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Hello folks, My entry is a little unusual. I have a weak spot for Autogyros. Fortunately for the BM universe, until now this affliction has not been thrust forth, up, down, port or starboard onto or into these hallowed digital pages. All that, is, I'm sad to say, going to change . KASKR-1 The Soviets sometimes had an interesting habit of, shall we say, building things following the lead, the example, of others. Their earliest, and even their second autogyro, both fit very well into this category of development. The most inspiring genius in this field, and the man regarded as the inventor of the Autogyro itself, was one Juan de la Cierva y Codorníu; Count de la Cierva of Mercia, Spain. His inventions, life in Spain, then life and untimely death in England, are described here, on Wikipedia: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_de_la_Cierva His Cierva C.6 autogiro design, first demonstrated to the Air Ministry in Farnborough, Hampshire, England in 1925, was based upon the fuselage and many other main components of the British Avro 504K biplane aircraft. Avro 504K British Trainer Aircraft (Wikipedia: Public Domain) The subsequent and more stable Cierva C.8 series Autogyros, were also based on the Avro 504K and derivatives such as the Avro 552 and Avro 504N (Cierva C.8L Mk II and III). Meanwhile, the Soviet Union, in addition to using a number of British built Avro 504K aircraft following the Great War, was producing its own copy; the Uchebnyi -1 (У-1) U-1 Avrushka ('Little Avro'). У-1 (Avrushka - 'Little Avro') Wikipedia Russia PD. In turn, as had been the case with the original Cierva C.6 and C.8 Autogyros and the Avro 504K derivative fuselages, the Soviets used a U-1 '504K copy' as the basis for their KaSkr-1, Cierva C8 based autogiro. It was virtually a copy of the Cierva C.8L Mk. III. The name designation was taken from the names of the designers: Kamov and N.K.Skrzhinskii. Known as 'Red Engineer' (Krasny Inzhener), a number of trials took place in this U-1 based Autogyro: This first version was not particularly successful, a full account of its flight achievements (or, sadly more correctly, lack of them), can be found here: http://www.aviastar.org/helicopters_eng/kamov_kaskr-1.php Everyone has to start somewhere and this airframe was subsequently modified into the KAСКP-2, a notably more successful autogyro. I will use Russian type designation from now on. The KAСКР-1 and KAСКР-2, and a number of other splendid Autogyros and exotic early Soviet aircraft are produced, in 1/72, by Amodel. People tend to love or hate early Amodel kits. They are short-run and often pose a number of challenges. The challenges can vary from batch to batch of the same kit, but in general, their kits are becoming, although still definitely 'short-run', easier to get together. I have always liked them; the unusual subjects and often bizarre challenges make them, to me, a little like a combination of a new kind of Rubik's cube, as yet unsolved, and a model kit. I don't always succeed in completing them. I still have a stalled thread here on Britmodeller involving three of their I-16's. Don't worry, that thread isn't over yet ! Here I will attempt to build this first Soviet autogyro,, replete with what appear to be washing lines with socks hanging off of them. OOB, exactly as you can see on the box-art: As the Australians here will understand, it is clear here that we can see the ghostly image of Stalin looking down, quite contentedly, as his socks dry on his design bureaux's first attempt at the 'Hill's hoist'. This design was subsequently exquisitely perfected in the antipodes for its designated purposes. To this day it is known to be capable of flight, given correct wind speed and direction: I am very much looking forward to the challenge(s) that I'm sure this kit will pose. As stated, it will be OOB and clean. All photographs I can find show it as a cared for and clean experimental prototype. I am behind with my modelling projects for a number of unavoidable (and mostly unpredictable) reasons, but hope to start this soon. I am struggling to find control panel decals for my F-111 before time runs out. For the DH Group Build, the recent announcement of a forthcoming 'twin-stage' Mosquito from Special Hobby, also has me rethinking sawing up a 'virgin' more or less mint collectible Matchbox Mozzie. Therefore, whilst I ponder those two, I will move ahead with my Jak - 23 for the Prototypes, World Firsts and Record Breakers GB, and in all likelihood, make a start on this on Saturday (Mrs. T has a coursework assignment to write that day). I hope this build will provide something a little different. Thank you for reading this far if you're still here , it would be lovely to have you on board Bye for now and have a nice Friday TonyT