Heller Airfix AMD Dassault MIRAGE 2000 1/72 Model Kit Review Jet Aircraft

Happy carnival to everybody! today we'll celebrate along the Mirage 2000 (an aircraft still in use with many air forces of the world) of Heller;

Boxes; The first box is good and looks modern, but the jet gives a rather chunky impression. The Heller Humbrol is very interesting, as it seems the drawing of a model kit! the last, the Airfix one, which is the one I bought, gives a nice sense of speed. 

THE KIT - 7.5

It's not a bad kit, being made in 1979 is quite good. And probably if you build the original Heller release, everything will fit quite nicely, instead, in the Airfix version you have to sand a bit here and there to make pieces fit, nothing too important but present.

The worst flaws comes with the machine guns under the pilot, which are, to put it simply, missing. You are forced to believe they exist inside the small holes, but in truth they stick out and should be seen. Besides this, the undercarriage lights are a joke of a part, being just two transparent squares together, when the real thing has no similarities.

Finally, the undercarriage is very fragile and quite unaccurate too. It is one of those models to build in flying position.

But everything is not bad. It has nice panelling engravings, the cockpits fits very nicely and is very detailed, and with a good sense of sanding you won't need to use putty to fill gaps.

PRICE-VALUE RATIO - 9.0

Having been substituted by kits of the other Mirage versions, this kit is now quite cheap on selling platforms like eBay. 


 Overall;

Nowadays this kit is just a cheap alternative to the Italeri one, much better detailed and made all around, just a bit more expensive. In my case, I bought it along other kits in a lot and I decided to keep it and build it, as I always wanted to have a Mirage, although my favourite period is WW2.

So if you really want a Mirage 2000, get the Italeri. If like me you are just slightly interested on the subject, the Heller one is good enough, or maybe, as the Mirage has quite a lot of interesting camo schemes, the way of making without spending so much or just for a change.


If you have enjoyed this review and want to say thanks, the best way is to click in one of the advertisings in the blog. Every little help will be appreciated. 
This is the example I built, I went for the most colourful and weird "camo", this tiger camo was used by the NATO. Note that I included an Atlantic figure as pilot, as the kit doesn't provide one.;

And yes, this camo does exist, here is the proof :) ;

Here you can get inspiration on other builds, gathered from the net;

Thanks for reading, and see you in the next battle!

Atlantic THE EGYPTIAN ARMY Nexus Egyptian Infantry Set 1502 Biblical Era

Another great classic, the first kit that for nearly 30 years was the only one of its kind, the Atlantic Egyptian Army!!

This is how  the Atlantic box looked like;

And this is the reissued Nexus box;

As with all ancient Atlantic sets, the box art is a pic of the painted soldiers, with superb painting skills and a very good selection of colours.  The Nexus box just reuses the photo, using it horizontally as Italeri and other manufacturers do today.

This is what the figures look like;

(They are tan in Nexus reissue, and there is some other Atlantics set with a sort of tan-orangey colour. Probably there were made in  many other colours too)

SCULPTING - 7.8 out of 10

As with other Atlantic ancient sets, the level of sculpting is nice and high. Detail is sharp and they can be nicely painted, but the figures have some not every interesting poses (too many spearmen just carrying the spear without doing anything with it) and I am still trying to make out what the archer is doing holding the bow in that position at the same time as he carries an axe and having no quiver for his arrows. They also seem a bit skinny and tall, maybe they would be skinny in a bad year for crops, but probably not so tall. 

All the same, you get a good number of poses, and generally they are anatomically right (at least far more than brands like Strelets, or some Italeri sets with big heads).

HISTORICAL ACCURACY - 8.5 out of 10

 They are a sort of mish-mash remix of different eras, but  overall they are correct, and as the Egyptian empire spawns for 3 millennia I think you could find a spot where all men fit. In our days we would probably demand  3 sets for correctly covering the subject, but back in the 70s and until very recently, you wanted Egyptians and you didn't care about  anything more.

The worst figure arguably is the Pharaoh. At least this is what we deduct, as he carries the crown of the Lower Egypt. But he doesn't have any sort of armour or fancy clothes, he only carries a sort of sceptre (normally the Pharaoh would go to battle in chariot and he would use either a bow, or a more sophisticated type of weapon), and worst of all, a regular shield like the other infantry. 

The Pharaoh was quite an important person, and he had commodities such as shield-bearers to protect him, so this leaves this figure as simply a general or somebody of the royal family, who most probably didn't wear the crown (this is furtherly confirmed as Atlantic also made a Pharoah figure ), so you would have to cut his crown to be more historically accurate.

ARMY REPRESENTATION - 2.5

"The army representation score is the potential of the soldiers to be used for other purposes different to the one originally intended"

These figures have Egyptian written on their faces, and they can't be used for anything else really.  Some of the figures with a bit of modification could be made into Meroe and Aksum infantry, but not much more.

