Kopro 1/72 Letov S-328

KOPRO 1:72 LETOV S-328
'INBOX Review'

Reviewer: Damir Stanzer (rec.models.scale)

Aircraft

The Letov S-328 was a robust one-engine biplane aircraft produced in Czechoslovakia during the 1930-ies. It was originally designed for Finland, but its export was never realised. The Letov factory continued development and 445 aircraft were produced in a period between 1934-1939. It was used as reconnaissance plane and a light bomber in pre-war Czechoslovak Air Force. During WWII it served in German, Slovak and Bulgarian air forces. It was one of the last biplane aircrafts used in combat role (during the Slovak National Insurrection in 1944).

The S-328 was powered by Bristol Pegasus II engine, licence built by Czechoslovak company Walter. Standard armament of the aircraft were two under wing machine-guns and one twin machine-gun used by observer. The Letov S-328 could carry 6 bombs under the wings and 2 bombs under the fuselage (total weight: 500 kg ).

Four planes were equipped with floats of English company Short in the year 1935.

The Kit

Kopro (No. 3143): Letov S-328 (1:72)

The kit consists of 72 injected parts (on 4 sprues), 64 of which are molded in mid-soft grey plastic and there are 8 clear parts including a clear stand. The panel and rib lines are finely raised. There is not much extra flash for cleaning. In the very informative full color box is also the instruction sheet and decals for 4 versions.

Accuracy:

According to data and scale drawings from «Ilustrovana Historie Letectvi» (Triada, Naše vojsko, Prague 1991), the basic dimensions of the kit are almost perfect: the span is cca 1 mm too short (18,9 mm instead of 19,0 mm), the length of the kit spot on. The comparison of surface details with scale drawings showed that the kit is very studiously designed and prepared. All panel lines and rivets of metal covered surfaces (front part of the fuselage and floats), and all lines that represent ribs on fabric covered rest of the airplane are present. Every single line and every single rivet are in the proper place! Lines of movable surfaces (rudder, ailerons..) are realistically engraved.

Detail:

There is various levels of quality of the kit's detail. Some of it is very good (engine, stick, propeller, twin-gun, instrument panels and all struts), some of it is satisfactory (engine cowling, bombs, wheels). The seat is bad, and the ridiculous figures (pilot and observer) are unusable. Several parts need cleaning because of extra-flash. The main shortcoming of the kit is the lack of cockpit detail. The observer's space is extremely big and, because of that, it is very visible on the finished model. Unfortunately, the kit inside the observer's space offers nothing except floor, instrument panel and the good twin-gun on bad (too simplified) stand. There are two ways to fill the cockpit spaces. One of them is a standard scratch and the another one is buying the excellent metal sheet produced by Extratech company. The second solution seems to be logical choice in this case: this metal sheet covers almost every shortcoming of the kit and gives an opportunity to make a really great contest model.

Instruction sheet:

The instructions are excellent and have a brief history of the plane (in English, German and Czech), a numbered parts layout, a clear and logical build sequence (with painting guide for all small parts) and 4-views painting guide for all versions of markings and paintings. All colours are given in Testor, Humbrol, Revell, Gunze, Tamiya and Agama (!). Instructions are written in English, German, French, Spanish, Japanese and Czech.

Versions and Decals:

It is possible to make standard S-328 with wheels or S-328v with floats. There are 4 versions of markings and paintings: two pre-war Czechoslovak versions (one of them is float version), one Slovak version and one Slovak National Insurrection version. Decals seem to be of high quality; they look very good, without any «register problem».

Final Comments:

As with every other 1:72 model of biplane aircraft - this is not a "shake and bake" model and it is not for the beginner. I can recommend it to every modeler who has experience in building biplane models. This is the only kit of this interesting aircraft on the market (it is important for Luftwaffe fans). On the other hand, this kit is almost completely accurate in dimensions and it is completely accurate in surface details. In the time when it is very hard to find completely accurate Spitfire or Bf-109G in 1:72 on the market, this fact deserves respect. The problem with the lack of the cockpit detail is solvable and one who is able to conduct relatively complicated procedure of building two-wing structure of biplane, won't have much problem with the rest. All those serious modelers that dislike raised panel lines should engrave just few lines (on metal covered surfaces), because finely raised lines of the rest of the model (ribs on fabric covered surfaces) look very realistic and it is not necessary to make any changes there. All in all: do reserve more than one weekend for this model and expect some work. But don't expect frustrations and unpleasant surprises. I think that final result (especially in the case of the beautiful float version) can be great.

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