Airbus A320 Edelweiss Air

[Mike]

Airbus A320 Edelweiss Air

1:144 Revell

The first of the successful narrow body range from Airbus, the A320 flew commercially for the first time in March 1998, having completed its maiden flight in February of the previous year. Designed to compete for a share of the short to medium range market which at the time, was dominated by Boeing and Douglas with their B737 and DC-9 respectively, a production run of fewer than 1000 aircraft was originally intended. However, the success of the design, and the introduction of the longer A321 and shorter A319 and A318 derivatives has seen the A320 family become the world’s fastest selling airliner. As of March 2011, Airbus has delivered more than 4600 aircraft, with a further 2600 firm orders making this the world’s best-selling, single-generation aircraft programme.

The Original Revell A320 kit released in 1988 represented an early series 100 aircraft and included a small airport tractor. It did not however feature the now familiar Airbus winglets. These are included in the current, updated kit which is comprised of two sprues of white styrene and a third in clear styrene which contains the windscreen and wing-tip lights.

The mouldings are, as one would expect, to Revell’s usual standard with finely engraved panel lines. These do appear to be rather overstated for an airliner model in this scale, however they are toned down appreciably with the application of primer and final colour coats. Other versions of this kit have been criticized for a certain amount of flash on some of the smaller components. This particular sample is fortunately flash free, and will require only minimal clean up of some parts.

The fuselage is moulded in two halves with the cabin window openings meant to be filled in with a liquid glazing compound such as Micro Crystal Clear. Alternatively, they can be filled and decals used to represent the windows if so desired. Various aerials and antenna are moulded integrally with the port fuselage side. This makes life difficult when cleaning up the seam lines and I would suggest that these are removed prior to assembly, and re-attached later. Additionally, the instructions call for assembly of the nose gear leg prior to closing up the fuselage halves. This again makes for a more difficult clean-up operation though the nose leg can be omitted until later in the construction sequence. The cockpit glazing is provided in clear styrene as mentioned earlier and fits well with little fuss. I would suggest at this point that the glazing lines moulded on the windscreen, be sanded off and the screen re-polished. This will prevent the "glazed" areas from appearing under-sized once painted. Alternatively, one can use decal options though these are not included and will have to be sourced elsewhere.

The wing mouldings included in the kit represent the double slotted wing of the A321 version and as such, will require the removal of the smaller flap track fairings. There are five below each wing, which are easily removed with a sharp blade. The engraved line representing the additional slot should then be filled and sanded down. This process is adequately illustrated on the instruction sheet, and will take very little time to accomplish. The fit of the three piece wing assembly to the fuselage is very good, with minimal sanding required. The winglets now incorporated are slightly under-sized, though there is adequate internet based information available for the fabrication of replacements if desired.

The remaining assembly work is straightforward and soon completed, bringing us to the painting stage which is clear and concisely presented in the usual Revell style. The required colour references relate to the Revell paint range which is to be expected.

This release features the livery of Edelweiss Air, the award winning Swiss Holiday Airline. The current scheme employed by Edelweiss Air features a white fuselage with a bright red fin and forward fuselage. This in turn is decorated with a large stylized floral design, and the large billboard style company name is applied to both sides. The wings are finished in the usual Airbus factory scheme of natural metal, grey and "Corroguard".

The decals are produced for Revell by DACO and as such should need no further introduction to long term airline modelers.

All of the airline specific decals are in perfect register, and the stencil markings provided stand up well even when viewed under a magnifying glass. Although the sheer number of decals included will make this one of the lengthiest stages of the whole build process, though to me at least, one of the most satisfying, they should not present any problems based on past experiences.

Conclusion

Another excellent kit from Revell, with an unusual choice of colour scheme. If however, the chosen scheme is not to your liking, one can always substitute the kit decals for one of the many provided by the specialist decal manufacturers. This option, together with the fact that both the CFM and V2500 engine options are supplied with the kit and the comprehensive range of aftermarket accessories available means that the choices are almost as varied as the Airbus customer list.

Main review text by Chris Tonks (Stringbag).

Review sample courtesy of

[Paul A H]

Nice review!

[Rabspat]

I have had this kit for 2/3 weeks now, what i think is a nice touch is both types of engines, previous boxing has left out the V2500 engines. So well done Revell for doing this, which makes it easier for doing British Airways scheme plus any other Airlines that use the V2500 engines.

[Dads203]

Thanks for that review Chris, very informative on the full size machine as well as some good pointers for the kit itself.

Cheers

Dan