1/72 - Hawker Hurricane Mk.IIc by Zvezda - released

[Homebee]

Zvezda is to release in 2021 a new tool "easy-build series" 1/72nd Hawker Hurricane kit - ref. 7322

Source: https://vk.com/doc6108131_578170851?hash=b62de4a6f84263e904

 

V.P.

 

Edited July 23, 2021 by Homebee

[Graham Boak]

That's a Mk.IIc

[JWM]

To be compared with Arma Hobby one (of course II c) ....

Edited November 27, 2020 by JWM

[stevehnz]

I hope they have done their homework on this, the bar has been set pretty high & I can feel the vultures circling cognoscenti poised to pounce on any inaccuracies. Having said that, their recent offerings appear to have been very good in this respect & another good Hurricane kit in 1/72 will be welcome imho.

Steve.

[TEXANTOMCAT]

Hear hear! It’s a tough market to have a punt at- Arma for finesse and Airfix for price (depending on the Mark you want) - put squarely between £6.99 and £12.99 I imagine cos unless they smash Arma for detail/ options etc they could be priced out of the market 👍

 

TT

[Meatbox8]

55 minutes ago, TEXANTOMCAT said:

Hear hear! It’s a tough market to have a punt at- Arma for finesse and Airfix for price (depending on the Mark you want) - put squarely between £6.99 and £12.99 I imagine cos unless they smash Arma for detail/ options etc they could be priced out of the market 👍

 

TT

Their 1/72 fighters (Yak-3, Me109F etc) are £8.50 at Hannants.  As it's an easy build I wonder if it's aimed at the younger market.  I wouldn't be surprised if they went for a lend-lease model which would be interesting with its different armament and might give it some extra appeal. 

[PhantomBigStu]

Picture has a mkii. Wonder the chances it’ll end up being a I wing with a II fuselage? Least that will give the mkIIa Arma don’t yet do 

[TEXANTOMCAT]

52 minutes ago, Meatbox8 said:

Their 1/72 fighters (Yak-3, Me109F etc) are £8.50 at Hannants.  As it's an easy build I wonder if it's aimed at the younger market.  I wouldn't be surprised if they went for a lend-lease model which would be interesting with its different armament and might give it some extra appeal. 

Oke doke had a quick squizz on eBay for prices! The point still stands they’ll have to be competitively priced, have exquisite detail or both - best of luck to em- per previous post, you can never have too many Hurricanes! 👍

[Troy Smith]

45 minutes ago, PhantomBigStu said:

Least that will give the mkIIa Arma don’t yet do 

Arma do a IIb,  I'd be surprised in they do a Iia, as all you need to do is fill the outer gun bays, muzzle holes and ejector slots and you have a IIa. 

1 hour ago, Meatbox8 said:

I wouldn't be surprised if they went for a lend-lease model which would be interesting with its different armament

There is very little external difference on the Soviet modified planes,  a couple of gun barrels, a different underwings plate and some RS-82 rockets.

The Soviet made airfilter would be a neat add on though.

Hurricane Soviet air filter_zpseti9uhtf by losethekibble, on Flickr

[Giorgio N]

This is not a kit that will aim at competing with Arma's, it's a simplified assembly kit aimed at modellers interested in these things, may be younger modellers or wargamers. Of course other modellers may also be interested as the previous kits in the series have been pretty nice and while simplified these kits offer acceptable details. In Russia they are quite cheap, in the West they are less so. 

In any case if the accuracy and quality is similar to the previous kits, this may be interesting for those modellers who want to focus on the camo and markings aspect with less interest in the internal detail

[Graham Boak]

AH do a Mk.IIb, but only in a double-priced set that is half given over to Mk.IIc and unwanted super-detail.  One day I expect they will release a Mk.IIb on its own.  I agree that doing a Mk.IIa is an easy mod, but people don't like that sort of thing nowadays do they?  And there is the need for specific transfers. 

 

Bear in mind that many overseas Mk.IIb were operated without the weight of the outer guns anyway.

 

I suspect that the kit will be a Mk.I (ish) , and the picture simply laziness - but until more is known we can't say.  I have a few of Zvezda's smaller scale aircraft but whereas the Li.2, SB and Ju.52 were nice enough for their size, their Hurricane did not compare with the Sweet ones.

[Meatbox8]

56 minutes ago, Troy Smith said:

Arma do a IIb,  I'd be surprised in they do a Iia, as all you need to do is fill the outer gun bays, muzzle holes and ejector slots and you have a IIa. 

There is very little external difference on the Soviet modified planes,  a couple of gun barrels, a different underwings plate and some RS-82 rockets.

The Soviet made airfilter would be a neat add on though.

Hurricane Soviet air filter_zpseti9uhtf by losethekibble, on Flickr

Presumably they used the already extant gun bays for the Berezins or ShVAK cannons?

[Troy Smith]

12 minutes ago, Meatbox8 said:

Presumably they used the already extant gun bays for the Berezins or ShVAK cannons?

Yes.  On another computer I have pics of a salvaged ex VVS Hurricane, with some additional mounting parts in the gun bay, my 'holy grail' on this is a photo with the weapons installed.

One point was made, they had enlarged the gun opening on the spar with a hammer..

see here, which also has drawings

http://massimotessitori.altervista.org/sovietwarplanes/board/index.php?topic=881.0

A variety of combinations was tried, the one settled on was a 20 ShVAK in the outer position, with 12.7 mm UBT in the inner position.

