DeHailland DH4 British BiPlane Fighter

This 1/48 scale kit is from a familiar Ukrainian model company called Roden. I’ve built a lot of their kits over the years and they can be hit or miss. This one is almost a hit. The pros of this kit are as follows: You have three paint schemes to choose from and the one I did is on the cover of the box called No.32808, White 17, of the 11th Aero Squadron (Bombing), USAS, Flown by Lt. John L. Garlough with Lt. Robert C. Payton as his observer, Maulan, France, 1918. The other two paint schemes included are No.32457, Red 19, of 20th Aero Squadron (Bombing), USAS, France, 1918 and No.32274 (A-3261), D-11, Of the US Marines C Squadron of the US Marine Corps Northern Bombing Group, flown by 2/Lt. J.F. Gibbs with 2/Lt. F. Nelms as his observer. Fresne air field, Netherlands after a raid on Lokeren in Belgium, on 28 October 1918. Most of the pieces fit well although they require a little spackle to fill in the gaps. I thought the painting of the aircraft is spot on as well. Lots options for bombs and armament. Even though the instructions call for only one rear-firing machine gun; I added two rear-firing machine guns in the rear cockpit because not only it looks cool but sources say it can carry between 1-2 machine guns in the rear. The cons for this kit are as follows: No matter what paint scheme you want to do, they neglect to show the right side of the aircraft. My biggest con in my opinion are the decals themselves. First of all, the rudder decals are in the wrong shape and don’t match it at all. I had to use tiny scissors to trim them to the right shape. They are also hard to get off the paper even with hot water; fortunately only one got ripped and was fixed very easily. Some decals cover the holes in which you’re supposed to put some components on too. So I had to poke around the decals just to find the holes. In conclusion, I give this kit a rating of 4.5 stars out of 5. Roden if you’re reading this it’s a solid kit as a whole but you need to do a better job with decal size and have them not cover any holes whatsoever. Overall, keep up the good work.