SCALE MODEL NEWS

David Jefferis reports There are some interesting kits coming from the Hasegawa team at the moment, and these three cover a wide enough range to sharpen the appetites of many model makers. Giant German glider tug The Heinkel He 111Z (‘Z’ for Zwilling, meaning ‘twin’) was an attempt to provide a decent airborne tug for the huge Messerschmitt Me 321 Gigant military glider. Other solutions for hauling the lumbering Gigant off the ground included using three (yes, three!) Messerschmitt Bf 110 tow planes, each pulling a steel cable while flying in precise vee-formation. Even when the Me 321 was fitted with underwing rocket boosters, takeoff was a chancy business. The Zwilling was a better solution, achieved by mating two He 111s and adding a fifth engine in the middle. Even so, the Luftwaffe never achieved an effective heavy-lift capacity, though the Zwilling was developed further, to include bomber and recon variants. Hasegawa’s big ‘Z’ The Zwilling’s 228 components assemble well, and resu...

Mat Irvine reports Things often seem to go in cycles... in the 1970s, AMT, a company better known for its automotive and Star Trek models,  issued three kits based on the designs of that true Renaissance Man, the Italian artist and inventor, Leonardo da Vinci. The AMT kits were interesting in their own way, but soon disappeared from the catalogues, and a rumoured three more never materialised. New Leonardo kits But now - several decades on - the subject has gone full circle, with not one but three kit companies announcing new kits of Leonardo’s devices. Revell-Germany has announced a series of, appropriately enough, wooden kits for release later this year, while Japan’s Doyusha is issuing a series in plastic. But first to arrive - in the UK at least - are a pair of Italeri kits, reboxed from a set originated by Academy of South Korea. Working boat The Paddle Boat, also known as the Self-Propelled Boat, was a Leonardo idea that was an ancestor of the 19th paddle steamers. The kit ac...

David Jefferis reports from the show The SMN crew spent yesterday at the UK’s premier business-orientated aerospace show. The weather was fantastic (which just goes to show how useless the predictions of some iPhone weather apps are...) and it was a real pleasure to watch high-power aerobatics and more genteel flypasts in bright blue skies, with puffy clouds to set them off. Stealthy delta Highlights of the day included new aircraft like the Airbus A400M military airlifter, and old-stagers such as the delta-wing Avro Vulcan, currently maintained in flying order by an enthusiast group, and good for them. The Vulcan’s shape gave it stealth-like abilities long before stealth became a design essential for survival in aerial combat... A380 airliner For model fans, shows like this are fantastic. Wandering round the real machines parked by the flightline reveals so much detail you just never see in photos. And as for weathering, one look at the A380 demo airliner should give you airbrush mode...

Mat Irvine reports Old friend Andy Yanchus in New York, past Project Manager at Aurora, and a kit historian - with a much wider knowledge than me - points out that the Revell Germany Classic Kits reissue of the Chance Vought Cutlass F7U-3 (see SMN July 3) is not from the actual original. The very first version Revell tooled up was the F7U-1, which had a more pointed nose. In addition, and as was common with these very early kits, it had no cockpit or undercarriage. However it did have a stand, a simple two-piece design moulded in the same colour as the main parts. Added details However, Revell soon upgraded the Cutlass, along with the two other fighter kits it manufactured, the Lockheed Starfire and Grumman Cougar. These featured ‘new-fangled’ details, such as a cockpit and undercarriage. At the same time, the Cutlass tooling was changed to the later version, which had the more rounded nose. Revell swivel stand At the same time, Revell replaced the original stands with a transparent ty...

David Jefferis reports Here’s some interesting information for British model fans - the ModelZone chain is adding new outlets to its already extensive number of stores. The new expansion will cover Birmingham, Ipswich, Leicester and Glasgow, with more to come. It’s an encouraging sign that points the way to a good future for the hobby. Wide range at ModelZone ModelZone markets a wide array of miniatures, from plastic kits and model trains to sci-fi collectibles and slot-car racers. There isn’t a vast range in any particular genre, but the sheer variety means that there is a tasty ‘Aladdin’s Cave’ flavour to these stores, and it’s almost impossible to leave without purchasing something pleasing. An exploration is highly recommended! Airfix Fighter Collection Among products available at the moment is the Airfix 1:72 scale ‘Fighter Collection’ set, featuring five World War II aircraft: four Spitfires of various types, plus a Hawker Hurricane and a big stand. As you can see from the pic, ...

Mat Irvine reports From around 1955, one of the mainstays of the US Army’s military might in Europe was the surface-to-surface Corporal ballistic missile, the first such to carry a nuclear warhead. The 139 km (86 mile) range Corporal looked sleek and functional, but in reality was very unreliable and took a large number of personnel to ready it for launch. But the Corporal did prove an ideal subject for the early Revell company’s growing range of space and missile kits, and it now stars as another of Revell-Germany’s Classic Kit range reissues. Uniquely, Revell issued the kit in two forms, one of which consisted of the missile and launcher, with three crew and a stand-alone tracking station; it’s this kit that Revell-Germany has reissued, using the original box-art as a centrepiece, with the ‘Classic Kits’ medallion added. These types of kit had to have ‘working parts’, so the launcher’s support arms were designed to be foldable, the transporting road wheels can be unsnapped, and suppo...

Mat Irvine reports Aeronautical designers have a history of fascination with aircraft that are round - in the ‘flying saucer’ sense. There have been dozens of designs over the years, though the vast majority have been impractical, were ‘paper projects’, or would likely never have flown even if a prototype had been built. Flying Discs However, flying saucer planes remain fascinating, and specialist model producer Allen Ury, who runs Fantastic Plastic, has slaked his enthusiasm for these bizarre designs with a kit of the US Air Force ‘40 foot Flying Disc’, a design that was supposedly proposed in the 1960s. As Allen says on his website: “In 1967, former US Navy aviator and aviation writer Jack D. Pickett and his business partner Harold Baker visited MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida, to gather information for an Air Force-sponsored article on historical experimental aircraft.  At the edge of the base, they were shown four decommissioned X-planes - all of them flying discs - me...

Mat Irvine reports Revell Germany has recently released another batch of Classic Kits, and this includes one of the oldest originals to be reissued to date, the F7U-3 Cutlass, dating back to 1953. This really does make it an ‘old style’ model kit, from the prominent raised rivets and etched-in decal placements, to the odd 1:60 scale, as it comes from a time when many kits were made to ‘fit the box’ size, not to a standard scale.  Nicely sculpted pilot figure Moulding on this Cutlass is on the heavy side, which was fairly usual for the period and has little of the fine detail you would expect from a modern kit, but the pilot figure - although moulded to his seat - is actually not too bad. Four early-model Sparrow missiles are provided as armament, though these are fairly basic in shape and detail. Revell Selected Subjects Program The idea of these Classic Kits originally came from the American side of the ‘Revell’ name, Revell-Monogram (technically now a separate company), who intro...