Folks, this is a nice kit. The box art shows Adolf Galland’s Bf 109E-4. Inside the box, three sprues of gray and clear plastic are individually bagged. The large-format, 12-page instruction booklet includes a brief history and written instructions with icons in 43 clear, error-free steps. Four-view color and markings drawings and a parts map are provided on a separate page. A decal sheet of flat-finished images has markings for three aircraft:
Bf 109E-1, -3, and -4. Moldings are crisp with no flash, minimal mold seams, and small sprue attachments. The engravings are consistent and in scale.
Included in the kit are a pilot figure, separate posable flying surfaces, extended or retracted landing gear, and a three-piece canopy that can be shown open or closed. What’s neat is the engineering that allows you to accomplish these features. Tabs are provided for the flaps, the canopy hood, and the slats. Tabs intact, the flaps are down, the canopy is open, and the slats are extended; tabs removed, everything is closed up. Guns, aileron balance horns, and the pitot tube are separate pieces. Retracted landing gear parts are separate and work amazingly well. The main landing gear struts and tail-wheel strut plug into tight-fitting receptacles for proper alignment. Exhaust manifolds, engine cover, oil cooler, and radiator parts are all separate pieces, making painting easy.
Assembly is smooth and straightforward: no tricks, no errors. Colors are called out by numbers in the drawings. The DB601Aa engine is molded to the fuselage halves and needs only masking and painting. The cockpit fits exactly as designed. I used just a little Squadron white filler putty along the upper and lower fuselage seams.
Careful assembly will allow the propeller to turn. The main wheels and the tail wheel, however, are not designed to roll.
Parts fit is exceptional. Everything lines up and fits perfectly. Even the stabilizer struts leave the stabilizers horizontal; no tweaking necessary. I added an antenna of stretched, clear sprue.
With fond memories of the old Monogram Bf 109E, I wanted this kit to have the round-topped canopy, which left only the E-3 to build from this kit. An interesting aircraft, this: It was the first fighter shot down over the UK during the Battle of Britain. Photos I found on the Internet show the plane and captured pilot down in a field at Bladbean Hill, Kent, on July 8, 1940.
I painted my model with out-of-production AeroMaster and Floquil Military enamels, then gave the model several coats of Model Master clear gloss in preparation for decal application.
The decals were impervious to solvents, drying and silvering, then flaking off the model with the touch of a finger. And they were quite brittle: one of the white 4s broke into three pieces while I moved it into place. However, when I oversprayed the decals with clear gloss after application and drying, it seemed to fill in the clear edges of the decals and eliminate the silvering. I replaced several of the larger images and added swastikas from my spare decal box (the kit provides none).
The finished model’s measurements are spot-on. Its stance looks exactly like the drawing on the cover of Messerschmitt Bf 109 (Robert Grinsell and Rikyu Watanabe, Random House, ISBN 978-0-517-54256-9).
I would guess that almost any modeler (including beginners who’ve built a kit or two) who has an interest in the Luftwaffe and access to aftermarket decals will be as pleased with this kit as I am. So, Airfix: How about some more like this one?