You have seen the images of the sprues. A sprue with 17 parts B with 33 and C with 1. Instructions are 6 step exploded views. The fuselage appears 3/32 too long at the stern post. The struts appear short by 1/32 of and inch. This is of course in comparison to the drawing. The Landing gear legs are spot on. The wings are exactly correct in chord and span. Minor detail on the undersurface of the lower wing and less detail on the undersurface of the top. This is a good thing folks. Roden shows you a clip of paper that tells you to delete the cowling the has the inset but it seems they did that themselves. The insert had the cooling holes in its center. THe modification that Roden chose at the factory was similar to the Eduard treatment of their Nieuport 17 and the the Sopwith Triplane kits in the same scale. Much better in my opinion. Cabane struts are exactly correct in length. The oil tank is located on the firewall per the original. Though the firewall has an upper and lower half the tank is entirely on the upper section. The War bond posters are stickers that have a peel off backing. The choice here I think was to include all of the poster's colouring in the small scale. These are fine examples of the originals. Far better than the old K&B versions. The wet transfer decals are beautiful. The blue is exactly the same colour that Jeffers used on his Rising Sun Spad XIII. (The Lafayette Foundation has the pilot's left side section of the fabric with the Hat-N-the Ring and the rays passing behind it, from this machine.) Folks this kit is a gem. I'm sure to pick up three more. Go Roden GO!!!
More later. StephenLawson