FUNNESS - 8.0

"I feel that many reviews are oblivious to this point - there are fantastic figures, which you can´t say anything against, but they are just too "correct", maybe too static, and so just boring. So I feel that this is an important consideration on deciding if you buy this set"

They are Egyptians! until the Caesar set, they were the only Egyptians you could buy, and from the late 80s until the Nexus reissue, even these were not available. How has mankind  survived the lack of 1/72 during so much time? I wonder. Just for being what they are their level of funness is huge. 




WARGAMING VALUE - 8.0

Except the lack of archers (which you can easily solve getting the Atlantic Egyptian Cavalry set)
this is a very good set for wargaming. For other unique characters you have the Atlantic At the Pharaohs Court set.


PRICE-VALUE RATIO - 10.0 

"The price value ratio of these soldiers will vary between every shop you go to, and the best I can do is judge by their average price on eBay"



Nexus no longers reissues these figures, but all the same by eBay you easily can find the infantry, either the original or reissue, for a very good price, hence the 10.0 score. I bought mine for 9,99 € I think, which for Nexus reissue, that gives you 62 figures, is a great price. Just be alert, and you'll find a second hand lot for roughly 8 GBP shipped.




PAINTING AND GLUEING - 5.5

Both the Atlantic and Nexus are not very good to paint or to glue,being  flexible and slippery. Note that although they never had flash problems in this set, there is a bit of flash present in Nexus sets, so you will have to cut it, and it is not easy as the plastic is very elastic.


OVERALL VALORATION - 8.5

I had lived without any Egyptian miniatures for too long, and these were the answer to my miniature prayings. For me, not having Egyptians was like missing Greeks or Romans, and so I am bit biased in favour of this set, but I think even now, with good Zvezda and Caesar sets, they have a more "Egyptian" flavour in this set than in the others. So even now, I recommend this set over their competitors. Besides this, the other sets depict the later armies of the Egyptians, so for early Egyptians, this is still the one and only set.


PAINTED EXAMPLES
"Your figures could appear here if you want! just send me a email with the pictures to tam_cob@hotmail.com and I´ll gladly include them"

These figures have been painted by myself.

Thanks to Gabriel from http://1-72degabriel.blogspot.com/2010/02/infanteria-egipcia-2300-1500-ac.html for giving his permissionm to show his greatly painted Egyptians! ;

Thanks for reading, and see you in the next battle!

1/72 CAESAR - HITTITE WARRIORS ARMY - Battle of Qadesh, against Ramses of Egypt Miniatures Figures

Here we have another Caesar Miniatures review, some of the most relevant armies that Caesar have made. We are talking of the Hittites.


This is the box;

It is one of the most appalling box arts I've ever seen. I had to say to myself twice "forget the box art, the figures inside are fine". They seem a choir of renacentist women singing. Probably in my top ten of worst artboxes. Anything, just a transparent plastic would have been better.

Let's forget the box and see the figures;

SCULPTING - 7.0 out of 10

Normally Caesar Miniatures have wonderful, sharp and crisp sculpting, and yes, the detail in this set is fantastic. But for some reason, they don't have the right anatomical proportions that other Caesar sets have. The heads of some of the figures are very small, and nearly all figures have very big and disproportional hands. The closed fists of the leader is as big as his head! some of their feet are also too big. The spears are too thick, which could be understood, but also the spearheads are very big, not in proportion with other Caesar sets.

One of the spearmen has a very small stand which makes him unbalanced, but this is easily solved by glueing him into a bigger stand.


HISTORICAL ACCURACY - 8.0

We have a rather strange set to review today. The Hittites are still quite obscure and hard to research, but we do have some of the depictions the Egyptians made. Although they isn't anything very wrong, the combination and amount of the different characteristics are quite incorrect in my opinion. 


Too many soldiers don't wear helmets, and they have the "elf" style hairstyle, as though they have been  taken from a Osprey book, and in my humble opinion this  is too common among the soldiers. The archers with the boots just seem  wrong. Being bare-chested and wearing boots doesn't fit together very well. It is true that the Hittites used these characteristic boots, but again it was not a 100 % common characteristic. Some of the soldiers would use sandals or just go barefoot. 

And in some cases they seem that they are wearing clothes for winter in the Anatolian  mountains, not in the desert of Qadesh.

All shields have the same dimensions and shape, and this is not what we see in the Qadesh depictions of the Egyptians. Even if they are historically correct, not all the troops again would have used them.


ARMY REPRESENTATION - 3.0

"The army representation score is the potential of the soldiers to be used for other purposes different to the one originally intended"

 Having so many characteristic hairstyles, boots, armour, etc, they are not of much use besides being Hittites. Some of the archers with some conversion could be used as other Anatolian or a Middle East tribe, but they are of limited use.

