are correct and line up when located in the plane. Landing gear and lower details are added next and once again no problems were found.

Lastly the canopy is installed and needed some careful lining up. The provided mask set is very useful for the canopies and wheels.

The aircraft is now painted, and I did have trouble finding a color I thought would be best to represent the main blue. I opted for a Testors Metallic Sapphire blue which is not perfect but I liked the final look.

Now for the decals which I thought may be a real problem due to shapes and line, but they went on great. I did mess up two very thin white lines but that was my error!

Summary

This was a nice kit and apart from the frustration of the cockpit installation was a fun build. I highly recommend it to experienced modelers with a lot of patience.

Thanks go to Eduard for providing this kit to review and IPMS USA for allowing me to review it.