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Eastern Express 1/144 HP Herald?


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23 hours ago, Britman said:

Very welcome and will have to have one. I flew in one with Janus airways out of Lydd years ago G-TIGG I think, although I am having trouble remembering reggie's just lately!  Nice to see Ray taking an interest. 

 

Keith. 

Knew I was adrift there! It should be  G-ATIG.

 

Keith.

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Love the Herald, and even though I'll have one of these, 1/72 would be my preferred choice also. I had my second flight on a Herald in 1984 as part of a school trip to Southend airport. We got a tour followed by a half hour flight down to the white cliffs and back. Great fun! Having grown up in Southend, I think the sound of RR Darts is ingrained in me.

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6 minutes ago, stringbag said:

Must get one of these ready for the red square decals that one of the aftermarket manufacturers is bound to print.  :winkgrin:

Alas, the BEA Heralds were Series 100s with shorter fuselage, so you would need to do a cut-n-shunt job! 

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Postage is £9, but it seems thats the way it will be with Eastern Express kits. Zvezda 737 & A320 sell for about £20 and will have a wider appeal in what is a very small segment of the modelling community, so in that sense a Herald, Shorts family and dash-8 etc.. probably would (should?) retail for a little bit more or what we perceive as too much for too little.

 

I'll be buying one or two.

 

Jeff

Edited by pinky coffeeboat
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17 hours ago, pinky coffeeboat said:

I'll be buying one or two.

I'll wait for your review before I get one Jeff, hopefully Ray will have some for a reasonable price.

Cheers,

Ian

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  • 2 weeks later...
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Well as an update to this thread,  mine was delivered over Christmas but I wasn't there so today was the first time I could collect it.

 

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Overall, model quality wise (not accuracy because I'm not too clued up on the Herald yet) it's not too bad. The photos highlight quite unfairly the slightly uneven panel lines, with your eye they're not too bad. Its like the F-27 in terms of plastic smoothness and panel line finesse - in fact there are couple of parts on the sprue that bear a passing similarity to parts in the F-27 kit too. There are one or two sink marks, one on the engine side intake:

 

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And some flash on the props:

 

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Interestingly a flight deck is provided in the form of seats, floor and rear bulkhead but the instructions instruct (obviously!!) to disregard these as there is no clear piece provided for it in the kit! It must have been an ambition at the design and early production stage. There are wing light recesses for which no clear pieces are provided, instead a couple of solid plastic parts are installed instead. Clear parts are noticeably absent.

One thing I have noticed is the fin and rudder don't have the ribs that are visible on the actual aircraft in some lighting conditions:

 

Herald

 

Herald - nice colours hint, hint!!

 

Those who really care can spend an enjoyable series of evenings gluing on finely stretched sprue!

 

I'll add more as I see it. 

 

The big question is - "is it worth it?"

 

The price of EE kits is well documented and commented upon. This cost me £34 (£26 for the kit and £8 for postage) and was delivered pretty quickly after I bought it on eBay, actually quicker than I have received models bought from some UK sellers.

 

How much do you really want/ need a Herald in your collection? 

 

Jeff

Edited by pinky coffeeboat
Even worser grammer and spooling, misstakes
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Adding a little bit more as I give the kit a good look over.

 

The exhaust are one piece solid parts that a few seconds with a fine drill can rectify 

 

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The fin strake as moulded includes the bulge for the a/c (? - like I mentioned I'm not too au fait with the Herald yet) and the air intake is a separate piece to add to the top of the strake if needed

 

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It's going to be one of those models that's not quite a "shake and bake" kit; I'm currently building or completing the EE F-27, dhc-8 and Shorts 360.  The dash 8 is a beautifully moulded kit that almost falls together. The F-27 and 360 require a few minutes working with almost all parts to ensure they fit as best they can. I'm also building the F-rsin ATR-72 and F-28...glutton for punishment you might think, but truth is I love these type of models. Theres so  much enjoyment gained from them and little things that can be added here and there that I almost fool myself into thinking I'm scratch building!!

