T-2 Buckeye ‘Anniversary Markings’ 1/32
The T-2 Buckeye jet trainer is no doubt among the very legends of the US naval aviation. Both the US Navy and Marines operated this type for a very long time whilst in Greece, the Buckeye saw service even longer. Besides the standard white and red colour scheme, quite a few US airframes bore much more striking colours. And mostly in 1976 when the USA commemorated the bicentennial anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and many of the Buckeyes got various display schemes. The Greek machines, on the other hand, flew camouflaged and only at the very end of their service one of them was painted in a scheme commemorating the faithful, 40-years long service.
The kit set comes on no less than eight grey styrene sprues joined by a sprue with clear parts, resin items and etched details. The decal sheet caters for markings for one white-blue-red US Navy airframe and one from Greece with colourfuly painted empennage.
Grunau Baby IIB ‘German WWII Glider’ 1/48
Both in the pre-war years and during the war, the Grunau Baby IIB was the most widely used glider all around the world. It is estimated that about six thousand of these simple aircraft might have been built. While before the war, the Grunau Baby gliders were built mainly by amateur pilots using available drawings, with the war on the horizon the type entered almost mass production in Germany to serve as a basic training type with the NSFK – Nationalsozialistisches Fliegerkorps, a paramilitary organization within the Nazi party. And the same system of flying training was used by Germany allies such as Slovakia or Croatia.
Our model of this important type comes on one styrene sprue joined by a clear one with the windshield. The decal sheet caters for two NSFK gliders, one of which flew in a camouflage scheme in Eastern Prussia in 1944 whilst the other one was flown from an airfield near the city of Dresden and featured a painted emblem of a sponsoring organisation. These two schemes are joined by two more, one from Slovakia with civil registration and one as owned by the Croatia air force.
– accurate and nicely detailed model
– interesting colour schemes
– a type very important for the history of aviation
Scheuch-Schlepper 1/72
The rocket-propelled Me 163 tailless aircraft was not fitted with a usual undercarriage and so it lacked the ability to taxi to its take off position or after landing by its own power. And thus the Komet needed some other means to get around the airfield and it was found in the form of the Scheuch-Schlepper tractor. This rather diminutive vehicle was originally devised as a low-cost and widely available agricultural tractor by Rudolf and Eugen Scheuch brothers. The Scheuch company was established in the town of Erfurt and the tractor was developed with the help from Auto-Union, a branch of the DKW-Einbau-Motoren firm. The Scheuch-Schlepper was usually used in two configurations, either with a rear auxilliary wheel to tow the Komets or with a specialised device enabling it to recover the Komet after it has landed.
Our kit of this quite unique vehicle contains usual styrene injected parts, resin cast ones and also a fret of etches.
– highly interesting type
– nicely detailed model kit
PT-20/STM-2 1/72 Ultra Limited Kit
Ryan PT-20, with the factory designation STM, followed the previous sport and trainer variants of the Rayn ST (Sport Trainer) planes. The “M” in the designation means Military, Ryan supplied these aircraft to the US Air Force (they later preferred the PT-22 version with radial engine), to China, Dutch East Indies and several Latin American air forces. The American planes were used for training on US soil, those in the Dutch East Indies had a more colourful fate. Part of them was equipped with floats, the others had a wheeled undercarriage. They were used for training both army and navy pilots. After a Japanese attack, part of the Dutch planes was destroyed, some were captured and used by the Japanese Air Force. The rest were evacuated to Australia where they joined the RAAF training units and served there till the end of the war.
We first made the PT-20 kit in 1995 and in 2004 we reboxed it as the PT-22 version. Both kits were sold out in 2006. But while we were cleaning up our warehouse recently (AKA the Tin House) we found a whole box of these sprues. So we decided to re-introduce the kit to modellers. The sprues are not really up to Special Hobby’s current standards so we created a new product line with the fitting name “Vintage treasure”.
The decals are new and offer one USAAF plane and an ex-Dutch one in RAAF colours. The windshields are vacuformed. We recommend this kit for experienced modellers only. As we have a very limited number of sprues you can only buy the kit via our website or at modelling shows where we participate.
HobbyLink International
Hoblylink International Shop
eBay Store
