Well, you know what they say, when you fall off a horse you should get right back on again. So after the Hellcat ’warped plastic’ farce on with a new build....
So, why after an aborted and problematical build opt for a Revell? Well, those who know me are aware that I am not a fan of Revell as I find their kits built to a price and as such compromise on overall quality and accuracy. I much prefer to spend more on a better kit. But - this kit is a wolf in sheep’s clothing....
It may be in a Revell box but it is really the Dragon bf110C inside the box.
About the original Dragon release.
I built a Dragon bf110 some years back and here is the completed thread:
https:tongue-out3:/www.scale-models....f110c-7.18358/
I loved that build, it was a joy start to finish. The only problem being the instructions which were the worse I have ever seen. I have wanted another of these kits and when I realised it was released by Revell and at a fraction of the Dragon kit then I could not resist it.
So in what ways is the Revell release different to Dragon’s.
1/ The instructions. The Revell ones cannot be worse that Dragon‘s. I will be doing a bit of a ‘Google’ though to be sure that Revell have covered all bases....
2/ The plastic. One viewing the sprues I was disappointed to see that this is molded in Revell’s cheap hard plastic instead of the high quality plastic Dragon used. At least Revell‘s cheap plastic, being hard, is better suited to large scale kits than Airfix’s cheap soft plastic. I will say a bit more about the plastic later. Using the Dragon tooling though the fit will be good and the fine detailing is there despite the plastic.
3/ No p.e. There were a few p.e. parts with Dragon as alternatives to plastic ones also provided. The one absence being seat belts but that is not a problem as I would have bought aftermarket anyway and have done so.
4/ Paint schemes. I am getting aftermarket decals anyway. I would prefer to paint the markings but I could not find a scheme in masks that I liked, so I will use decals.
A word about plastic In kits.
All of us who build kits from different manufacturers will know that there are clear differences between the plastic used and I am sure that we all have our pet hates and likes. Interestingly there is often not even consistency in the plastic from manufacturers and you can often see this with kits with multi-coloured plastic. One I remember very clearly like this was the Zoukei Mura Skyraider when it was first released in three colours;
. A grey very much like Revell’s hard plastic which had reasonably sharp detail, the airframe was this plastic.
. A silver, it was quite soft plastic but not the way Airfix plastic is, it almost but not quite had that same soft quality of the old Airfix 1/72 sets of soldiers had (might still be the case). The detail was softer than the grey as well, it was hard to sand. This was used for the engines.
. A black. This was a harder solid plastic and much of the internal detail was made of this. Sharper detail, easy to cut and sand, it was unlike most model plastics I have used.
The interesting thing about this kit was that all the molds were done by the same people to the same standard with the only real difference being the plastic and, yet, the detail did not have the same sharpness across all the colours of plastic. It was like the silver, in particular, just did not ‘hold’ the detail as well as the black. I still find that strange.
The Airfix soft plastic is easy to work with but has a tendency to warp and shrink but it holds detail well. The other type of cheap plastic is Revell’s as with this kit, harder it has much less tendancy the shrink and warp, it is not hard to work with but seems a little brittle and the detail can appear a little softer. Then there are those in between, top quality goes to Tamiya’s plastic, hard, not too hard, not brittle, not hard to work with and it holds really nice sharp detail, the Dragon original tooling was the same high quality as Tamiya. Trumpeter and Hobbyboss for instance are closer to Tamiya than the others but, not quite as good.
I am not an expert in plastics and I just record what I have found and I would be interested in what other think specially if they have some specialist knowledge on the subject.
I digress, so back to the kit.....
So, why after an aborted and problematical build opt for a Revell? Well, those who know me are aware that I am not a fan of Revell as I find their kits built to a price and as such compromise on overall quality and accuracy. I much prefer to spend more on a better kit. But - this kit is a wolf in sheep’s clothing....
It may be in a Revell box but it is really the Dragon bf110C inside the box.
About the original Dragon release.
I built a Dragon bf110 some years back and here is the completed thread:
https:tongue-out3:/www.scale-models....f110c-7.18358/
I loved that build, it was a joy start to finish. The only problem being the instructions which were the worse I have ever seen. I have wanted another of these kits and when I realised it was released by Revell and at a fraction of the Dragon kit then I could not resist it.
So in what ways is the Revell release different to Dragon’s.
1/ The instructions. The Revell ones cannot be worse that Dragon‘s. I will be doing a bit of a ‘Google’ though to be sure that Revell have covered all bases....
2/ The plastic. One viewing the sprues I was disappointed to see that this is molded in Revell’s cheap hard plastic instead of the high quality plastic Dragon used. At least Revell‘s cheap plastic, being hard, is better suited to large scale kits than Airfix’s cheap soft plastic. I will say a bit more about the plastic later. Using the Dragon tooling though the fit will be good and the fine detailing is there despite the plastic.
3/ No p.e. There were a few p.e. parts with Dragon as alternatives to plastic ones also provided. The one absence being seat belts but that is not a problem as I would have bought aftermarket anyway and have done so.
4/ Paint schemes. I am getting aftermarket decals anyway. I would prefer to paint the markings but I could not find a scheme in masks that I liked, so I will use decals.
A word about plastic In kits.
All of us who build kits from different manufacturers will know that there are clear differences between the plastic used and I am sure that we all have our pet hates and likes. Interestingly there is often not even consistency in the plastic from manufacturers and you can often see this with kits with multi-coloured plastic. One I remember very clearly like this was the Zoukei Mura Skyraider when it was first released in three colours;
. A grey very much like Revell’s hard plastic which had reasonably sharp detail, the airframe was this plastic.
. A silver, it was quite soft plastic but not the way Airfix plastic is, it almost but not quite had that same soft quality of the old Airfix 1/72 sets of soldiers had (might still be the case). The detail was softer than the grey as well, it was hard to sand. This was used for the engines.
. A black. This was a harder solid plastic and much of the internal detail was made of this. Sharper detail, easy to cut and sand, it was unlike most model plastics I have used.
The interesting thing about this kit was that all the molds were done by the same people to the same standard with the only real difference being the plastic and, yet, the detail did not have the same sharpness across all the colours of plastic. It was like the silver, in particular, just did not ‘hold’ the detail as well as the black. I still find that strange.
The Airfix soft plastic is easy to work with but has a tendency to warp and shrink but it holds detail well. The other type of cheap plastic is Revell’s as with this kit, harder it has much less tendancy the shrink and warp, it is not hard to work with but seems a little brittle and the detail can appear a little softer. Then there are those in between, top quality goes to Tamiya’s plastic, hard, not too hard, not brittle, not hard to work with and it holds really nice sharp detail, the Dragon original tooling was the same high quality as Tamiya. Trumpeter and Hobbyboss for instance are closer to Tamiya than the others but, not quite as good.
I am not an expert in plastics and I just record what I have found and I would be interested in what other think specially if they have some specialist knowledge on the subject.
I digress, so back to the kit.....
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