I think this kit will fall into that level of enjoyment for me too.

 

Please Ray, do another deal and offer these kits and some of your decals, I'll buy a fleet!!

 

Jeff

Edited by pinky coffeeboat
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Thanks Jeff, an interesting and informative write-up.

 

Like you, I enjoy building these short-run kits of smaller airliners; you'll inevitably need to fettle some of the parts for a decent fit, some kits seem more "refined" than others.  As you say, you can add as much detail as you wish, depending on your skills and taste. There's a certain satisfaction in finishing something a little out-of-the-ordinary.

Its a shame the Herald doesn't come with a transparent windscreen/cockpit - most of the other recent releases from Eastern Express do. 

 

Eastern Express (and F-Rsin) are to be congratulated on bringing us less common subject matter.

 

Donald

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Hi Donald, looking at the kit, I think EE had every intention of providing clear parts due to the flight deck parts and the holes in the wings. Perhaps they've looked at numerous online airliner builds where the vast majority of modellers use decals for windows and decided to abandon the idea and save a little bit of money. There are also top and bottom anti-coll lights provided as solid plastic parts that would originally have been in clear plastic.

 

These kits are great fun and as you say, there's something quite pleasing about adding little bits to enhance the basic kit. EE, F-rsin and Amodel and others deserve some credit for having the courage to mould these "low demand" kits.

 

Jeff

Edited by pinky coffeeboat
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Hi Jeff

 

I'm sure you're right, the lack of a transparent windscreen for the Herald may be due to economic limitations by the manufacturer.  

EE's F27 kits (like Skyline's exceptionally good 737 Classic range) give you the option of cutting away the solid plastic cockpit cab from the fuselage half and replacing it with a transparency.  Personally, I prefer transparent windows/windscreens but many Modellers don't.  I thought that the Herald cockpit/windscreen section - much like a Viscount - would have consisted of a simple, clear "bubble/blister" design, replicating the distinctive dome-shape of the full-sized aircraft.

 

I'm currently enjoying building EE's diminutive Short 360.  Its not a shake-and-bake project by any means, but its a nice little model; I've found its helpful to plan in advance how to tackle it (eg ensuring there's sufficient tabs in the fuselage halves to anchor the fuselage floor section).

 

The likes of Eastern Express, F-Rsin and others (mainly of Eastern European origin) are currently serving the 1/144 airline enthusiast very well.  I had thought of including A Model's products in my previous post - they've a comprehensive and eclectic mix of aircraft available - the only reason I didn't mention them was that my most recent purchases of their line have been the (already available elsewhere) Comet 4B, Caravelle III and Lockheed Hercules !   Roden are producing some lovely airliners too, their Super VC10, Carvair and Britannia are particularly good, especially for fans of large British transport aircraft; I'm looking forward to their forthcoming Convair 340 (and C 133 Cargomaster).

 

Will you be posting pictures of your EE Herald when done ?

 

Donald

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I bought a few EE Shorts kits when they were first released. On my first 360, I ended up using a fair lump of Miliput on the upper surfaces to fix a bowed inwards fuselage join that I'm certain could have been easily corrected if I'd taken the time to adjust the fuselage halves and add a couple of tabs. I also found the main u/c installation tricky but resolved that by cutting off the flat top of the leg and gluing the leg to inside the sponson. Other than those issues, it's a decent little kit that is just waiting for some overall white paint (I'm using the kit American Eagle decals) before anymore progress can be made on it.

 

The HP Herald certainly will be presented here, and may even be a WiP. I've got some kits as mentioned to finish off (ATR-72, F-28, YS-11, dhc-8, Shorts 360, F-27 and one or two others) but when I return home next week, it'll be full steam ahead with those and more!

 

Jeff 

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Have you looked at their feed back? All of the models I've bought from Russian and Asian sellers have always delivered the goods. Never had a bad deal from eBay and it's protected by PayPal.

As I said in post 38 above, mine was delivered after less than a week from purchase, faster than some UK based sellers I've ordered from.

 

Jeff

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