What can be said, one of the most famous aircraft ever and, in my view, certainly one of, if not the, best looking aircraft ever to fly.

First conceived in the 1950’s Concorde entered fare paying service on January 21^st 1976.

Due in part to environmental protest and the soaring cost of fuel Concorde never reached it’s full sales potential with only nine airframes being completed, each costing about $60m.

However, no jumbo is ever going to give it’s passengers their own mach meter, nor will that meter read M2.05 (1,350 mph)  It has been said that getting Concorde into service with the technology available at the time was equivalent to putting a man on the moon.

It’s a crying shame she’s gone.

      Before I ordered this kit I took a quick look at a 1/144 Concorde, not very big so I took the plunge.  Now stop reading and go get a tape measure. The box for this kit is;

600mm long, 350mm wide and 120mm deep, (that’s 23.5” x 13.75” x 4.75”)

This is one big model.

     The box says 90 parts, I counted 151 on 12 sprues, (not counting a 6 part stand that looks like it could support my car!) You also get 1 tube of glue, 1 tube of clearfix, 2 brushes 12 pots of paint and 2 metal rods for the core of the main undercarriage units and decal sheet that is 570mm x 230mm (22.5” x 9”)  O.K. what’s this cost?, £20.00, yes I did say £20.00.

     The detail is engraved, not to Tamiya’s standard but it’s mostly ok though on some items such as the undercarriage legs it’s a bit ‘soft’ and you get ‘real rubber’ tyres, love them or loath them.  (Hannants in the UK are stating on their web site that replacement wheels are in the offing.)

     I may be miss judging Airfix but we have a multi part fuselage.  The first is the cock- pit to forward of the wing,(I think the nose may ‘droop’ as in the prototype) second is to the trailing edge/flaperons, and third is the tail unit and then the nose and tail cones.  No less than six bulkheads are provided and looking at the instructions it should be a fairly solid unit when built, however, we are left with two major vertical joints on the fuselage as well as the usual horizontal joint, lets hope it’s a well engineered set of moulds.  There are also some ejector pin marks that will need to be filled.

     The next thing to mention is the kit is moulded in three colours, white, silver and black.  The reason seems to be that you can build a ‘full colour’ model without opening the paint, so why supply the paint?  The instructions also show how and where to fasten thread to hang the thing off the ceiling, well the box does say age 8 up, though I don’t believe many 8 year olds will be able to make this kit without some adult help, I for one  had to study the instructions for some time before some sections made sense. (I know we all should but when you’re 8 you want it built yesterday.)

     The decal sheet is comprehensive offering three schemes, all BA, seen during Concords service.  Of course being Airfix they’re out of register, only slightly but enough to make several items unusable, Airfix, please wake up and either get your quality control right or buy in from a manufacturer who can do it right first time, please.

     As I’ve said, Hannants are apparently going to offer replacement wheels & tyres and I would imagine that other accessories will be obtainable soon.

I’ve taken the plunge and removed some parts for dry fitting and I have to say I’m hopeful that construction shouldn’t present too many disasters.  I tried the fuselage half’s, (I didn’t use the bulkheads), the nose and tail assemblies, and one upper wing panel to the lower centre section, and they all seem to fit quite well, shear size may present the main problem, we’ll have to wait and see.

    I am desperate to start this kit but I am going to have to find some place I can display it when it’s finished.

   Overall I would give it  8/10 before I attempt to build the thing.  As for value for money I really can’t fault it, I mean, £20.00, even if you throw out the paint, glue, ect it’s still remarkable value (other manufacturers may have produced a better engineered kit but what would the asking price be, not £20.00 I’ll bet)

    By and large I think Airfix deserve a resounding well done for producing this kit, there’s not a lot to mark the passing of one of the most graceful aircraft ever to fly, it’ll be an impressive sight when built, I just wonder how many I’ll see.

October 2004