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This is a nicely detailed model of the Nike Hercules and its launcher, a definite improvement over the classic Revell kit and in a standard scale to boot. The size of the finished model is impressive. Superdetailers have room to improve and add to it, but I built mine out of the box and find the level of detail to be quite good. I'm quite pleased with it and recommend it without hesitation to anyone who wants to add a Nike Hercules to their collection. That said, this is no fall-together kit of the sort Tamiya is famous for, and should only be tackled by an experienced modeler. For a modern kit, there is a high degree of mold seam cleanup required, and some parts (many of them associated with the launcher assembly and molded in halves) need to be slightly reshaped due to their rectangular profiles appearing trapezoidal as a result of the molding process. There are definite fit problems with some launcher assembly components, and gap filling and puttying will be essential to producing a nice model. In those regards it has a lot in common with its Revell predecessor, but the final result is far more accurate. One final word of caution: although Freedom suggests linking several kits together to create a battery (which would be awesome indeed if you have the space for it), this kit represents only the fixed launchers that sat on concrete. If you want to build a typical full battery, at least as they appeared in the U.S., you'll need to do some scratchbuilding to get the elevator launcher looking right, because there are subtle differences to the launcher frame beyond just adding the elevator base, especially in how the missile rails connect. Each typical battery had several elevator launchers that rose up from the underground magazine, and each connected to a series of fixed launchers. A common arrangement was six groups of four missiles, with the elevators in position 2 within each group. The elevator launcher was used to load the missiles onto the fixed launchers by means of rails, which are provided in the kit, but the elevator launcher necessarily had a different rail design in order to mate with the fixed rails when it was fully raised. Check for photos and videos of the restored launcher at SF-88 to see some of the details that would be required. I opted not to convert my kit to the elevator launcher despite the visual interest that it would have provided.Read full review
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Nice cold war era kit! Offer flexibility to build a diorama.
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Great kit with lots of detail much better than the old Revell kit
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I haven't assembled it yet, but it looks well made.
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
La escala y tamaño es excelente y tiene muy buena calidad
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
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