Thanks to Ray Rimmel of Albatros Productions and to IPMS/USA for giving me the opportunity to review these two wonderful volumes!

These wonderful publications by Gregory Alegi address a little known aspect of early WW1 aviation, the development of early heavy bombers. The volumes are actually the 3^rd and 4^th Caproni volumes authored by Mr. Alegi, but recent access to privately held papers in the Caproni family collection allowed updated and improved description of this unique aircraft.

The Caproni Ca.3 had an impressive (for the time) 22.2 m wingspan, 11m length, an empty weight of 2300 kg, and could stay aloft for 4 hours. The bomber’s ceiling was 4500 m, but it would take 48 minutes to reach that altitude! The aircraft was a twin-boom design with two engines in-line with the tail booms and a third engine in pusher configurations was mounted directly behind the cockpit

While Trumpeter has come out with a lot of large scale Soviet kits, there are usually some things that could stand improvement with these. Their 1/32^nd scale Mig-21 is a solid kit and I have seen it built up into a nice finished kit many times. That being said, one of the deficiencies of the kit is its weapons pylons. They have minimal detail and like a lot of injection molded pylons, no detail whatsoever on the bottom.

Zactomodels has two varieties of these to select from, early and late, and there are differences between the two. The modeler needs to research the particular aircraft to determine which one is needed. The pylons for the Mig are designated BD3-60-21, early or late.

Let's look at what's in the box. The set comes with 4 pylons- two inner and two outer that are perfectly cast. Also contained is a complete sprue of hardware for each pylon including complete sway braces options.

Chris "Zactoman" Wilson provides another much needed update for the 1/32 Trumpeter Su-27 with the release of a full weapons pylon set - ten [weapons] in all. In the set, you get replacement for the both wing tip pylons, 2 APU-73 pylons, four AKU-470 pylons with separate actuator rods, and two APU-470 pylons. The difference with between these pylons and the kits is phenomenal. All have the correct shape so the missiles added will sit at the correct angle. Detail is provided on the bottom of each pylon so if they are left empty, there is not just the flat bottom provided by the kit pylons. Detailing is incredible and I have pictures of the kits and the Zactomodels sets together - there is no close comparison.

For the IPMS build involving various aftermarket parts for the Trumpeter Mig 23, I did not want to do the kit decal markings for the “M”. Therefore, I ordered the Linden Hill Warsaw Pact decal from Linden Hill imports. I told Guy at LHI I was doing the review and he threw in the second sheet (32012) for the ML, MLP, LMA, etc., as flown in Afghanistan and other places. Those will be used in a separate review later. Extreme thanks to Guy at LHI for providing us these items for review. We at IPMS USA appreciate the serious, undying support of distributors like you!

I received the bypass doors and Control levers from Quickboost via the IPMS lottery for use in my MIG 23 build. THANKS QUICKBOOST for providing us these items for review. We at IPMS USA appreciate your continued support!

I started this review with the Quickboost bypass doors; Install the doors in the outer intake duct. All that is required is to remove the mounting lip on the intake, and carefully install them in a partially-open position. Nicely done Quickboost!

The control stick is a work of art; three are provided. The three-button stick with the Autopilot “off” paddle is extremely well detailed, and a great improvement over the kit item which doesn’t really look like it should.

Final verdict: an excellent effort from Quickboost!