- Price: £5.00 to £6.00
- Length 11.6 cm Width 13.7 cm
Review by Max Williams
This kit is a re-boxing of the Matchbox one produced in 1973. It is stated as Skill Level 3, a “more demanding kit with up to 100 parts”. (There are actually 31 parts plus the canopy).
The appealing box art shows a Gladiator flying over a village, an LNER steam engine pulling named goods wagons in the middle distance, with the airfield beyond that; a nostalgic scene that conjures up England in the halcyon flying days of the late 1930s.
There are just two sprues plus the canopy, the latter moulded in the closed position. Its clear plastic appears quite thick, with the canopy framing raised enough to aid masking and painting. The main sprues are moulded in silver so that the model could be finished with a minimum of painting if the kit’s colour scheme is followed. There is a minimum of flash limited to the edges of the wings; all parts are otherwise clean and crisply produced.
The representation of ribbing on the wings and aft fuselage including tailplane is well done though there is no attempt to convey any texture of the fabric finish. The panelling of the forward section of the fuselage is also convincingly moulded with fine lines between adjoining panels and fastenings which look very much to scale.
With any biplane, fitting the struts securing the upper and lower wings together can prove to be a problem, but Revell appear to have engineered a good solution to this with interlocking sections which should give a trouble free but accurate finish.
The instruction sheet is clearly laid out in a series of eleven drawings plus a twelfth which attempts to convey the rigging structure, although there is no advice about the best way of doing this. There are slightly raised sections on the wing surfaces which I assume are the attachment points for the wing rigging, though these are not present on the tailplane areas. I suspect that most modellers at skill level 3 would think rigging one step too far!
Painting instructions are easy to follow, with references throughout for Revell’s own paint range though the colours are also described precisely if other brands are preferred. There is no guidance for painting the major surfaces of the kit, the assumption being that the modeller will be satisfied with the base plastic silver though all colour details for smaller areas are given quite meticulously.
The detailed decals provided are for a Gladiator of No. 3 (F) Squadron based at Kenley circa 1938. They seem finely printed with a matte finish on a thin film. Revell have overcome the potential problem of a misregister by providing the centre red circle of each roundel separately, leaving the accuracy of position to the skill of the modeller! Revell advise the use of a decal softening agent to ensure maximum adherence to the plastic which I think is a sound recommendation for the less experienced modeller.
The instruction sheet for decal application repeats painting guidelines and specifies silver for the main areas, though with no variation in finish between fabric and metal sections. The introduction also includes a short though surprisingly detailed history of the Gladiator in service.
Conclusion…
Despite the fact that the model is the best part of forty years old, it appears to be a well thought out kit for the level stated. I know that I’m going to have fun building this iconic and final biplane of the RAF – and that is what model making is supposed to be about!
Highly recommended
Max W.