Riders in the Sky Preview PLUS!
Eduard 1/72 Liberator GR Mk.V Limited Edition by Tim Upson-Smith
ITEM 2121-NAV1
Box Art by Piotr Forkasiewicz
13 Markings options (Decals by Cartograf)
201 Injection moulded plastic parts by
Hasegawa over 12 sprues (many parts
marked not for use)
39 Clear parts by Hasegawa over 2 sprues
79 injection moulded plastic parts by
Eduard 1 sprue
39 clear parts by Eduard 1 sprue
Eduard colour Photo-etch 1 sheet plus 1
sheet brass, c.79 parts
Eduard paint masks
A2 rolled poster of the box art
76pp softback book ‘Riders in the Sky 1944’
24-page full colour instruction bookTHE KIT
T
he bulk of the plastic in this
box is by Hasegawa, but
Eduard have worked their
magic to upgrade this kit to a GR
Mk.V, coastal command Liberator
with the addition of a brand new
clear sprue, with the correct gun
turrets for the British version.
There is also a new grey moulded
sprue with the rest of the parts for
the gun turrets, but also contains
new propellers, a searchlight and
all of the parts for the fuselage
mounted rockets system. Eduard
have also included two phot-
etch sheets, one in colour, as
well as a very complete set of
masks for all of the glazing and
there is quite a lot of glazing!
In the bottom of box, you will
find an A4 76-page book, the
printed version is in Czech, but atranslation should be available on
the Eduard website by the time you
read this. The book give a history
of the RAF Coastal Command
Liberators, with sections on the GRMk.III and GR Mk.V. The book then
goes on to describe the aircraft that
are featured in the kit. As well as
details of each aircraft there are
biographies of some of the pilotswho flew them with 311 Squadron.
The book is illustrated throughout
with contemporary black and white
photos and some superb colour
profiles and plans. The book forms
the ideal one stop reference for
your build and will certainly help
you to get the weathering right!
As you would expect the
Hasegawa plastic is spot on with
no flash and recessed panel lines
as appropriate. The two new
Eduard sprues are just as good as
the Hasegawa and if they didn’t
have Eduard moulded on them
you would be hard pressed to
tell them apart! There will be a
lot of parts for your spares box
from this kit, as there are a large
number of items marked ‘not for
use’ on the sprue layout diagram
inside the instruction booklet.
Before starting your build of
this bomber, you will really need
to study the instruction booklet
in some detail and decide which of
the 13 colour scheme options you
are going to portray, as the first
page of the booklet has optional
parts for different schemes. So,
no changing your mind halfway
through with this build!
Thirteen colour schemes are
included in the kit, all of which are
illustrated with four view colour
diagrams. All of the schemes are
either extra dark sea grey over
white. Or extra dark sea grey
and dark slate grey over white.
Seven of the schemes included
40 • JUNE 2018 • SCALE AVIATION MODELLER INTERNATIONALFIRST LOOK!
040-43-FirstLooks-0618.indd 40 11/05/2018 16:02