1:72 SCALE RUSSIAN SS-25 ROCKET LAUNCHER VEHICLE FROM REVELL

REVELL'S NEW 1:72 SCALE KIT DEPICTS the mobile transporter for the SS-25 intercontinental ballistic missile. A single SS-25 is carried inside a long cylindrical housing.

RUSSIAN SS-25 ROCKET KIT FROM ZVEZDA, WITH EXTRAS FROM LVM STUDIOS IN THE NETHERLANDS

WE HAVE ALREADY LOOKED AT the 1:72 scale Zvezda kit of the Soviet/Russian SS-25 missile. Now we’ve built a kit, so here is the complete report. We also took the opportunity to add the conversion kit from LVM Studios. This turns the military missile into a commercial satellite launcher.

DETAIL-UP KIT BY LVM STUDIOS FOR 1:72 SCALE ZVEZDA SS-25 MISSILE TRANSPORTER

WE LOOKED AT THE 1:72 SCALE ZVEZDA SS-25 missile transporter kit recently, and now a detail-up kit for this is available from LVM Studios of The Netherlands.

MIGHTY MISSILE FROM RUSSIA: ZVEZDA SS-25 TRANSPORTER-ERECTOR-LAUNCHER TO 1:72 SCALE

There was a time when missile models of all types littered the model catalogues. But things changed and they have become, like many of the real things, obsolete. Consequently, this 1:72 scale kit of the SS-25 TEL (Transporter-Erector-Launcher) by Zvezda, Russia’s major kit manufacture, comes as a bit of a surprise.

BOEING 787 FIRST COMMERCIAL FLIGHT WITH ANA - BUT ARE YOU GOING TO BUILD A KIT FROM REVELL OR ZVEZDA?

SMN report:

The Boeing 787 Dreamliner has - after many delays - finally gone into passenger service, with the first fare-paying flight by lead airline customer All Nippon Airways (ANA). Years late, the Boeing twinjet is now rewriting the rules for lightweight construction, fuel economy, and passenger comfort. 

BOEING 787 DUE TO FLY TODAY

She’s years late and way over budget, but finally Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner is ready for flight. As planned, the twinjet should take to the air later today from Paine Field Airport, north of Seattle, US.

Taxi tests earlier this week were successful, and Boeing’s big baby even lifted her nose briefly, though not before the test pilot had applied speed brakes to avoid an accidental liftoff. You can see this, and hear the roar of the thrust reversers in the video above. The 787’s a pretty plane by any standards, and while those engines - airlines have a choice of Rolls-Royce or General Electric designs - may be massive, they will be incredibly economical and low on emissions too.

For model fans however, there hasn’t yet been too much activity on the kit front where the 787’s concerned. An exception is Zvezda, a Russian company that already has a neat 1:144 scale 787 in production, and which is slowly filtering into the retail supply chain. As you can see from the component layout pic above, it’s a relatively simple kit of an important aircraft for which Boeing already has some 840 orders, and is well worth adding to any collection of 1:144 scale airliners.

Good luck to the 787 on her first flight today, the second major first flight this last week, after the European A400M airlifter.

Visit Zvezda’s interesting range here.

Zvezda's kit is becoming available at model stores and online suppliers; there's also a much smaller 1:400 Gemini Jets 787 you can see here.

Video courtesy David Parker Brown.