More on this is in the Helion book on Lend Lease. 

[IanC]

1 hour ago, Giorgio N said:

 Of course other modellers may also be interested as the previous kits in the series have been pretty nice and while simplified these kits offer acceptable details. In Russia they are quite cheap, in the West they are less so. 

In any case if the accuracy and quality is similar to the previous kits, this may be interesting for those modellers who want to focus on the camo and markings aspect with less interest in the internal detail

 

Quite so.  I've just done their Bf 109F which is dimensionally very accurate and goes together well.  

 

I'll settle for that any day, even if it means doing without trim wheels, rudder pedals and other fiddly details that no-one will see!

 

 

[GrzeM]

It is listed in Zvezda catalogue as "no glue necessary" easy to build snap-kit - like their previous Bf 109F, FW 190, Yak-3 and Stuka.

Good quality, but obviously somewhat simplified.

[Tbolt]

9 hours ago, PhantomBigStu said:

Picture has a mkii. Wonder the chances it’ll end up being a I wing with a II fuselage? Least that will give the mkIIa Arma don’t yet do 

Zvezda just seem to use a pictures of a type not a specific model for their initial announcement before they have the box art available, for example their recent Il-2, the initial pictures was of a two seater for a single seater kit.

[sroubos]

I like their easybuild kits. The 109F was pretty good when it was released, almost on par detail-wise with the FM kit and at a fraction of the price and much better availability. The AZ kits have provided some options now but the Zvezda kit is still the cheapest and easiest way to build an accurate 109F.

 

The same could apply here. There is, strangely, not a lot to choose from when you want to build a good BoB-era Hurricane. Arma's kit is brilliant but more expensive and harder to obtain than this when it is released.

[Work In Progress]

2 hours ago, sroubos said:

There is, strangely, not a lot to choose from when you want to build a good BoB-era Hurricane. Arma's kit is brilliant but more expensive and harder to obtain than this when it is released.

 

And of course the Airfix one which correctly represents a fabric-covered wing Hurricane in squadron service during the  Battle of Britain. So that's two, soon to be three modern and decent kits in 1/72, which is more than a lot of types.

 

 

 

[Graham Boak]

Can we wait for the appearance of the Zvezda kit before sanctifying it?  All we have so far is a promise and a photo of the wrong variant.  That Zvezda has made some good kits  I know, but they have made some clunkers too.

[Dave Swindell]

1 hour ago, Graham Boak said:

All we have so far is a promise and a photo of the wrong variant.

How do you know the photo is the wrong variant Graham? I've not seen anything that suggests it's anything other than illustrated, and the text only says " interceptor hawker hurricane" So unless @Homebee has further info that it's a MkI and not a MkIIC as illustrated that he's not letting on to, I'd assume we're getting what Zvezda have shown us.

[sroubos]

3 hours ago, Work In Progress said:

 

And of course the Airfix one which correctly represents a fabric-covered wing Hurricane in squadron service during the  Battle of Britain. So that's two, soon to be three modern and decent kits in 1/72, which is more than a lot of types.

 

 

 

 

 

I'm still puzzled why Airfix never released the metal wing version of that kit. Happy to have the fabric wing but it would have been so nice to have that metal wing and buy stacks of it for 5,99 at Aldi every Christmas

[Work In Progress]

15 minutes ago, sroubos said:

 

I'm still puzzled why Airfix never released the metal wing version of that kit. Happy to have the fabric wing but it would have been so nice to have that metal wing and buy stacks of it for 5,99 at Aldi every Christmas

Because they would have had to change the fuselage too

[Graham Boak]

1 hour ago, Dave Swindell said:

How do you know the photo is the wrong variant Graham? I've not seen anything that suggests it's anything other than illustrated, and the text only says " interceptor hawker hurricane" So unless @Homebee has further info that it's a MkI and not a MkIIC as illustrated that he's not letting on to, I'd assume we're getting what Zvezda have shown us.

Same principle applies - let's see it before praising it.

 

Airfix did an early Hurricane: good for them!  Not just yet another standard variant but something with a bit of difference that no-one else had considered (OK Sword... no-one else mainstream).  They should be congratulated for their initiative rather than see repeated ad nauseam this now rather tired comment.  Complain about the problems with the kit by all means; but once the choice is made, live with it.

[sroubos]

18 minutes ago, Work In Progress said:

Because they would have had to change the fuselage too

 

Ah, I didn't know that. From the fact that Alleycat released a conversion with just the metal wing (and a newer windscreen I believe) I always thought it would have been a fairly easy way to kit a very popular variant. Perhaps it's still in the pipeline. In the meantime the Arma Hobby is just a treat, one of the best kits in 1/72.

 

[Work In Progress]

The Hurricane with metal-covered wing has more fuselage panel lines that the one with the fabric-covered wing, and the fuselage is also different where it interfaces with the different windscreen.  The aftermarket can get away with assuming its customers are happy to fill lines and sand things down and hack things about, but the aftermarket only caters for a small number of comparatively masochistic model kit customers.  I don't think for a mainstream mass-market offering like a 1/72 Hurricane that Airfix or its customers would be happy with a kit that required modification and the use of filler on relatively delicately detailed components to make the thing accurate.

 

Anyway, Airfix is not short of pipeline projects which don't compete directly with Arma so they don't really need to go down that route. 

Edited December 1, 2020 by Work In Progress