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Next Kovozávody Prostějov - KP (http://www.kovozavody.cz/) 1/72nd kit is a new tool North American P-51B/C Mustang - ref. Source: https://www.facebook.com/SAMEditor1 V.P.

Kovozávody Prostějov (KP) is to rebox the Heller/Směr Yak-3 kit. Release expected in February 2024. - ref. CLK0013 - Yakovlev Yak-3- Aces Source: https://www.kovozavody.cz/produkt/jak-3-aces/ - ref. CLK0014 - Yakovlev Yak-3 Source: https://www.kovozavody.cz/produkt/jak-3/ V.P.

Photo from Clintonville Public Library (Clintonville, WI) In 1939 the Four Wheel Drive Auto Company (FWD), a major manufacturer of four-wheel transmissions and heavy-duty trucks based in Clintonville, Wisconsin, opened a flight department and traded a company truck for a Waco biplane for their company's use. In 1944 company executives decided to start an airline named Wisconsin Central Airlines, and service began between six Wisconsin cities in 1946. This led the company to buy two Cessna UC-78 Bobcats, and, soon after, three Lockheed Electra 10As. In 1949, the familiar logo of "Herman the Duck" was created by Karl Brocken, a Milwaukee industrial design consultant. The flying mallard, silhouetted against the sun by day and the moon at night, symbolized the frequent and quick flights of Wisconsin Central's aircraft. More revenue allowed three more Electra 10As, then six Douglas DC-3s. Within three years the airline was serving 19 cities in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. In October 1950, Wisconsin Central bought six Douglas DC-3 aircraft from Trans World Airlines (TWA). These larger, 21 passenger aircraft cost $450,000, nearly a quarter of the airline’s total revenues for that year. In 1952 the airline moved their headquarters from Wisconsin to Minneapolis, Minnesota and changed its name to North Central Airlines. In July 1979, North Central acquired regional carrier Southern Airways and became Republic Airlines. This merger ended the proud legacy of Wisconsin Central Airlines and Herman the Duck. In 1986, Republic merged with Northwest Orient Airlines. Following the merger, the new airline became Northwest Airlines (dropping the "Orient"), which merged into Delta Air Lines in 2008. Once the merger was finalized in early 2010, the Northwest Airlines brand fully retired with the Delta Air Lines name surviving as the successor to Wisconsin Central Airlines. From its start in small-town Clintonville, Wisconsin, Wisconsin Central Airlines, and its successor North Central, grew into a major regional and national air carrier. In its 35 year history the airline carried nearly 6 million passengers, served 96 cities, employed 3,400 people, earned $140 million and flew seven different types of aircraft. A history of Wisconsin Central and North Central Airlines aircraft, from top to bottom: Cessna UC-70 Bobcat, Lockheed 10A, Douglas DC-3, Convair 440, Convair 580, Douglas DC-9, Douglas DC-9, Douglas DC-9 Series 30 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ In Spring of 2020, having decided to retire and relocate to Madison, Wisconsin, I built this model of a Lockheed L10 Electra in Wisconsin Central Airlines markings: Now, I'm all settled in to my new home and it's time to expand my collection of Wisconsin-themed aircraft. For this project, I will be building Wisconsin Central Airlines's first aircraft, the Cessna T-50 Bobcat: Let's open the box and see what's included! Two sprues of gray plastic: One clear sprue for the canopy and side windows: Two sheets of decals, representing four Bobcats in civil markings: Lastly, four pages of instructions: I will also be using these aftermarket items: Research is the necessary prerequisite for building a historic aircraft, and I was challenged to find any photos or other information about WCA's Bobcats. Fortunately, Space Ranger came to the rescue with a color profile drawing and a 1947 black & white photo taken in Clintonville of NC51401 and NC63662: My first question was, is the Wisconsin Central Airlines logo in the profile correct? The aircraft in the photo show no logos present. Perhaps the profile creator was applying artistic license? Then, Mika at Arctic Decals unearthed this photo, which confirms the passenger side of the WAC Bobcats carried a logo: Just a few days ago I stumbled on a veritable treasure-trove of information about Wisconsin Central Airlines at the Clintonville Public Library. In addition to the color photo at the top of this post, I found the following items to help me in my build: This is going to be fun!

