Eduard 1/48 PBY-5A Wheels Set 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. Many AMS modelers will collect the relevant Eduard photo-etch sets for a given project, but they'll also go out and gather specific resin enhancements as well. Eduard has stepped up with a new product line to complement their photo-etched detail series - Brassin. Brassin is a play on words with Brass and Resin, and in many sets in this series, the resin details also include a set of color photo-etch as well.

Here is a fine example of patience paying off. Eduard tries to tackle the newest and hottest kits coming on the market with their extensive photo-etch, Brassin, and mask sets, but they also try to go back and address kits that were overlooked or released prior to Eduard reaching their current production pace. Such is the case for Revell-Monogram's outstanding 1/48 PBY-5A/OA-10A Catalina kits. After being on the market for many years (I built one in the early 1990s), this kit is still the only styrene option in 1/48 scale and is the the best Catalina in any scale (in my opinion).

Eduard has come back to this subject with some new photo-etch and this nice Brassin set. This is the resin wheel set which are literally drop-in replacements for the kit wheels. Cast in gray resin, these wheels are nicely detailed and provide the two large main wheels and the nosegear wheel. The wheels have the weighted flat spot cast into the parts and include a set of yellow tape paint masks.

Eduard continues to produce a nice range of weapons at a reasonable price which will make the job of detailing up your PBY-5A kit much easier!

My sincere thanks to Eduard for this review sample!