For me and all other Star Trek fans/modellers, it has really been great to watch Round2 pull out the old AMT Star Trek kit molds, re-work a few things and then re-release the oldies, in new form, and on top of that release super new kits in the same genre and in comparable scales. In the first quarter of 2013, among several other great releases, Round2/AMT re-packaged the original series (TOS) USS Enterprise with her two primary adversaries, the Klingon D-7 Battle Cruiser and the Romulan Bird-of-Pray (BoP) as the newest entry into their familiar 1/2500 scale, Cadet Series.

I want to start by thanking Round2 Models for providing this kit for review and IPMS USA for giving me the opportunity to review it.

In the Box

The new 3-ship Star Trek, The Original Series Set is packaged in a colorful box with new artwork on the front and back. Inside you'll find a single-sheet, double-sided, tri-folded instruction sheet containing the build-up & finishing instructions for all 3 ships on one side and painting and decal placement details on the reverse side. There are 3 sprues - a silver sprue with 4 parts for the Romulan BoP, a light green sprue with 10 parts for the Klingon D7 and a light gray sprue with 13 parts for the immortal USS Enterprise. A comprehensive decal sheet is provided that includes an expanded set of the standard markings for the ships, the most noticeable of which, is the ominous, orange Bird of Prey.

Construction/Finishing

The great thing about this TOS set and all the Cadet Series kits from AMT/Round2 is that they are designed for simplicity and snap-together assembly. As far as assembly goes, these kits go together nicely and quickly and in about 30 minutes you're done with the whole set and ready to paint and finish. The alignment of the parts for BoP and the Klingon Battle Cruiser was excellent - the parts lined up and pressed right into place. Of this set, the Klingon ship is spot on for scale size, shape and part alignment and fit - that ship was a really fun build. One thing about both the Klingon and the Romulan ships though - the tops of both ship bodies leaves a small but noticeable gap once assembled. I use Testors Clear Parts Cement & Window Maker to fill small gaps like these because it was a simple, fast solution and it turned out nicely.

The assembly of the Enterprise was a little tougher with a couple alignment problems that go all the way back to the original AMT molds. The saucer section went together fine but the pins and sockets that hold the secondary hull halves together are slightly askew which might make it difficult for young hands to install the base of the navigational deflector onto the front of the hull. The solution I took was to clip off the alignment pins between hull halves, install the engine pod pylons in accordance with the instructions and use quick-setting liquid cement to assemble it. Once the secondary hull was dry, the huge pin that holds the deflector base still prevented the base from fitting flush to the hull so I removed it as well. The result was a smooth fitting, finished assembly. Round2 has also slightly re-tooled the engine pods from the original AMT design and the end caps now fit onto large pins like the deflector base. These pins for the end caps work o.k. with some effort but I trimmed those pins off as well for what I thought was a better fit. Lastly, even though it is a snap together kit, a small bit of twisting and bending is needed to keep the engine pods and pylons lined up with the rest of the ship and then a small touch of liquid cement is needed to hold everything in position but any modeler will be able to figure that out.

The 'actual' ships had simple paint schemes and these models lend themselves well to being painted before assembly. The light gray plastic the Enterprise is molded in, is very close to the color of the TV show filming model so you could finish it without an over-all color and it would be a great looking model. Application of the decals will take some patience as many of the decals a very small but it is well worth the effort. There are more complete details with these Enterprise decals than AMT had with her bigger scale cousins back in the day. Admittedly, it's the great orange bird-of-prey that you get anxious to apply. Wow! The decals are strong and forgiving and do react well to setting solution which pulls them right down onto even the compound curved surfaces. You may want to shoot the model with a clear gloss finish before applying them, to give them something to stick to then when the decals are thoroughly dry, a final coat of flat/semi-gloss/gloss on top depending on your preference. As usual, you can put as much effort into finishing as you want to get the desired effect but even simple finish schemes turn out great looking models.

Conclusions

Like the AMT originals, this kit was a fast, easy build and great fun to detail. The molding of the new Bop and D7 raise the bar a little more from the classic AMT 2500 scale ships. I highly recommend the Star Trek Original Series Set for modelers of all ages and experience just because it's fast, fun and inexpensive to build. Also, being a big fan of trying to get kids into modeling, these are fabulous kits to start with. These are perfect for the 'Make-&-Take' tables at your local model shows & contests. You almost can't afford not to pick of a few of these kits and build your own Star Fleet to hang from your ceiling.

I really appreciate Round2's effort to resurrect these old Star Trek kits (and all the other old kits) and get them back out to the public - I can't say enough about that.

Again, I want to thank Round2 Models for providing this great kit to IPMS/USA for review and thank you IPMS for the opportunity to review it.

Additional Information for die-hard fans and more experienced modelers

I wanted to be sure to document this Original Series Set and make sure Round2 knew how much we appreciate these kits coming available again. Having done that, there is one last subject to touch on separately - that is one of sticking to accuracy of size, shape and scale.

I reviewed AMT/Round2's Deep Space Nine and I made a couple comments about scale calculations. I have also built the Star Trek Cadet series Motion Picture Set which includes the Refit Enterprise, the USS Reliant and the Klingon K'T'inga (an up-armored version of the D-7 battle cruiser) and over the years I have built many copies of all the old AMT 1/2500 scale Star Trek kits.

While completing this review, the difference in size between the K'T'inga from the Motion Picture set and the D-7 from the Original Series set was immediately noticeable. The K'T'inga should have been slightly larger at the same scale but it was actually slightly smaller.

Calculations showed the D-7 battle cruiser and the Enterprise in this TOS set are, for all practical purposes at 1/2500 scale, as are the Refit Enterprise and the Reliant from the Motion Picture set. The K'T'inga from the Motion Picture set is closer to 1/2700 scale at the length produced.

In addition to the scale issue for the BoP the shape of the Romulan BoP in this Original Series set threw me off a little as well. The BoP in this new Original Series set seemed stretched out of proportion in length compared to wing span. The proper shape, I believe, is the same as the old AMT kits - shorter front-to-back compared to the wingspan.

The web-based source of Star Trek ship size (and other reference material) I prefer to use is https://www.ditl.org/. The reference materials on that site are very well documented and for most of the old AMT kits and the new Round2 kits, AMT/Round2 is spot on with just a few exceptions.

Make no mistake, these Cadet series sets are great model kits for modellers of all ages and are accurate and representative of the genre and it is not intended that this additional information take away from the Round2's production of these new kits and the re-release of the old AMT Star Trek kits - for that we old die-hards are very happy and grateful to Round2!