I'm down to one current build, the Airfix 1/600 Ark Royal for the NMCZ GB, and I found myself pulling this one out to delay resuming it... I fondled the plastic a bit, read all the posts in Rumourmonger about this vs the ClearProp version (KP didn't win) and took a photo of the kit: Although it came off second best and needs a bit of work beyond just throwing it together, it looks like a nice kit and I'm looking forward to building it. I should set a good example and get on with the Ark Royal, and I will resist the temptation to start until the ship is properly under way. So this is just a placeholder for now. Must.... Resist... Regards, Adrian

Kovozávody Prostějov (http://www.kovozavody.cz/) back with two 1/72nd Zlin C-205 & Z-226M kits - ref. M7201 & M7202. Source: http://modelweb.modelforum.cz/2014/04/11/kovozavody-prostejov-novinky-duben-2014/?lang=CS V.P.

As builds in other GBS are finishing, I thought I might start another kit for this GB. So from the stash I have pulled the KP Hornet. I intend to finish in the scheme shown as the five view in Profile 174 on the Hornet, which I have had since 1968, and never got round to building one. I have the AeroCraft engine set and it is one of the decal options. We live only about twenty minutes or so from the airfield and occasionally our walking group do a walk which takes around the perimeter and past some abandoned dispersals in a field next to the airfield. I suspect back in time the Hornets would have flown over as aircraft for Church Fenton used to come close when it was in RAF hands. As the kit parts have already been illustrated on another thread, I am not putting them on here

Reserving a spot for an unarmed Spitfire with Stars and Bars. I think the Title and the Tags tell all I know about my build plans so far! V-P

Greetings. Since I got the wonderful book "Spitfires in the Sun" I have been trying to build some of the planes beautifully profiled in it. These profiles include Spitfire VC MA 368 that went through some interesting paint transitions since it got to India. Having the KP and Airfix kits I am going to try to build at least 2 of the profiles for this aircraft from the book.

Good day, I finally check in with my first submission for 2023. This is the Mig-19S Farmer from KP. Here is a brief overview of the kit……… 1. Colors / paints used A. Airframe : Model Master Sand, Helicopter Green, Vallejo Air Light Blue B. Cockpit, gear wells, air intake : Vallejo Air Greyish-Blue ( AMT-7 ) C. Landing gear & pitot tube : Tamiya titanium silver ( X-32 ) D. Bombs : Mission Models Light Grey ( 36307 ) E. Missiles : Mission Models Flat White 2. Various washes of sand, brown, black, and light grey 3. 0.5mm brass pitot tube used to replace kit supplied tube. 4. Pastels & pencils for various weathering highlights 5. Plumbers Putty and lead fishing sinkers used for ballast. 6. Included photo etched seat belts. 7. Vallejo “Fuel Stains” for the wing tanks. I found this kit to be similar to the Airfix Mig-17 Fresco in construction and fit. The landing gear assembly was particularly troublesome however the overall fit to the airframe itself was good. I used the two bombs from the spares box. Unfortunately , the windscreen only comes in one piece. I had given thought to cutting it open but I did not have a spare kit to use. The supplied decals come in four rather colorful Egyptian and Syrian options and were very nice. The kit can be a bit tricky in certain locations mainly with the main landing gear and nose gear well. There are no shortage of tiny bumps, blisters, and antennas to place all over the fuselage. The wing fences are separate pieces. Due to the added complexity, I can only recommend this kit for more experienced modelers to construct. Thank you in advance!!!! With much respect, Mike And here is a picture of the 0.5mm brass tube before i painted it……….

Morning all. Managed to wrap up this build which has been on the bench since early December! There's a full thread of what's been going on here- For those who've not been following it started life as the 'new' KP 1/72 kit, but had a lot of changes made during construction and various bits of metalwork and etched brass details added (struts are made from soldered brass for example) Cheers Paul

Not realising the whole bunfight protocol our hero got stuck into a KP 1/72 DH5 as soon as he saw mention of a DH Cookup in one of Marko's threads (Sorry old fruit - promise it won't happen again) ☺️ Anyway since the current Eindekker build was sitting in the cabinet waiting for paint to dry and I'm not getting any younger I cracked open the box and made a start. Overall impressions were pretty good initially. I've got a few of these KP boxes on the shelf and unlike some it doesn't have the prominent rib ridges that some have (For those of a certain age think the old Matchbox trench digger in reverse) 😉 The softish grey plastic is easy to work with even if many of the 'details' are rather heavy handed and needed refinement. First up though was sorting out the flying surfaces which needed a slight adjustment to outlines and a lot of sanding to get somewhere near acceptable thickness . . . . After much sanding (That well known village in the Cotswolds) we ended up with some useable parts that just needed the control surfaces removing and new control horns adding. The rather horrible looking cowls opening cowl was too small so needed enlarging as well as slots refining and new stiffeners added with 5though plastic card strips after everything was sanded (anyone spotted a theme here?) After that all the rigging holes were drilled and for once I managed to avoid breaking any 0.3 mm drills 😎 After a few evenings work I've now got a kit of parts that I'm reasonably happy with (Cowl stiffeners yet to be added in the above picture) Roden supplied a much nicer engine and wheels as well as a half decent Vickers (although it would be nice to have a Miniworld or Gaspatch one there are none easily available at the moment. If anyone has a spare laying around that they'd like to sell please get in touch) I added a few wrinkles to the fabric sides and new plastic tubular intakes. The prominent fuselage stitching is absent in the main and in it's place are a few more trenches ready to be filled 🤨 Hey ho. Overall I really like the kit despite what I've said; it's an interesting prototype and would build into a sound looking DH5, but I just like to fiddle . . . . . Toodlepip Paul

Next Kovozávody Prostějov (KP) kit is a 1/72nd Letov -20. Release is expected in late September 2014. Source: http://www.modelarovo.cz/letov-s-20-azmodel-master/ The box art and more V.P.

This is a batch of two new tooled KP Seafire Mk. IIb kits. New tooled you ask? Yeah, there is a marked quality improvement compared to KP's earlier Spitfires and a better way than following the Freightdog/KP Vc conversion. I built a couple of them last year along with some Sword Seafires...... my goodness how I don't the Sword kit. Photos show the inside and stage right now where I've got the main parts together. Need to search the stock pile for another set of seat harnesses. Apart from those and maybe some resin wheels and exhausts if I find any lying around, the kits are OOB. I like all three of the box options. Choices. What it did provide me was one aircraft with a tropical filter and one without. The gun sight is too low and will be adjusted. If you are wondering why the rear frame is broken it's because I ripped this out of an earlier build that ended up being trashed last year. Here, for the first time ever, in more than 6 previous KP/Sword builds, I actually got the wing roots pretty much spot on. The two kits. The second didn't go as smoothly.

Hello, I didn't find any topic via search function about, so delete if already available. Here are first pics of the new double seater CS-199, with is coming in October (if I am correct, coz my czech is not that good). http://www.modelarovo.cz/avia-cs-199-172-rijnova-novinka-kp/

Kovozávody Prostějov (KP) is to release in 2017 a 1/72nd Messerschmitt Bf.108B Taifun kit - ref. KPM 0081 & KPM 0082 Reported to be the Fly kit. Source: https://www.facebook.com/kovop/photos/a.182240158636508.1073741828.182206638639860/567316046795582/?type=3&theater Fly Bf.108: http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234947435-172-messerschmitt-bf108cd-taifun-nord-100010011002-pingouin-by-fly-released/ V.P.

Here's me with my funny MiG-21UM. I say funny as it has quite comical artwork, reminds me of the artwork by the Eduard Bunny cartoonist whoever that is. I've had this in the stash for a year now & purchased the Kopro decals to go with it, great that this MiG-21 GB has come along. On first look, the details look nice & fine, loads of fine rivets. I think I'll be building this completely out of the box & I'm happy with decals for the seat harnesses. We'll see how it goes. Wings of wood, bricks for undercarriage & taped together! Here's some pics...

Good evening. I see @exdraken also has a 1/48 Su-25 in this GB, but I would like to add this version to the GB. Given the world we are in at the moment, I will make it in Ukrainian AF colours, out of respect for the friends and work colleagues I have in Kyiv. When built I plan to sell it, with any proceeds going to the DEC Ukraine Fund. Anyway, initial photos: Nice looking kit, including PE and canopy masks. Thanks for looking, Icarus

Hello all Finished alongside the IL-14 Last week (I build in batches) is my MiG-23UB. On first looking into the box the moulding and detail looks quite reasonable. On closer inspection it became apparent that other than the pitot there were no aerials or probes supplied with the kit!. Why???. Regarding the build the fit was poor and the decals were out of register. The front wheel guard was too small and was discarded. I made the aerial and probes on the nose from brass and plastic card. The seats are from Pavla. This was the first time I’ve used Blutack worms for a five colour scheme in 1/72 and I think I will hand paint next time. (far too fiddly). I would be interested in hearing other people’s comments regarding this kit as I was far from impressed. Well, here it is. Cheers Pete Thanks for looking. Pete

Time to play catch-up, as I am now quite confident I will complete this kit by tomorrow night. I first built this kit as the KP Avia C-2 many, many, moons ago. I think the kit was issued circa 1980. The Arado B-1 was unarmed, but other B-subtypes were armed with either a machine gun or bombs, depending on the training role. The kit includes parts for both, neither of which are obviously being used here. I assumed I had taken a picture of the contents months ago, as I had already decided to do build the kit for this GB, but only after I'd started it did I realise I'd not done so ... The kit includes marking for a Hungarian aircraft in a 3-colour upper camouflage, but unfortunately this is an A-series with a completely different cowling profile, which cannot be built from this kit. That's not the only issue. The instructions clearly bear no relation to this tooling, as they far more detail and advanced parts engineering. A quick check online confirms they are copied straight from the Special Hobby Ar 96 kits: Naturally, this causes certain issues with matching up parts, and in detail painting. I had always viewed Mistercraft as being sloppy if not incompetent, but maybe that should be upgraded to downright shady, Some of the surface detail is a bit busy, although some of the fuselage detail was going to get obliterated in fixing the canopy fit. Maybe I'm in a minority here, but I wish Airfix had applied this sort of detail to (say) the current Lancaster tooling, rather than the plain recessed panel lines they did use. Some of the parts are extremely thick: Normally, I'd complete the tail section first, partly to use it as a guide for orienting the main wing assemblies at the correct angle. Not so here. The wing to fuselage join required quite a bit of cleaning up, but it was very far from the being the worst I've ever seen. The one-piece tailplane & elevator looked as if would be too far aft, so some minor surgery was required to bring if forward by about 2mm. The canopy was relatively thin, but still distorted, and only an average fit. The canopy was too narrow, leaving an ugly "step" on each side, which in turn required a lot of careful sanding - and loss of fuselage surface detail - to rectify matters: Cockpit framing complete, both RLM 02 undercoats and RLM 70 top coat. The exhaust stubs I cut right down from the bulky and oddly shaped originals. The main fuselage doors were extremely thin, a marked contrast to much of the rest of the kit. Tomorrow, I'll move onto the painting.

Hello to all of you.I have just finished this little zlin.it is not the best kit out there but again nothing that an avarage modeller cant build.I painted the model with gunze acrylics and varnished it with vallejo satin varnish. Enjoy the photos

Lavochkin La-5F, 126 IAP, Cpt. Petr Nikiforovich Beljasnik, July 1943 - Kursk area Kit: KP Lavočkin La-5F "Esa" (KPM0175) Scale: 1/72 Paints: Vallejo Model Air, Vallejo Metal Colour Weathering: Tamiya weathering products, Vallejo weathering products, New tool La-5 by Kovozávody Prostějov is rather nice kit. Some fiddly parts inside the cockpit but other than that quite delightful build with good details. Decals were bit brittle, but they went down very well with the help of Vallejo Decal Fix & Softener. Painted with Vallejo Model Air and Vallejo Metal Colour. Weathered with Tamiya Panel Line Accent colours and couple other products.

Hi. A couple of weeks back I mentioned that I was thinking of entering a Mig-17, but had a problem with decs. Well I have ordered a sheet but have yet to decide on exactly which version and country. This is the kit, an old KP one issued in 1974. Since then a number of other Mig-17 kits have been entered, but I guess that is hardly surprising as this plane, like the Mig-15 on which it is based, is robust, relatively easy to maintain being Low Tech, has a decent performance and was of course relatively cheap even when purchased new from the former Soviet Union, and even cheaper from Poland (Lim5 and Lim 6) or China (Shenyang F-5), not to mention second hand. In other words perfect for some of the smaller African countries. As you can see the kit is of the radar equipped PF version which only a few countries such as Egypt may have operated, the majority being the F version, but I happen to have bought an Aeroclub conversion set to backdate it if I so choose. Looks like I actually made a start on it in the past and have painted the cockpit tub and IP, but well under the 25% rule. The name "KP" or variations on it has been used by several companies over the years, but I suspect this is the original Kovozavody Prostejov (accents omitted) which I believe is Czech for Prostejov Metalworks, Prostejov being a town in Czechoslovakia. Although rather basic, the cockpit is certainly on a par with any Airfix offering of the same date, and the two Mig-19S kits of theirs that I have built were pretty good. They covered subjects not then readily available and they were cheap! I assume from the name that they decided to diversify from normal metal bashing into making metal injection moulds and thus kits. A quick bit of background seems appropriate. When the Mig-15 aka Fagot entered service in 1948 it was in most respects as good as if not better than all existing Western jet fighters, and when first encountered in the Korean War it came as quite a shock. However, according to my Aerofax book on the Mig-17, in early 1949 the Council of Ministers instructed the Mig Design Bureau (OKB-155) to start work on an improved version in two forms, a “normal” tactical fighter and a radar equipped all weather interceptor. This would eventually be the Mig-17 Nato name Fresco. Initially the only major difference was a new wing swept back at 45°at quarter chord rather than the 35° of the Mig-15and the new version was known as the Mig-15bis 45° - it was believed that this would improve the speed without the need for any more changes as the book says Stalin had stated he did not want another new plane. The new wing was stronger, had a larger area and introduced the “scimitar” shape though nowhere near as pronounced as that on the HP Victor, and I suspect that the kit has not quite got that right. Inevitably further changes crept in – larger airbrakes, the aft fuselage was lengthened by nearly 3 ft, and the vertical tail enlarged slightly, coupled with a new slightly larger horizontal tail swept 45°compared with the 40° of the Fagot, and a small ventral fin was introduced. Test flights started in January 1950 and after a few modifications it was found that the aircraft was superior to the Mig-15 in most respects, but then the first prototype crashed killing the pilot. Further testing showed that the horizontal tail could suffer from flutter causing it to break up so it was strengthened and State Acceptance trials began in spring 1951 and after problems with the guns were resolved by making the mountings more rigid, the aircraft was ordered into production in September of that year, but as the Mig-17 Nato name Fresco-A. More as and when I decide exactly which version I am building! Pete

KP Mil-8/17 kit with scratchbuilt cockpit armour and winch and KP decals. Two Mil-8s were used to train Afghani crews but have now been disposed of. Steve

Hi all I have just finished this little kit, a nice kit but I didn't fancy the kit options so did one I liked from an image search on Google. The kit is quite a nice kit, although I had to add some bits of my own. The bracing between the struts and the wings, the mirror, the chin spoiler, landing light aerial mount, rear visible framework under the tailplane rudder actuators and aileron actuators. Red flashing beacon and mount and the Exhaust were also scratch built. Rigged with invisible thread and brush painted with Humbrol enamels, the black pinstripes are from the border around the Airfix SuperFreighter kit decals. I know the font for the codes is incorrect but it was the closest I could get hold of. Thanks for looking Chris

Hi all - first post here, and thought I'd do something a bit different: This was great fun to do...conventional model painting rather went out the window, and I used mainly homemade decals drawn with dip pen and acrylic ink. This was inspired by a real life aircraft in Katowice, of which there are plenty of photos on the usual sites, eg: https://www.jetphotos.com/photo/5788170 Seeing as I bought the KP 3-pack, I think I'll do a clean one next!