SCALE MODEL NEWS

David Jefferis reports For a limited time, the California-based XCOR Aerospace rocket engineering company is offering a numbered, limited edition of hand-carved 1:24 scale display models of its Lynx spacecraft, currently under development. Only 100 models were made and there are still some available. Many are now on the desks of various VIPs and XCOR investors, but the rest are on offer to space fans. Collectible spacecraft made of wood It looks an attractive model that just might have a collectible value one day, as the company is aiming for its two-seater rocket to be flying in little more than a year’s time. Each model is hand-crafted from Philippine mahogany, and comes mounted on an attractive base, painted with the Lynx color scheme and logo. An individual serial number is stamped on the bottom of the base. The 1:24 scale model measures some 280 mm (15 in) long, with a wingspan of 330 mm (13 in). The model isn’t cheap mind, coming in at $299 USD, but hey, what price a piece of his...

A Mat Irvine review Although Wonder Woman is most likely best known from the 1970s TV series starring Lynda Carter, the character existed long before that. In fact, the original Aurora kit of 1965 was based on the comic books that first featured the character in the 1940s. Along with Wonder Woman, Aurora issued others in the same vein, such as Superman, Superboy, Spider-Man, Batman, Robin, and The Penguin. However, amongst all those boys (and a bird), Wonder Woman never seemed to have quite the appeal - must be all that testosterone (and fish) - and the Wonder Woman kit was only available for a couple of years. Wonder Woman gets lost? Aurora did reissue its figure kits a few times, and invented the Comic Scenes series in the 1970s. Many of the original figure kits were repackaged under this title, a few parts were changed, there were new boxes, but otherwise they were pretty much the same as the originals. However there was one reissue absentee - Wonder Woman. The story went that the t...

David Jefferis reports The BAe Systems Hawk is one of the best known jet trainers, and the Red Arrows one of the world’s top aerobatic teams, so it’s great to see a new-tool kit of the two-seater on sale. The Hawk is not a large aircraft, but at 1:32 scale the wings span 294 mm (11.6 in) and the fuselage is some 368 mm (14.5 in) long, so the benefits of sheer size are clear. There are 158 components in the kit, including the ventral tank carrying the diesel fuel used by the smoke system. As a vet of many a Reds display, I reckon they use more smoke during a show than any other team I’ve seen - in Guernsey one year, a vast mist of the stuff wafted across the crowd in a multi-coloured haze, but everyone loved it! Hawk details and a Guernsey antique shop Revell has included the sort of detail you might expect, with the twin cockpits in particular packed with detail - they form the best Hawk interior yet available in the model market. The ejector seats are especially worthy of note, and th...

SMN report Eurofighter has released details of its proposed navalised Typhoon jet, and a glance at the details makes it seem the answer to a defence planner’s budget problems. The basic aircraft is already in service and proven, the development cost would be far less than a clean-sheet design, and best of all, there’s enough power from the two EJ200 engines to allow carrier takeoffs using a ski-jump - no catapult equipment needed. Typhoon-N to replace the F-35? For the UK’s Royal Navy, the Typhoon-N looks particularly interesting. Here’s a way to cut out the F-35 completely, and keep the cost of new aircraft carriers down as well, for ski-jump installation and operations are far cheaper than using catapults. Commonality between Typhoon and Typhoon-N has another benefit too - maintenance ought to work out cheaper, from flight and technical training to the supply and cost of spares. A Typhoon for kit-bashers For model makers the Typhoon-N looks a very interesting project indeed, and a no...

Mat Irvine inspects an interesting mixed media kit In the middle of 2010, Scale Model News carried a report on one of the new kits from Italeri, originated by Academy, that explore the technological design marvels from the pen of that Renaissance Man, Leonardo da Vinci. At the time it was said that this literally was a rebirth of interest as you would be getting models from not one, but three different kit companies. Two would use conventional plastic - as does the Academy/Italeri - but Revell planned kits that would use materials that Leonardo would certainly be familiar with - wood, cloth, and cord. da Vinci designs Six of the ten da Vinci kits have been issued, and they are not only an intriguing cross-section of his designs and inventions, but certainly look the part in these traditional materials. They are also reasonably easy to build, as both wood and cloth parts are pre-cut and pre-stained. Aerial Screw kit The first kit I’m looking at - the rest will follow - is one of Leonard...

SMN report. The 1:72 scale Airfix TSR.2MS, a rocket-boosted, missile-equipped aircraft designed to destroy deadly space rocks, is now available. And the good news is that if you change your mind and decide against the sci-fi version - based on the Japanese anime series Stratos 4 - then the box still contains the decals that allow you to finish the aircraft as an epitaph to British aerospace achievement and while you’re at it, a blaming finger at the sadly misguided politicians who cancelled so many brilliant projects in that era. Stratos 4 the series As an asteroid-killer, the TSR.2MS is an interesting concept - especially the reaction-thrusters used for attitude control at peak trajectory - and when we get our hands on one, we’ll pass judgement on fit and finish of the kit. SMN featured the TSR.2MS in late 2010, but the world of ‘what-if’ models makes the standard TSR2 a strong interest for anyone interested in advanced aviation from the 1960s. A TSR2 that might have been Over at Greg...

Weekend Model Window is an occasional spot to show you some interesting stuff we've come across recently.  The 1:43 scale Ferrari F40 is a Herpa plastic readybuilt, full of detail and a beautiful little product that sold to a lucky eBay buyer recently.  The Messerschmitt Me163 Komet diorama was created by SMN star Mat Irvine, and very neatly done, too. The Revell 1:32 scale Red Arrows Hawk is a finely detailed model that we'll have a closer look at soon.   The slightly smaller scale 1:35 Wiesel 2 mobile air defence system of the German Army comes complete with rotating quad missile launcher. 155 components make up this 129 mm (5.1 in) long Revell kit. Ah Ghostbusters , what a great movie! And that Cadillac is still an object of desire at SMN Towers, even more so if it arrived driven by a lady with legs like that. This neat model was spotted at a show in Birmingham, UK.   Science fiction in all its forms is an SMN enthusiasm, so this Martian War Machine caught ou...

Mat Irvine reports I made a quick trip to the London Toy Fair at the end of January, and one of the biggest surprises of my visit was to find Revell-Germany announcing a 1:24 scale London Transport RM Routemaster double-decker bus plastic kit. Often suggested as an idea - and I recall there were rumours back in the 1970s that Airfix was planning such a venture - but the general consensus was that it would have been far too large a kit, and so that put the kibosh on the concept. Is a big-scale kit too big? In fact Airfix was also likely to have released a 1:24 scale Mosquito around that time, but it too was shelved as being ‘too big’, and instead released much later in 1:48. Of course, we do now have an Airfix 1:24 scale Mosquito, and large-scale kits in general are not uncommon. Revell has issued giant kits of oil platforms, bucket-wheel excavators and the shuttle launch pad, and it already has a big bus in the form of the 1:24 scale Cityliner coach, which admittedly isn’t as tall as a...