IL-2 Stormovik Single-Seater w/Skis

Completed this kit about a month ago and had a lot of fun with it. Moulded in grey plastic, the fit was pretty good with just a minimum of putty needed along the fuselage joints and where the wings meet the fuselage in addition to areas around the nose. The cockpit detail was pretty good and if ever there was an aircraft with a lot of metal canopy framing this one is it. Very little of the interior can be seen once the canopy is put in place. The biggest decision to make is whether to build the ski equipped version or wheeled version. I chose wheels. The instruction sheet, which is probably the weakest point of the kit, does not show the wheel installation so one must study the parts carefully. The biggest change from the ski version is you must cut out the attachment bar that joins the two main legs of the main gear and also disregard the ski retraction arm. A little research can lead to a myriad of colour schemes being limited only by decals availability for single seat Il-2s. Conveniently, Russian aircraft early on tended to be fairly plainly marked so a few red stars and a couple of numbers are all you will need. Many camouflage schemes, both summer and winter, can be used and weathering your aircraft, the sky is the limit as they flew from pretty basic grass airfields. There are a number of small pieces so tweezers or a sticky pencil are a necessity. All in all, a very enjoyable build of what turned out to be a larger than I thought model. Cheers, Jeff

This was a very fun kit to assemble and paint. I would rate this as an easy to intermediate build - enough of a challenge to keep you engaged but without the hundreds of small parts of a Dragon or Hasegawa kit. Part fit, detail and quality were all good, with only a couple of pieces needing minor filling because of mold ejection marks. The cockpit was nicely detailed even though it is hard to notice all that detail after the canopy is in place. No pilot figure is included. Decals were few - only six red stars, a couple of tail numbers and a few no step markings. The decals were, however, of good quality and snugged down nicely. I especially liked the option to use either the skis or the wheels - I chose the skis because this made the plane that much more unique and different. Unfortunately, the instruction sheet lacks clarity when showing how to assemble the landing gear. I was left to my best guess as to where some of the support struts connected, and if you choose to use the wheels, then you are on your own - the instruction sheet only shows the installation of the skis. Even with these small frustrations, the kit turned out beautifully and I would highly recommend it. Another very nice kit from Academy.