Customer Reviews

05009 1/144 German Sub Type VII D

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With a little over 100 pieces, this is not a beginner's plastic model like Revell 1:180 USS Lionfish Submarine. For example, the main gun, which is barely one inch long, consists of seven pieces. The sail, about two inches long, has around 40 pieces. Some pieces are literally 2mm wide. I had hoped that I could share the experience with my son but ended up doing most of the work myself.

1:144 may sound like a reasonably large scale, but Type VII is a small boat and this model, with so many little pieces, can tolerate little dimensional errors. Fortunately, it seems to be one of the newer Revell and the larger pieces generally fit well together. The small pieces require some cutting and bending at times, but nothing excessive. The 15-page manual is both informative and accurate. It even provides detailed painting schema for all six historical Type VII-D.

My main gripe is the fragile nature of the small pieces, particular those involving thin lines. It is obvious that little attention was paid to the structure strength of these pieces. Some parts of the sub, e.g. the rudder assembly, are so weak that they cannot withstand the gentlest of touches. Making matter even worse is the fact that these thin pieces come connected to the grid with thick tubes. Just taking them off the grid is a delicate operation. Even with a sharp new knife, I still ruined several of the most fragile ones and had to reconstruct them somehow.

The weakness of the little pieces is a fundamental problem resulting from the choice of cheap soft plastic. Tamiya models of similar complexity suffer none of the breakage issue because the green Tamiya plastic is simply a lot tougher. Revell will do well to upgrade the material used.