Zvezda 1/350 K-266 “Oriol” Oscar II Submarine
By Chris Banyai-Riepl
Overview
In the 1970s, the Soviet Navy began construction of a new class of guided missile submarines, the Project 949 ‘Granit' boats. Labeled Oscar I by NATO, these submarines were giants, coming in third behind the Typhoon and Ohio SSBNs. The first Project 949 submarine, K-525 Arkangelsk was commissioned in 1980, followed by the K-206 Minsky Komsomolets the following year (later renamed Murmansk following the collapse of the Soviet Union).
Learning from these two boats, the Project 949 submarine line underwent a major reworking, resulting in the Project 949A ‘Antei' boats. While only two 949 submarines were constructed, eleven 949A submarines were built at the Severodvinsk factory. The first, K-148 Krasnodar, was commissioned in 1986, with new boats coming at a pace of about one every year.
The most famous of the Project 949A boats is the K-141 Kursk, which was lost with all hands on August 12, 2000. An explosion on board sent the ship to the sea floor near Severomorsk, where it laid in 350 feet of water. Both British and Norwegian teams offered to aid in a rescue attempt, but the Russians declined any assistance, stating that the sailors all perished almost instantly from the explosions. In 2001, though, when the Kursk was raised by a Dutch consortium, it was found that as many as 23 sailors were alive for hours, if not days, trapped in the aft compartment.
The Kit
Given the story surrounding the Kursk, it is no surprise that a kit of the sub came out shortly afterwards. Zvezda produced their kit of the K-266 in 2003, and on first glance it looks to be pretty good. Molded in black plastic (a trend I do not particularly like, as it makes it tough to see paint coverage; just because the original is finished in black doesn't mean the plastic needs to be that color), the kit has some finely recessed panel lines and some useful options. A small decal sheet provides the minimal markings found on these subs.
Construction is fairly straightforward. The hull is split into upper and lower pieces, with the missile section open in the upper hull. Two pieces per side provide the cover for the missile tubes, which would allow the modeler to pose these in the open or closed position. Note that the doors are molded in one piece, which was not commonly seen. These generally opened up in individual sections one at a time. As these are thin, with the lines clearly marked, it is a simple matter to just cut one door apart from the rest, should you wish to display them open. The more fastidious modeler might want to add more detail around the missile tubes, should they wish to display these in the open position. What you do not want to do is open up the vents on the second piece. These are not open holes, but shuttered holes, which the kit does a good job of capturing.
The other option for the hull is with the forward dive planes. This is opened out in the upper hull, with optional inserts provided for extracted or retracted dive planes. The remaining main hull additions include the vertical fins and screws on the rear hull and four cooling scoops on the lower hull. The latter are molded as flat pieces of plastic and while close in shape, really could use some beefing up of the actual scoop area. I recommend examining the photos of the Kursk after raising to see these in better detail.
Moving on to the sail, this is quite nicely done, even including clear parts for the windows of the enclosed bridge. Made up from five main pieces (including the clear windows), the scribed details on this assembly are accurate and capture the shape and location of the various antennae. Added to this are all the various masts and periscopes, which are decent out of the box. Some of the finer details, though, would best be replaced by fine wire, namely the Park Lamp DF loop antenna, which has a wire cage at the top.
Painting is simple, and to plagiarize the Stones, I see a red sub and I want to paint it black. At least, that's what the instructions would have you paint this kit. However, in looking at the photos of the raised Kursk, one can clearly see that the lower half is painted in the expected hull red color. Several of the 949A boats have markings on the sail, but the K-266 apparently did not, so it is much simpler to finish. The decals include the hull hash marks and the escape hatch markings.
Accuracy
When it comes to submarine models, determining accuracy is extremely challenging. In their environment, at best all you can see is the upper 1/3 of the ship. Toss in the fact that this is a Soviet/Russian submarine, and a newer one still operational at that, finding detailed information can be incredibly challenging. The Kursk disaster changed all of that, though, and from that we have quite a few photos showing the Project 949A boat out of water (albeit minus the bow). So, how does this kit hold up compared to the photos?
The answer to that question is, good in some places, poor in others. First, the good: while the sides of the sail should probably angle out a bit more, on the whole the sail is pretty close to correct. The vertical fin just needs the back end of the tube drilled out and it'll be spot on. Although I have not found a good photo of a 949A screw, these seem to have the right shape and correct blade count (the latter is not always the case with sub models, and is always challenging to fix).
These good areas, however, do little to mask the poor areas, namely, the hull. Upon opening the box and seeing the hull, I was immediately struck with the “something doesn't look right” feeling. After examining many photos, both of operational Oscar IIs and the Kursk out of water, I can tell that the upper hull slopes off too much on the sides. It should be much flatter on the crown. Moving to the sides, the kit seems to accurately capture the flat sides of the boat, but I think they continue that slab side too far down. The lower hull should be more round, a smooth curve as opposed to the flat bottom with rounded edges the kit has.
Another potential problem area is with the bow. It seems that it should slope off more on the top. This is tough to determine, though, as while I can examine the Kursk photos for the rear hull, the nose remains at the bottom of the ocean. This leaves photos of subs in the water, and it can be very tough to determine shapes when water is cascading off the hull. None of the drawings I have come across match up in this area, so, aside from contacting the manufacturer and requesting drawings, this might just have to remain a question mark until some Oscar IIs are retired and sent to the scrapyard.
So, can the hull be salvaged is the next question. My initial thoughts are yes, it can. It will require finishing the kit with the missile doors closed, as those will form the basis of the correct upper hull slope. By attaching those in the right position, one could either build up the rest of the hull off of those parts, or scribe and bend up the kit hull to match. Fixing the lower hull would be more challenging, and probably the easiest way would be to just replace the whole thing with a scratched insert. In fact, this might be required, as the process of changing the upper hull will result in an increase in beam, and the lower hull will need to be broadened to match.
Conclusion
I think this kit reflects the great challenge in producing models of submarines. Working on the best information they had at the time, Zvezda did a pretty good job in producing a fairly accurate Project 949A boat. By providing the option of open or closed missile hatches, they have also made it a bit easier to correct the now-apparent hull errors. While challenging, building this kit and correcting the problems will not be too tough, and will be a great way to practice those scratchbuilding skills.
The Zvezda K-266 kit is available from Roll Models.