I have completed my little ‘side build’ of the two Merlin’s, a Packard and a Rolls Royce
For those who dont know the B1 Lancaster had Rolls Royce Merlin’s while the BIII Lancaster had Packard built Merlin’s. Given this kit includes both Merlin’s it occurred to me that it would be nice to see how they compare specially as I will build the aircraft ‘buttoned up’.
Some initial thoughts on this model.
1/ I do like the Border plastic. It is soft, but not ‘Airfix soft’, it is a good quality plastic that is easy to sand and work with. It holds fine detail better than that horrible Airfix stuff that is prone to warping.
2/ The instructions are awful. No colour call-outs at all. There are just some colour photos of the interior and exterior, and that’s it. But worse than that they leave some ambiguity over how some smaller parts actually fit. You also cannot easily identify parts by comparing the part to the drawing, so be careful if, like me, you remove parts from the sprue in batches.
3/ As for the Merlin’s themselves. It is worth comparing them to the excellent Tamiya 1/32 Merlin’s in the Spitfire, Mustang and Mosquito. I have built eight of the Tamiya offerings and I would say that, marginally, the Border ones are slightly better detailed. That said, the Border Merlin’s are, I believe, slightly more under scale than the Tamiya. Remember that all internal details of models needs to be under scale because of the limitations of plastic in order for the external dimensions to be in scale. That even applies to 1/32 scale and is more pronounced in smaller scales.
Here are the two Merlin’s.
The Rolls Royce is on the left.
For those who dont know the B1 Lancaster had Rolls Royce Merlin’s while the BIII Lancaster had Packard built Merlin’s. Given this kit includes both Merlin’s it occurred to me that it would be nice to see how they compare specially as I will build the aircraft ‘buttoned up’.
Some initial thoughts on this model.
1/ I do like the Border plastic. It is soft, but not ‘Airfix soft’, it is a good quality plastic that is easy to sand and work with. It holds fine detail better than that horrible Airfix stuff that is prone to warping.
2/ The instructions are awful. No colour call-outs at all. There are just some colour photos of the interior and exterior, and that’s it. But worse than that they leave some ambiguity over how some smaller parts actually fit. You also cannot easily identify parts by comparing the part to the drawing, so be careful if, like me, you remove parts from the sprue in batches.
3/ As for the Merlin’s themselves. It is worth comparing them to the excellent Tamiya 1/32 Merlin’s in the Spitfire, Mustang and Mosquito. I have built eight of the Tamiya offerings and I would say that, marginally, the Border ones are slightly better detailed. That said, the Border Merlin’s are, I believe, slightly more under scale than the Tamiya. Remember that all internal details of models needs to be under scale because of the limitations of plastic in order for the external dimensions to be in scale. That even applies to 1/32 scale and is more pronounced in smaller scales.
Here are the two Merlin’s.
The Rolls Royce is on the left.