History

The Handley Page Victor was conceived as a nuclear bomber in the late 1950s. It was the third and last of the “V Bombers”, following the Valiant and Vulcan. As the Royal Navy took over the nuclear deterrent mission with submarines, the V Bombers became aircraft without missions. The Valiant had already been reconfigured as an airborne tanker, but when the airframes became worn out, the Victor bombers became the tanker force.

In 1982 the Victor K.2 tankers participated in one of the most complicated missions ever conceived. Operation Black Buck used 11 Victor K.2s and a single Vulcan B.2 to deliver a bomb load from Ascension Island to Port Stanley Airport in the Falklands, a distance of 3900 miles.

The next, and last big deployment of the Victor K.2 was the 1991 (First) Gulf War, The RAF called their participation Operation Granby. This was the operation to force Iraq out of Kuwait

Tsesarevich (Russian: Цесаревич) was a pre-dreadnought battleship of the Imperial Russian Navy, built in France at the end of the 19th century. The ship's design formed the basis of the Russian-built Borodino-class battleships. This set represents what she carried prior to an attack in the night of February 9, 1904, in the Russian-Japanese war. She was one of three ships to be struck by Japanese torpedoes and limped back to Port Arthur. There she lost four of her 75mm, two of her 47mm, and two of her 37mm guns to reinforce the port defenses. After the Russian-Japanese war, Tsesarevich, helped suppress the Sveaborg Rebellion. Around 1906, her fighting top was removed and her superstructure was cut down, in the process losing more guns, mainly most of her 75mm guns. In time, ~ 1914, all of her 75mm guns were removed.

I think everyone has seen and many of us have used or attempted to use a handcart, or dolly as they are called in many parts of the US. This set from Brengun includes enough parts to build 6 hand carts. The set consists of a photoetch fret of six frames, six base plates and six axles/braces and 12 resin wheels. The photoetch is nicely done and the parts are easily cut out with a set of photoetch scissors. The scissors also make cleaning up the attachment points very easy as well.

History

An Essex-class carrier commissioned in 1943, she set more records than any other Essex Class carrier. The Lexington was the oldest working aircraft carrier in the United States Navy when decommissioned in 1991. The Lexington was originally named the USS Cabot but while final construction was being completed at Massachusetts’ Fore River Shipyard word was received that the original carrier named USS LEXINGTON, CV-2, had been sunk and the new carrier’s name was changed to LEXINGTON. The nickname ‘Blue Ghost’ came about due to the Japanese claiming to have sunk the ship 4 times.

This is the fifth set of 1/72 decals from AOA Decals and the second set that I am reviewing. The decals look very nice, clear, and in-register. They are printed by Cartigraf of Italy and work very well. I was very impressed with the ease and smoothness with which they were able to be applied. They came off the sheet well and I was able to move them into place once I got them on. They reacted well with Microset and Microsol making the decals appear as if they were painted on.

There also needs to be a special note about their instruction sheets. There were eight 8 1/2 x 11 sheets detailing everything you would want to know to build one of these options. The profiles were in color and easy to understand. You can tell that a lot of work and research went into this. It’s really nice to see a company put this much care into a product.

The options included in this set are: