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Arma Hobby 2019 new release - 1/72 Yak-1B!


Procopius

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Well, my condolences to all those who seem disappointed by this news, since I've been the Yak-1b fanboy all over the Internet for so long (not that that carried any weight with Arma, but regardless); please let me encourage you all to broaden you horizons a bit (did I begrudge you your Hurricanes? No! In fact, I almost bought one myself...) - the Yak-1b was a beautiful aircraft with lots of markings and camouflage variations, and well deserves this sudden eruption of interest from Brengun and Arma after decades of neglect. I'm sure I'll buy more than one of the Arma kit, depending on price. Good times, good times...

 

John

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2 minutes ago, John Thompson said:

Good times, good times...

I’m sure it’ll sell well, but it currently doesn’t fit in my personal interest bubble. I wish Arma well with the Yak, and hope it does as well for them as the Hurricane did. Small kit makers producing interesting and high quality kits is a benefit to all of us, even some of us don’t necessarily appreciate the products they make. 

 

I will keep hoping for a modern tooling of the Battle. One will come along one day.

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Good subject as I think Arma will do it better than Brengun did with his mishappened kit. I can only criticize the lack of vision here not providing the razorback option too. The sprue layout suggests Arma doesn't have the intention of making it. Pity!

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1 hour ago, MarkoZG said:

Good subject as I think Arma will do it better than Brengun did with his mishappened kit. I can only criticize the lack of vision here not providing the razorback option too. The sprue layout suggests Arma doesn't have the intention of making it. Pity!

Too many changes were incorporated in both designs to play with the part breakdown to such an extent that would allow to make both Yak-1 and Yak-1b (and resulting kits would really be pain to assemble). It's not an accident that both Brengun and Arma went for this solution, it is the only reasonable solution given the amount of differences between the particular Yak variants.

 

What I don't like from the very beginning is the use of a not really photo documented marking option for the box art of the 'weekend' kit. We don't even know if Litvyak's Yak was no. 23, and there is some evidence it wasn't: 

 

Edited by caughtinthemiddle
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I think a lot of the disappointment stems from most of the membership here being "Western" in origin and naturally they'll think of the aircraft from that sphere first. Many westerners aren't altogether familiar with Soviet/Russian and Eastern European types. As Arma Hobby's a Polish company it doesn't really surprise me that they've done a Yak. They've done the PZL P.11, Hurricane I and now the Yak-1b so I think it'll be safe to say that Arma's main market will be Poland with a primary focus on the aircraft types either built there or used by the Polish Air Force.

 

Anyway, I was going to get myself the Brengun offering but I think I'll hold off until the Arma Hobby kit appears.:hmmm:

 

Mike.

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Under the announcement on Facebbok, Arma Hobby confirmed there will be no "razorback", because there is to many differences, and those are basically different aircraft. Also Bregun Yak-1b is a early type, when theirs is a late one.

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Very good choice of aircraft and if the CAD images are any indication , will incorporate rivet details which is welcome. 

Arma Hobby has picked up very good pace of development and interesting subject choices over the past couple of years and the best part if they are very reasonable marked . The basic edition of the fokker E.V cost me barely 8$ which is a steal for a kit of that quality . oping they keep it up and find the success they desire.

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I like the way the windscreen portion of the canopy mates with a recess in the upper surface of the cowling, following a panel line. That looks like it will work quite well.

 

Yak-1b walkaround - this is the only remaining Yak-1b in existence:

http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A//scalemodels.ru/modules/photo/viewcat_cid_198.html&langpair=ru|en&hl=en&ie=UTF8

 

This aircraft was "restored" many years ago, part of which was the installation of the wing roots and intakes from a Yak-3, so just be aware of that inaccuracy.

 

The best paper reference available is issue 2/91 of the Polish aviation magazine Skrzydla w Miniaturze, by Zbigniew Luranc; this includes drawings based on actual measurements of that Yak-1b (or Yak-1M, as it was designated in Poland). The wing roots are correct in these drawings, BTW. Well worth tracking down in print or as a download!

 

John

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5 hours ago, Botan said:

Under the announcement on Facebbok, Arma Hobby confirmed there will be no "razorback", because there is to many differences, and those are basically different aircraft. Also Bregun Yak-1b is a early type, when theirs is a late one.

What are the differences by which you can tell early from late -1b?

