Revell Deal’s Wheels “Flt. Lft. Rif
Raf & his Spitsfire”
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Introduction
Bwaahaaaaahaaaaaaaaaaaa! Woo-hooooo! Thirty-plus years of waiting is
over: I finally own one of these kits. Actually, I bought three of them,
the very first evening they became available. (Nov 30th: I’d been
Googling the Internet daily.)
At around $12 per Spitsfire kit, and given how many paint jobs historical
Spitfires
had (including natural metal), I’ll pick up a few more, to make
up for the long wait.
THE PARTS
The sprue pictures and sides of the box tell most of the story about
the 34 parts in this kit. (30.5 for the plane; 3.5 for the partial pilot
figure.) I had seen this kit in eBay auction pics before, but I was surprised
how much fine surface detail there was, in person. Pretty cool! (Note:
it’s all raised, not engraved.) I was also surprised at the size:
it’s larger than I thought. The individual parts are almost vacu-form
thin in places; and just rubbery enough to flex as desired - a good thing,
as far as parts fit goes.
Be aware the kit never included the dart, as seen on Dave Deal’s
cover art. A pity: it would add much charm. (A dart could be made from
scratch, however - use sprue for the body; wire for the tip; and paper
for the dart’s fins.)
DECALS
Waterslide decals are included. I haven’t tried them, but they
look pretty nice. They had a protective cover sheet, but were not tucked
inside the instructions. (The clear canopy was not bagged, either: two
packaging downgrades, as compared to the two pre-buyout re-releases.)
The only “huh?” is decal #7. As supplied, it’s one-piece.
It will not fit onto the model as shown if you simply cut it out, around
the outer edges. I believe previous incarnations of this kit included
“Peel-n-Stick” stickers, which came pre-cut down the center
... and no one noticed that separation when the older artwork was scanned
in and touched up? Just cut #7 down the center, before you cut it out
around the edges, and things should work out fine.
At first I thought decals for the bottom of the wings were not included,
by mistake. There’s simply no space for them, due to the over-sized
landing gear and under-sized wings.
INSTRUCTIONS
Original-style instructions, with cartoon diagrams and text. Four pages.
Assembly order is geared towards giving youngsters rapid, encouraging
progress with each step. Adults may wish to follow another order, to minimize
seam-filling later. (Try the tail halves first; then fuselage halves.
Seems to be easier that way.)
BOX ART
This is the second re-release in 2007, after Hobbico bought Revell.
(Four total: two before, two after.) As with the ’57 cHEVY, box
proofreading could have been better. One box side says, “Body molded
in: Orange”. Just a few inches below that it says, “Molded
in green and clear”. (They apparently re-used older Zzzz-28 side
panel art, but didn’t update it well.) As a reviewer I note such
things to show I’m paying attention. As a builder, it doesn’t
bother me. As long as they put Dave Deal’s artwork on the cover,
they could leave the sides blank or print random pages from a phone book
there, and I’d still be a happy camper.
OTHER RE-RELEASES
During the early 1970s, a total of 13 cars and 4 airplanes were released
in the Deal’s Wheels series. Older fans hope to see all of them
again, and I’m sure younger fans would also enjoy them. We once-youngsters
each have Holy Grail kits. Personally, I'd love to be able to build the
Swine Hunt (a dune buggy tank) again, or make a custom VolksRod out of
a Bug Bomb kit (VW Beetle), or
... For a fun look at the Deal’s Wheels series, check out Tres
Wright’s inspirational and nostalgia-overload site, or see my
First Look articles on the Zzzz-28
and ’57
cHEVY car kits.
I would have also First Look’ed the Baron’s Funfdecker Fokker
airplane, except that I only bought one kit (already hard to find! Doh!)
and then went to town modifying
it ... without taking “before” pics. Rumor says the next re-release
may be Lucky Pierre’s WWI Nieuport biplane.
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