Mirage 1/48 PZL.37B Los Kit First Look

By Michael Benolkin

First Look

The PZL.37 was a very modern tactical bomber developed in the mid-1930s for the Polish Air Force. Named 'Łoś' (Moose), the PZL.37 was powered by a pair of license-built Bristol Pegasus radial engines. The aircraft was smaller than similar bombers developed in Germany, most notably the He 111P. Despite its smaller size however, the PZL.37 was able to carry a significantly larger bomb load with a longer combat radius than the Heinkel and other similar bombers of the day.

The initial prototypes of the PZL.37A series had a single tail, but production versions featured twin tails. By the time Germany invaded Poland, nearly 90 examples were in service and many of those that survived the initial Luftwaffe attacks were withdrawn to Romania where they were ultimately seized by that government for service in their own air force. A few examples were captured by the Germans for evaluation and a few found their way into the Soviet Union as well. Prior to the German invasion, PZL had standing orders for the PZL.37B from Bulgaria, Greece, Spain, Turkey, and Yugoslavia.

Mirage continues to turn out some beautifully detailed kits and this one is no exception. This kit has been on the market for a while and has been recently reissued. I thought it time to take a closer look. Like previous releases from Mirage, this kit nicely engineered and most of the online builds of this kit show the model to be a straightforward project.

The kit is molded in light gray styrene and presented on six parts trees plus a single tree of clear parts. The detailing is scribed and is nicely done.

The kit has the following features and options:

• Choice of propeller spinners
• Nicely detailed cockpit
• Nicely appointed bombardier station
• Dorsal and ventral rear-firing gunners stations
• Detailed bomb bay structures
• FULL load of bombs for the bomb bays
• Positionable bomb bay doors
• Detailed main landing gear
• Landing gear is positionable
• Landing flaps are positionable

If you've seen some of the online builds of this aircraft, you might notice that many modelers are painting the leading edges of the cowlings red. These leading edges are actually copper in color as these were exhaust collector rings to route the engine exhaust gasses out of the cowling. If you hadn't noticed this practice before, early World War 2 RAF aircraft also used the leading edge of the cowling to house the exhaust collector ring. If you build this kit and plan a few RAF subjects like the Lysander, Beaufighter, Beaufort, etc., then you'll want to have a bottle of copper paint handy to get this one detail correct.

Markings are provided for three examples:

• P.37B, 72-102, K, Polish AF
• P.37B, 72-225, 3, Polish AF
• P.37B, catpured Luftwaffe test article

This is a nice-looking kit and with several distinctive marking options. This subject will look really nice with the Monogram He 111, Classic Airframes Do 17, as well as other similar medim tactical twin-engined bombers.

My sincere thanks to HobbyLink Japan for this review sample!