Eeny ooony wanak noaaj zim whoono British Purchasing Commission nak Dutch Kindleberger wetnik mozg could do better than P-40s moosk Ed Schmued laminar flow airfoil nuk radiator producing net thrust monki Allison engine limkuto mirk beew fast long-range RAF Merlin engine nop tipo quirip high altitude rear view bubble top "D" tinque morko muntsh classic fighter wuruki Korean War tyuki nuk sempu surplus market firki burd suppo various Latin American wars nindu beek pupo naj Reno Air Races zoop 1970s warbird movement kompi meer reeki noy Hollywood Elite mont book Scientology gip trook Tom Cruise.

  Really? You expected me to say anything new about this airplane? Surely you jest.

  Very possibly winning the title of Most Charismatic Model Subject Of All Time, the P-51D has always been well-served in all modeling scales from the very first Frog Penguin celluloid kit of the 1940s. I won't try to cover the whole lot in summary; I'll just leave it that the Tamiya and New Airfix kits emerged as the best of the 1/72 bunch over the past two decades. Around the year 2000, we in the modeling world thought that the pinnacle had been achieved with the fine work of Japanese industry and technology.

  Incredibly, the likes of Eduard and (more recently) Arma have been in the past decade pushing this technological standard to one of even greater detail comprehensiveness and resolution and subject fidelity. In this context, the past two years has seen the ever-alluring P-51D return to focus, with one-two-THREE! more new-tool kits joining this selection.

   Eduard: True to form, Eduard cornucopias us with an absolute profusion of injected parts (211 of them!) over three expansive dark-gray sprues plus one clear. Here, the firm displays its legendary OCD attention to details not only in aircraft production block but individual airframe peculiarities. Eduard accounts for the difference between D-5 and D-15 with two entirely separate fuselages gated to a common sprue for the other main airframe parts, with all other appropriate smaller parts accounted for in the two common sprues. The sheer bounty of the kit's contents is a bit overwhelming, and Eduard predictably offers a profusion of aftermarket bits and decals to supplement this for those willing and able to pony up. Airframe options are as below for Arma, and Eduard has you hunting down various minutiae according to your subject to cut off, fill in, or scribe as needed. Both cuffed and un-cuffed Hamilton standard props are there, as well as the Aeroproducts for the 'K'.  For differences in internal detail, different sidewalls, instrument panels, and radio racks, along with more minor bits are all provided.  The fuselage is covered in some very fine rivet lines. Wings are "unputtied", and the detail not called out in the instructions, a surprising oversight...especially considering what follows below with the Arma kit. Absolutely everything that was ever carried under the wings of a Mustang is present on a sprue dedicated mostly to this, including HVARS and the P-38 style drop tanks. There have been further issues of this kit taking advantage of these parts and various configurations of on-brand multimedia accessories, or the no-frills "Weekend Edition".  No reconnaissance option, however.

   Arma Hobby: In contrast, Arma provides the essential parts and options for all P-51s D and K (plus the reconnaissance F-6D) over 121 parts across two very compact light-gray sprues and one clear. Arma handles the difference in the tail between finless D-5 against later blocks with different parts for the tail surfaces and surrounding "saddle" areas mated to a fuselage common to all these sub-variants. Both factory and field-retrofit dorsal fins are supplied, as well as the Hamilton Standard prop and the Aeroproducts unit of the "K".  Other options are for early or late seats, shrouded/unshrouded exhausts, paper or metal 75-gallon drop tanks, 250-lb. bombs, three different styles of cowl vent, fabric or metal elevators, three different canopies. Flashed-over holes in the lower wing indicate future variants, including a set for the 6x HVAR installation (and this is in fact now been provided with the "VLR" version of the kit, which now includes an additional sprue that also has the P-38-style drop tanks).  An innovative landing gear alignment jig is present on the clear sprue, and in another bit of innovation, a set of wheel well decals I'll do into below. There are no rivets on this kit, just the cowl fasteners. The overall level of refinement and detail is in keeping with the company's rising reputation for these qualities, but what makes this kit really stand out is that the wings are depicted in their correct puttied-and-sanded finish. Commendably, this is done not by eliminating the panel lines entirely, but representing them as very faint lines, like the real thing. Decals provide options for three aircraft and per Arma's settled-upon standard, kabuki-tape canopy masks are supplied. A slip of paper printed with a QR code gives a path to further refined parts if you have access to a 3D printer. Additionally, after what was probably a cooling-off period, Eduard has begun offering various upgrades for this kit as well.

   KP: Improbably, but interestingly, this manufacturer decided to go head-to-head and step into the ring with those other two heavyweights. While the company's earlier P-51A/B/C kits are re-boxed AZ Models products, this one is a new mold and based on Tamiya's still-nice D-5. Unlike the other two, this kit clearly isn't meant to be anything other than a D-5 owing to the limited options and 'closed-architecture' sprue layout. Options present are a choice in seats, exhaust, fabric and metal elevators. A comparison reveals KP's to be based on the Japanese one, with close parts match and surface detail of the same style, resolution, and placement. However, other than the seeming step backwards into limited-run medium, KP has improved over the 2001 Japanese product with more modeler-friendly engineering in the canopy area, deeper cockpit detail, and a welcome reduction in Tamiya's too-prominent wing root fairings. Flaps and ailerons are separate. Puzzlingly, the wheel well transmits an error in incorrectly depicting the rear wall as being up against the opening itself rather than the spar further aft, but I don't think that's a big deal in 1/72. If this bothers you, a fix is easy as in this kit the well area is a separate part.

