Academy 1/12 Suzuki RM250 By Zeljko Segin

This kit comes with three plastic trees, one of which is chromed.  You also get screws, tubes, springs, and PVC tires.  The majority of the instructions are in Korean except for a few color descriptions that are in English.  This can be a problem if you can’t read Korean or don’t have photos of that bike.  I used my knowledge of bikes and the drawings from the box cover in building this kit.

The parts in this kit are well molded, and there aren’t any major problems in assembling this kit.  The only area where you have to pay close attention is in completing the exhaust.  Before final assembly and attaching, dry fit everything and check the shape and positioning of it, as one part goes through the chassis of the bike.  If you don’t get this right you’ll have problems attaching it to the engine, most likely resulting in having to break the front curved part and make it again.

The kit does have some down sides to it.  The chrome parts aren’t as good as those in other kits, as they don’t have a nice shine.  The tires, on the other hand, are too shiny and look more like plastic than rubber.  The chain is molded as one part, complete with the rear cogwheel.  The engine is somewhat simplistic, with few details.  The front suspension is molded as part of the chromed forks, but the rear suspension is made up with metal springs and looks much better.

For display you can put the bike on the side leg or under stalk. I chose the side leg. Steering is connected with screw so it's movable, as are the wheels.

The only thing that is very bad is the decals. They are horrible!!! They look like some small kids drew them. Some of them are usable but some are not. You have decals for 2 version of bike. Because I wanted a model for home and because the decals were bad, I used decals from both versions to make one usable bike.

This bike came in either a green or red version. I chose the green version and painted it with Revell #60 color, which I think is a close match for the real thing.

In the end a decent model can be made from this kit, except for the decals.  If you want a more accurate and better-detailed model of this Motocross bike, Tamiya has a kit of the same bike.  If you want something just for your shelves this one can be good, but you’ll have to find other decals.