FUNNESS - 6.5

"I feel that many reviews are oblivious to this point - there are fantastic figures, which you can´t say anything against, but they are just too "correct", maybe too static, and just boring. So I feel that this is an important point when deciding if you buy this set"

I have mixed feelings here, with the fun of this set, and in general, with this set. They are different, they have good quantity of poses, two unique leaders, but they are not what I expected as Hittites. They lack some of the more typical depictions of them, you are given a leader which is not more than a man with sword, so we consider him as an officer, and a true king would have been much more appreciated. Also, the other unique figure has nearly the same pose as one of the normal types, which I feel is having lost a good chance to give a more different sort of figure. 

WARGAMING VALUE - 8.5

This is a very good set for wargaming. You are given all the different sorts of troops, and in good ratio (albeit if a bit too many armoured men without spears maybe, this seems to represent an  elite Hittite army), so it scores high here. Some sort of standard bearer and king is the only thing it lacks to be a ten.

PRICE-VALUE RATIO - 8

"The price value ratio of these soldiers will vary between every shop you go to, and the best I can do is judge by their average price on eBay"

As with most Caesar Miniatures, you can find them for 8-9 GBP shipped, which is a fine price for detailed figures, numerous and obscure , such as these are.





PAINTING AND GLUEING - 8.5

As can be said for all Caesar models, the plastic is a sort of rubber that is rough and not slippery. Even if maybe a bit too dark , a lighter grey would have been better. They can be nicely glued. A bad thing is that they come many times with bent lances or bent bases,(which in theory  can be solved with hot water, although many return to their bad poses again.)

OVERALL VALORATION - 7.0
"A bit unfulfilling, but a must for any collector"

I feel that  this set could have been done a lot better, with just a bit better combination of the clothes, armour and hairstyles,and with a tiny bit better sculpturing, I was expecting a lot, something like the Trojans, where everything seems to fit perfectly, even if there is very little information.Here with more information, they seem too rigid in the interpretation of the figures.

All the same, we have to thank Caesar just for trying to make this set, because without the Hittites we would be lacking one of the most important empires and peoples of ancient history. 

And as it is quite improbable that we will get Hittites made in any other brand, we'll have to stick with these.

PAINTED EXAMPLES
"Your figures could appear here if you want! just send me a email with the pictures to tam_cob@hotmail.com and I´ll gladly include them"

Painted figures by myself;

Painted figures extracted from Caesar Miniatures official website;

Thanks for reading, and see you in the next battle!

TAMIYA BRITISH SPECIAL AIR SERVICE (SAS) JEEP 1/35 REVIEW

Welcome to my first review of a model kit. I humbly strive to have all 1/35, 1/72 model kits and miniatures reviewed on this site. As obviously impossible as that is, I will try my best.

Let´s go on with the subject then;

BOX ART >> The box is the typical Tamiya one, with a nice illustration over white background. Always easy to recognize, artistically well done and describes perfectly what you get.

THE KIT - 9.0 >>

As usual with Tamiya, everything fits properly (even better than usual), the mould is as fresh now as it was back in the 80s when it was made for the first time, with perfect sharpness. It is indeed a very nice kit, unlike some cheap (or not so cheap) kits from lesser known manufacturers which you can be sanding and fighting to makea simple mudface fit .

The building is a piece of cake, and the resulting model is flawless. But in this world of near-perfection kits, I think we must focus onto other aspects, the aspects that make  one kit different from another.

EXTRAS - 8.5 >>

This model scores high on extras. You are given two very nice pilots, and all the equipment you could ask for and then some, boxes, petrol cans, machine guns, sand racks, flasks, etc.

POSSIBILITIES - 3.0 >>

The possibilities of this kit are somewhat limited, as if you have bought this kit instead of a regular Jeep, you can only make the Long Range desert group version, so there is not much to speak about here.

The basic possibilities I can think of are (besides the obvious);

Pink version, showing heavy discolour due to sunlight

A german captured version, which could be very interesting

Israeli army version for the 1950's

Egyptian army 1950's

PRICE/VALUE RATIO - 6.5 >>

It doesn't get a good score here. The average price on eBay is more or less 15 €/13 GBP/18 $, and let's face it, you can buy bigger and more interesting vehicles for not much more.

OVERALL - 8.3 >> 

Even if the price is usually high, it is a fine model nevertheless, and makes a good build of a Jeep that could be boring otherwise. There is a good balance between a nice detail and finish, without having to glue each miserable bit of unnecessary detail which you won't see anyway later. 

Sorry if my review can seem simple or inaccurate for the super-expert that researches the brand of tyre used during the summer of 1941, and each model takes him 6 months to complete, but it is oriented for the old-school fan that likes to build a model from time to time, and modelling is a  hobby and not an endless job. 

For those who think the plastic extras are not good enough, fine enough, etc, there are many resin-sets on eBay that will upgrade this model to the level they are searching for. However, in my humble opinion I don't think the kit needs any part replacement, as I show you in the images of the straight out of the box kit I built and painted myself;

IMAGES OF FINISHED JOBS