Eduard re edition of FW 190A
The year 2014 is good for me to remember since Eduard has again released some of their old projects. Two of interest are the Focke Wulf 190s. Very good kits, with good packaging and it’s worth it to see them again. Kits are both A models and stock codes are 8174 and 8177. These are well known samples from the ProfiPack series in 1/48 scale. So let’s see what we have again…
Fw 190A-5
First to be shown here will be the sample with stock code 8174 and this presents the Focke Wulf Fw 190A-5 model. The kit box presents nice action over the East front and content is also very good. First major difference from original box is resin tires for the kit and they replace original plastic from box. The rest of the content presents seven frets with plastic parts (one of those transparent), two sheet of the etched parts, one protective mask, excellent decals and of course the assembly instruction booklet.
Assembly of the kit is easy no matter that it is of complex geometry. Images present the assembly and some basic info you can have also here so I will not go into extra info.
For the final kit I decided to build one which will present a plane flown by Hptm. Walter Nowotny. The plane is the one flown on the East front and features very interesting camouflage. This camouflage is a bit doubtful since black and white images can be tricky to analyze. My opinion, based on just a few images, is that it is very possible that only the fuselage got a new coat of paint and wings were left in the original grey colors. The number of the new colors is also not easy to determine since on black and white images some colors tend to blend. On one image from the starboard side could be seen a third patch and it is a great possibility that it had more colors. I have seen a few color images of painted over Fw 190 on the East front and it shows more than two new colors used for this purpose. Without any strong proof I decided to paint what for sure have seen and this is the fuselage in new colors and rest in original scheme. I used two green paints for this, one as much as similar to John Deere green and the other standard Luftwaffe dark green. Result is as you see on the images.
Night fighter
The second kit in this review is the one with stock code 8177 and it presents Fw 190A night fighter. Very interesting subject to me and not so many were produced in WW2. Content differs much from other kits of Fw 190 and you have eleven frets with plastic. You have options there to choose from two types of fuselage and wings and also have one fret with radar aerials. Please take careful study of the kit before starting to build, take your choice of final kit and then make kit. Other versions of radar aerial are given as etched parts but they are incorrect.
When building this kit please take attention that inside of the kit are marked holes and you should drill holes there for mounting of the fuel tank and radar aerials. I will also note different type of the etched instrument panels, again, their use is related for the particular sample you plan to build.
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My final decision is to build the kit of the Fw 190A-6/R-11 ‘Neptun’ II./JG 300, Lobnitz, Fall, 1943. What attracted me to take this one is very interesting camouflage where the fuselage is covered with bands of the RLM 74, 75 and 76 colors. But when I checked out the archive reference image, I have noted that details on the image differ much from what is proposed by Eduard. Eduard gives an option that the top surface needs a light spray of the RLM 76 color. My point is that the original airplane did not have this; we have in this case a fade out color. I have seen also an image of the wing from another angle where could be seen wing top surface and it is definitely faded out and worn out paint. What I will do will be standard grey camouflage pattern which will be much faded and after that I will add spray of new color, most possibly RLM 74. Interesting that around number 8 is an extra dark patch, possibly in RLM 70 color. There are also technical problem with radar aerials, they have conical bottom and two part tubes. Images gallery above present problems I have noted.
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Conclusion
No matter of some points regarding to the details as well as camouflage, these are very good kits. Content good, good details, good assembly options as well as nice schemes provided. Final result will be for sure impressive. I have built the kits in a simple way and there are also good options to open cockpit, machine guns bay and even engine (which is very well detailed). I highly recommend these two kits to you, and you can find them here and here!
Special thanks to Eduard who provided me these nice products. And for your info, get this free e book about FW 190A!
Srecko Bradic
