Revell 1/48 Eurofighter Typhoon

REVELL 1:48 EUROFIGHTER TYPHOON
'INBOX Review'

Reviewer: Brian Manning (rec.models.scale)

Aircraft History: The Eurofighter is one of the latest fighter aircraft to enter service in the world. Although not quite on par, allegedly with the F-22 Raptor, the Typhoon is certainly cutting edge and serves with the British RAF, German Luftwaffe, Italian Aeronautica Militaire Italiana and Spanish Ejercito del Aire and is slated to enter service with the Austrian Fliegerdivision to replace that service’s Drakens. The type is designed to perform not only air intercept missions, but also ground attack sorties with laser-guided bombs and stand off munition dispensers.

In the Box impressions: Six sprues inside the box contain all the grey injection molded parts for this kit. They are crisply molded with superbly done surface detail and engraved panel lines. A sprue containing the clear parts is bagged separately and is nice and clear, all of the components indicative of new tool Revell technology. It looks very nice in the box. The usual A4 booklett is provided as the instructions and these appear easy enough to follow with the usual quotes from Revell's paint range and cross referenced to an Alphabetical label.

The cockpit is a touch poor in terms of detail, although raised detail is provided for consoles and instrument panels, as well as a decal for each console. Control throttle stick, seat, HUD are all provided along with the consoles. The seat itself is made up of half a dozen components to put together!

External detail includes a separate airbrake and integrally molded detail depicting flare dispensers under the wings. The wheel wells all have structural and plumbing detail and look very nice with weighted wheels and nicely depicted tyre tread. Internal detail in terms of engines, intakes and the like are also well detailed and look well engineered as well. There are no compressor fans in the intake area and the exhaust cones are a touch on the poor side in terms of detail too.

Where the kit really hits the mark apart from its good engineering and looks is the stores. There are probably more stores parts to put together in this kit than the aircraft itself. Think of all the AMRAAMs, AIMs, ASRAAMs, ECM pods, chaff pods, Sidewinders, AAMs, recon pods and GBU Laser Guide bombs the aircraft could potentially carry, and they are all in this kit! They are also looking rather good for the scale as well.

Everything inside the box looks nice and whilst I didn't test fit parts together (just fondled them) I couldn't see anything that would have me believe you would have anything less than a decent fitting project here.

Decals: The nicely sized decal sheet is well stocked with stencilling and seven possible choices for examples. These include three RAF birds (3, 17 & 29 Squadrons) along with aircraft from Austria (speculative example), Germany (JG 73), Italy (4 Stormo) and Spain (Ala 11) in mainly grey air defence type colour schemes. The decal sheet looks superbly printed and will take as long to put on the various parts of the aircraft and stores, as the kit will take to put together and paint! The only drawback as always with Revell kits is the chemistry qualification needed to mix the right shades of paints. Why don't they just put the common ones out like Humbrol?

Conclusion: This kit really does look superb in the box and I am anticipating a quality and rather hassle free build putting this one together. The Revell raptor that came out in 72nd scale is reputed to be quite accurate, and this one in this larger scale looks odds on to be pretty damn close to the real thing when its built. Highly recommended!

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