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15 hours ago, MarkoZG said:

Good subject as I think Arma will do it better than Brengun did with his mishappened kit.

 

Marko, what's wrong with the Brengun Yak-1B?

I just finished one and it looks alright, although I am not an expert on this type.

 

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37 minutes ago, MarkoZG said:

What are the differences by which you can tell early from late -1b?

I'm just repeating what Arma wrote on Facebook. Apparently air intakes in wings and radiator are different. More about may be in planned further articles on blog.

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1 hour ago, MarkoZG said:

What are the differences by which you can tell early from late -1b?

 

I wondered the same thing. I can think of a couple of things that might be differences, but are these accurate?

(1) Yak-1-style intake in the left wing root - this is shown in the Brengun Yak-1b box art, but were there any production Yak-1b's that had this feature, or was it just on the prototype? Regardless, the kit seems to include only the rounded intake typically associated with the Yak-1b.

(2) Exhaust stacks lacking the shield strips above and below the stacks, as shown in what I believe is a prototype photo. In this, the stacks simply exit through individual holes in the cowling, like the Yak-1.

(3) Oil cooler housing shape? This was revised several times during Yak-1/-1b production, so this also may be a difference.

 

There was a feature on the IPMS Stockholm site years ago, titled "The Confusion about Yak-1"; here it is, FWIW:

https://www.ipmsstockholm.se/home/the-confusion-about-yak-1-2/

 

There were sketches which help illustrate this article, which I think was based on Luranc's book which did include the sketches, but for whatever reason, I don't see them on IPMS Stockholm.

 

Those with a serious interest in this subject might want to check out the Scalemodels.ru forum occasionally, or one of the Czech forums - I'm sure these new kits will provoke some analytical commentary there.

 

John

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2 hours ago, Roman Schilhart said:

 

Marko, what's wrong with the Brengun Yak-1B?

I just finished one and it looks alright, although I am not an expert on this type.

 

Well, actually their original Yak-1 was a shapewise failure with more angled than curved cross-sections and wrong vertical tailplane.

Regarding the Yak-1b you made, Brengun completely re-tooled it from the initial Yak-1 and I assume the reason is the correction of the above mentioned mistakes. Your Yak-1b is the first built example I saw and from the photos it looks much better. At least the taiplane issue seems to be cured and I hope other things are too, but without having it in my hands I can't say for sure.

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I for one am very happy to see a Yak-1B from both Brengun and Arma. I will buy one at least, probably from Arma and may (probably) buy one of the Brengun examples. The more Soviet WWII aircraft, the better! Too bad the Poles didn't use the Il-4.

 

Regards,

 

Jason

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2 hours ago, John Thompson said:

 

Brengun Yak-1b box art,

This may be the reason of confusion. I think that Arma people may have not seen the actual Brengun kit, but only the box art which does not depict the same features as the actual kit.
BTW, I've taken a look at my Brengun kit last night and checked some features against the drawings in Kuznetsov book. 
If I'm not wrong, the only "late" feature (present from 123rd series) not depicted in Brengun kit is the trim tab on the right aileron.
 

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  • 4 weeks later...

Pricing is now up on Arma's e-shop, although the kits are still not available for ordering - the Expert set (September release) is priced at 14.50 Euros; the regular kit (October) is 9.50.

 

The latest from Arma is that the Expert version will be available by late September; there will be a one-week window sometime soon during which preorders will be eligible for some unspecified bonuses.

 

John

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On 7/28/2019 at 12:10 PM, caughtinthemiddle said:

What I don't like from the very beginning is the use of a not really photo documented marking option for the box art of the 'weekend' kit. We don't even know if Litvyak's Yak was no. 23, and there is some evidence it wasn't: 

 

Arma have the article  above as well as other research articles about Litviak so it's up to them to get it right. iI's a pity that there are so many regurgitated versions of old and incorrect info about some pilots around to catch the unwary but that's the way history goes. Much of it can be traced back to Bruce Myles' pot-boiler............

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/249831.Night_Witches

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From today's Arma e-mail:
"In the following week, 24-31 August we are taking preorders on forthcoming Yak-1b Expert Set. The model will be released at the end of September.
Preorder now and benefit from one free overtrees included in each preordered Yak kit. Decals included in the set contains six marking options: 2 Polish, 2 Soviet, 1 German and 1 French.  Two sets of control panels, seatbelts and stencils are included in the decals."

John

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