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In-Box Review
148
... in Finnish Air Force Service!

by: Jean-Luc Formery [ TEDMAMERE ]

The Finnish Air Force is known to have used one of the most heteroclite collection of planes during WW2. Aircraft of various origins (from American to Russian designs) have been widely used with great success by the Finnish pilots during the combats against the Soviets. One decal sheet by AML allows you to build a French, a German, a Dutch and an Italian plane... in Finnish Air Force Service!

content
The decal sheet is protected within a plastic bag (picture 1) and the content (picture 2 and 3) will allow you to depict the following planes:
- Morane MS 406, MS-327, flown by MSgt U. Lehtovaara of 2 / LeLv 28, Lunkula airfield, September 1941. Lehtovaara was the most successful Morane pilot with fourtheen kills. On 9 July 1944 he was awarded the Mannerheim Cross (No.142) and in his 400 missions carrer he was credited with 44,5 confirmed kills.
- Fiat G.50, 2nd series, FA-33, serial M.M.4745, flown by Flt.Sgt Aaltonen, 2/26 LeLv, Immola airfield, November 1941.
- Fokker D.XXI, FR-83, 2 / LeLv 12, Nurmoila airfield, February 1942. This version of the D.XXI is equiped with skis and has a nice unicorn artwork on both fuselage sides.
- Fokker D.XXI, FR-83, flown by commander Capt F.Mustonen of 1/LeLv 12, Nurmoila airfield, October 1943. It's the same plane as the above mentionned but fitted with it's original landing gear. The unicorn artwork obviously wasn't to the taste of the new pilot as it disapeared meanwhile.
- Fokker D.XXI, FR-92, 2 / LeLv 12, Nurmoila airfield, December 1942.
- Messerschmitt Bf 109 G-6, W.Nr. 165 267, MT-451, Flown by Major Eino Luukkanen of 1 / HLeLv 34, Taipalsaari airfield, July 1944.

All the planes have very colorful camouflages and markings:
- The two Fokkers are painted in the standard Black/Olive Green over Light Grey paint scheme with Yellow tactical markings. A said before, one option has a nice unicorn on the fuselage.
- The MS 406 wears a more complex Dark Blue Grey/Dark Earth/Olive Green over Light Blue Grey paint scheme with Yellow tactical markings and a red spinner. It has a big tail number (9) and kill markings on the fin as well as some unusual red markings on the leading edges of the wings (if someone could tell me the purpose of them, I would be grateful?)
- The Me 109 has a standard Luftwaffe Paintscheme made of RLM 74/RLM75 over RLM76. It seems the "Erla-Haube" was fitted later as it is painted in RLM 66 according to the instructions. The plane has also Yellow markings but some seem to have been overpainted on the top.
- At last but not least there's a G-50 with it's original typical italian camouflage of "Mimetico" Yellow/Brown/ Green over Grey. This paintsheme, associated with the Yellow markings and a big tail number is probably the most colorful! strangely, on the side views the spinner is Yellow but on the upper view it is Red/White...
A complete list of colours is given in F.S. numbers and for Humbrol, Gunze Sangyo, Lifecolor and Agama paints.

The decals are printed on a single sheet (picture 5) with no fuselage bands or the like. All the Yellow tactical markings will have to be painted on the model using masks. This could be seen as a bad thing but I think this is not really a problem since this sheet is obviously aimed at experienced modelers who would have painted them anyway rather than using decals.
I found no misalignements on the sheet and everything is in register. The colours seems to be accurate as well so I think AML did a good overall job. My first complaint is about the rather complex layout of the profiles in the instructions. Rather than joining all the views of a plane on a single page, they are randomly placed over the entire sheet. For the FR-92 you have the left view on page 1, the right view on page 2 and the top view on page 3... quite confusing. My second complaint is that no list of suggested kits is given by AML in the instructions. I assume the sheet is destined to the following kits:
- MS 406 = Classic Airframes or Hobbycraft kits.
- Fokker D.XXI = Classic Airframes. Ironically, if you want to do the plane equiped with skis, you will have to buy AML's sheet 48005 wich has the needed additional resin parts and... the exact same decals for that plane!
- Fiat G.50 = Flying Machine's kit comes to my mind.
- Bf 109 G-6 = I suppose Hasegawa's kit is the best... but you will have to find one with Erla-Canopy. Otherwise there are the Academy and Fujimi kits. The later has the "Erla-Haube".

An extra "bonus" in the sheet is a replacement vertical stabilizer for the Fiat G.50 to depict an export version (picture 5). The extra parts (three in total) simply replace the parts of the kit and therefore won't need any additional work other than eliminating the pouring stubs.

Conclusion
This is a decal sheet aimed at experienced modelers considering the subject and the complexity of the paintschemes. But if you like unusual markings you should go for it. The only bad side is the limited availability of some of the kits, mainly the Fokker D.XXI and the MS 406.

Please remember, when contacting retailers or manufacturers, to mention that you saw their products highlighted here - on AeroScale.
SUMMARY
The Finnish Air Force is known to have used one of the most heteroclite collection of planes during WW2. Aircraft of various origins (from American to Russian designs) have been widely used with great success by the Finnish pilots during the combats against the Soviets. One decal sheet by AML allows you to build a French, a German, a Dutch and an Italian plane... in Finnish Air Force Service!
  PRINTING QUALITY:90%
Percentage Rating
90%
  Scale: 1:48
  Mfg. ID: AMLD 48022
  Suggested Retail: £8,80
  PUBLISHED: Sep 22, 2006
  NATIONALITY: Finland
NETWORK-WIDE AVERAGE RATINGS
  THIS REVIEWER: 87.63%
  MAKER/PUBLISHER: 85.75%

About Jean-Luc Formery (TedMamere)
FROM: MOSELLE, FRANCE

I'm mainly interested in WW2 aircraft and I build them in 1/48 scale.

Copyright ©2021 text by Jean-Luc Formery [ TEDMAMERE ]. Images also by copyright holder unless otherwise noted. Opinions expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of AeroScale. All rights reserved.


   
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