  In short, other than being 2025 technology injection-molded kits of the P-51D in 1/72, the three products could not be more different! Arma received some criticism from the simple-minded for not following Eduard's example in depicting all those rivet lines everywhere, but in doing so, we have been given a welcome pair of options. Read on.

   Two airframe aspects to note here:

   The first concerns the flap and gear door position of the Merlin P-51 at rest. With the hydraulic system pressurized, both were retracted, and when the aircraft was shut down both would gradually drop into an extended position as the system bled pressure: first the flaps, then the doors. All these kits are designed for the flaps dropped. However, to make the most of this review (and since some of us like the option of depicting flaps up) I modified each kit to see how easy it would be to pose them retracted.

The second concerns the filled-and-puttied wings: P-51s of all models left the factory like this, and Arma is the first kit in any scale to my knowledge to depict the wings as such. I was curious to see how much time and effort it would take to do the same for the other two, so the Eduard and KP wings were filled and sanded.

    Finally, before I started this review, Arma's included alignment jig was cemented together, checked for true with a machinist's square, and left to cure undisturbed. I wanted to see how well it worked for the other kits.

  Eduard: ("Mary Beth", red-and-white checkers, no D-day stripes) Pick which aircraft you want to depict before you do anything else: Eduard will guide you to depict every little peculiarity to your chosen airframe as you build. The sprue gates in this kit go straight into the mating surfaces of the main parts, so take the time with a fresh blade to ensure you've removed them all and verify with a judicious dry-fit. Like the others, I built up the interior in subassemblies so I could get the basic colors painted, then after this cured went to weathering and detailing before construction proceeded. I found that the wing dropped right into place against the fuselage, but then required pushing the trailing edge down while holding the leading edge in place to prevent a step from forming at the flap line. Parts fit is otherwise excellent, but the inevitable seam-elimination processes obliterated some of that lovely and delicate rivet detail, especially in the belly and radiator areas. Posing the flaps up required cutting away a segment of the parts along the hinge line just aft of the leading edge, then doing quite a bit of work to get the flaps seated correctly. The radiator exhaust door needed its sides sanded down a little to fit. The instrument panel/hood assembly won't fit if attached when directed. I had to cut away a bit of the railing on each side of the extreme forward end of the cockpit opening; this was fortunately easy to do and the assembly dropped right into place. Eduard has attempted to depict the main wheels with an authentic 'see-through' void between the spokes, and has molded them in three parts each to do so. Unfortunately, and weirdly, the overall shape and look of the finished parts REALLY misses the mark and you'll want to seek an aftermarket resin product if you want your wheels to look right. In contrast, the unshrouded exhausts look especially exquisite, even cut off straight off the sprue and tacked right into place

  Arma: ("Old Crow", red-and-yellow checkers, fuselage D-Day stripes) Arma has also molded all its sprue gates into the mating edges of the main parts, and (surprisingly) there are little traces of flash here and there: it's absolutely essential that you remove all these little nubs and obstructions, filing them totally flush for parts to fit properly. Those wheel well decals went on following a thin gloss coat. Far from being a gimmick, the system does in fact work and looks really striking when applied as directed. It won me over—you ought to see it once all is cured and a black wash goes on! The only fit problem was that the wing assembly didn't want to seat properly against the fuselage saddle area—I trimmed away about 1/16" from the invisible leading edge of fuselage right above the radiator intake and applied a clamp. Subsequent issues of this kit reverse the order of assembly in this location which eliminates the problem. Like the other two kits, Arma's required filling and sanding and rescribing in the belly/radiator area, though this is less of a tragedy in this case as there is no rivet detail. Where Eduard has you worsening this by filling some inspection panels, Arma handles this difference with an optional part. Like the Eduard kit above, posing the flaps up required cutting away the segment along the hinge line just aft of the leading edge, then doing quite a bit of work to seat the flaps convincingly. Next time, I'll spend more time thinning the trailing edges of the ailerons to better match the trailing edge of the flaps. Like Eduard's, the radiator exhaust door required quite a bit of sanding on the sides to fit.

  KP: ("Shoo-Shoo Baby", OD-over-natural metal, full underside D-Day stripes) Naturally, the limited-run technology means you should probably have some references in hand when you begin by getting the cockpit together and be prepared to do some fitting. I found I had to raise the pilot's seat/armor assembly about 1mm with a little strip of styrene to get it to sit at the correct height and angle, and cut off about 2mm off the front of the radio rack to get this assembly hard up against the pilot's armor. The interior is missing the prominent trim knob console on the left wall, but is otherwise quite adequate under a closed canopy. There are a few other items that even a new modeler might want to attend; namely there's little interior detail to the radiator area oil cooler exit is open to create a see-through effect; all modelers will want to block this. Also, there was a mold artifact in the spinner base which prevented the propeller assembly from coming together which required 10 seconds with a Dremel tool to remove. However, overall the fit was pretty good and remaining assembly was quick and easy, and as with the other two, filler was required in the belly around the radiator area. I did also sand away about 1/32" from the wing root mating edges and a bit off the outer end tops of the wheel well insert. Unsurprisingly, ailerons and flaps required quite a bit of filing work to seat convincingly in their places, as well as the rudder and stabilizers. But compared to the kits above, posing this P-51 flaps-up was much, much easier. I selected the shrouded exhausts, and found I had to sand down their mounting bases quite a bit to get them in and seated correctly.