Eduard 1/32 Fw 190 Placards First Look

By Michael Benolkin

First Look

Eduard from the Czech Republic is easily the most prolific producer of aftermarket details. Period. Their series of photo-etched detail sets have brought additional fidelity to otherwise bland subjects, and have taken even the best-produced models and kicked them up a notch or two with details that cannot be produced with injection-molded plastic.

When Eduard first introduced the acetate-printed instrument faces that go behind their photo-etched instrument panels, this raised the bar on model cockpit reality as you could almost read the time on the aircraft clock. How could they top that?

It took a number of years, but the answer is color photo-etch. Somehow Eduard has developed a process for printing color directly on their photo-etched parts such that now you not only can read the instrument faces, you can now see the color warning arcs around airspeed indicators and color reference circles around Luftwaffe flight and engine instruments.

In this release, Eduard has produced an amazing set of photo-etched details for any of the the beautiful Hasegawa 1/32 Fw 190 kits. This is one photo-etch set that doesn't require any special photo-etch skills other than handling small parts and using small amounts of cyano adhesives.

This set consists of one fret of photo-etch parts that have color printing on their surfaces to replicate the various warning and manufacturers' placards on your average Fw 190. Designed for any of the Hasegawa 1/32 Fw 190 kits, this set provides the standard headrest warning placard, several information placards for the side consoles, a maintenance placard for each of the main wheels, various placards on the main gear struts, and even a BMW logo for the engine!

If you look at the diagram in the instructions versus the photo of the fret itself, it is clear that Eduard had a last-minute design change in their photo-etch set, but the details called out in the instructions are there.

While this set will really set off the detail in Hasegawa's Fw 190 kits, this detail set is not for the beginning modeler. You will need to be able to remove the photo-etch parts from their frets (simple once you know how) and then be able to apply these details using cyano adhesives without gluing yourself to the kit parts. It isn't difficult, or else these sets wouldn't be so popular.

You should be able to find this detail set at your local hobby retailer or one of the many online hobby shops. Trust me, this is worth looking for!

My sincere thanks to Eduard for this review sample!