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The subjects are packaged together in a
plastic bag. You get both on one sprue of brittle grey plastic. There is no decal
sheet included.
The few panel lines are engraved. Parts are well molded with next to nothing for flash.
There are no alignment pins on the parts.
Enzian:
This consists of 12 parts. Fit was very good. The booster bodies (part 3) had a bit
of a mold seam to clean up.
Construction was quick and very straightforward. Before I glued the fuselage
halves together (part 1) I drilled out the exhaust and inserted a piece of plastic tube with one end
blanked off. The fit of the vertical surfaces (part 2) was a bit dodgy requiring a small amount of
filler.
The finish on the plastic has a slight orange peel effect, which needs to be removed with a light
sanding. The model was painted overall with Aeromaster RLM02 Grey enamel. The boosters
were painted flat black and given a dry brushing of dark grey. Everything was sprayed with a
thinned coat of Testors Gloss Cote. The boosters were given a coat of Aeromaster acrylic flat and
then attached with super glue to the fuselage. Getting the boosters aligned to the same spots so
their nozzles pointed in the proper direction was a bit troublesome since there was no locating
holes on the fuselage nor any locating pins on the boosters.
There is a three part stand (parts 5 & 6) on which to place
the kit, but I elected to build a launcher instead.
The launcher started as a Hasegawa Flak 88 gun, which I built pretty much straight
from the box, except I did not add the gun portion. I scratch
built a launch rail to replace the gun using pictures from the
web as a reference. The launcher rail was made from an Evergreen plastic ladder
which had alternate rungs removed and replaced with diagonal braces. Other parts
were made from various pieces of Evergreen plastic rod. The complete launcher was painted Testors Panzer grey and given a
wash of black acrylic, after which the Enzian was super glued to the rails.
Bv-246:
This consists of nine pieces, two of which make up the fuselage rack for placement on an
Fw-190A-5 (Fw-190F-8 according to reference [4]). No recommendation is made as to which Fw-190 kit to use.
Fit was not as good as it was for the Enzian. The fuselage halves went together well, but the
horizontal stabilizer (part 9), the wings (part 8) and the fin/rudder (part 10) did not. The
horizontal stabilizer stands proud from the body and a bit of trimming on the fuselage needs to be
done to get a reasonable fit. Some filling will be required afterward. As for the wing to fuselage
join, it is not strong, being a simple butt join to a very small surface. Once the wings are on the
model, be very careful not to put too much pressure on them or they'll snap off. That happened to
me a couple of times.
Painting followed once everything was together. The kit received an overall coat of Aeromaster
RLM76 light blue-grey enamel with the uppers getting a coat of Aeromaster RLM74 dark grey-green.
The kit was then given a coat of Testors Glosscote followed by a final coat of Aeromaster
Acrylic flat.
References
[1] German Secret Weapons: Blueprint for Mars, Brian Ford, Ballantine Books, New York 1969
[2] German Secret Weapons, I.V. Hogg, Arco Publishing, New York 1970 SBN: 668-0-2337-6
[3] The Illustrated Encyclopedia of the World's Rockets and Missiles: A Comprehensive Technical Directory and History of the
Military Guided Missile Systems of the 20th Century Hardcover, Bill Gunston, Leisure Books, 1979
[4] German Guided Missiles, Heinz J. Nowarra, Schiffer Publsihing, Atglen 1993 ISBN: 0-88740-475-8
[5] Wikipedia (Enzian)
[6] Wikipedia (Bv-246)
[7] German Wartime Newsreel footage found on Youtube
[8] Luft46.com (Bv-246)
Conclusion
This set is very inexpensive and the two models can be put together quickly without too much fuss. Unfortunately the lack of detail on the kits
detracts quite a bit from thier overall look.
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