Friday, February 18, 2011

Received AMT Round 2's Klingon Bird of Prey 1/350 scale - Comparison Between the Old and the New

My AMT Round 2's Klingon Bird of Prey is here, and at 1/350 scale, she's on par with Polar Lights 1/350 scale USS Enterprise. Makes a nice companion or diorama, your pick. I got her mainly because there had been some upgrades done to this kit, as compared to her earlier issue under AMT Star Trek Generations' banner. Seeing the preliminary images at Round 2's blog got me interested in this one.



The box package is quite sturdy and one thing I like about this new packaging is that she now doesn't take up a lot of space in my stash room. The images on both sides do make for some nice reference.



First thing I did was to pull out my old kit from my stash to see what was different with the new one. First of all - the box size. I already like.



The old kit had all her parts kept in one sealed plastic bag, a shabby instruction sheet and decals. I took out the clear parts to give the decals some scale.



The old kit with all its' 44 parts laid out, including its display stand at the far right top corner. Old kit was molded in white and you can only pose her in two modes - Cruising mode and Attack Mode



The New kit separated its parts into four plastic bags,with most of its parts kept in two bags while the display base and metal rod in the other. The fourth bag contained the clear parts as well as the metal landing gears. The decals was also sealed in her own plastic bag. Instruction sheet looks better than her earlier release.



New kit has more parts as she now comes with three possible poses, Cruising mode, Attack mode and Landing Mode. The pieces are molded in green, making things easier for those who don't wish the hassle of painting her.



A big improvement over the old release as the kit now looks more professionally presented. Decals come with a protective wax paper to protect her.



The spruce tree for the main hull remains the same with the old kit, along with the paneling details. No changes made here



Side view of the main hull to show the similar details. Only thing different are those words printed on the new kit's main body, which will probably be hidden once the upper piece are placed there.



The lower fuselage reveals a neat hole cut off at the mid centre of the body section for the new kit. That area is to house the landing gears



No changes done for the wings



Closer look at the details on the wings between the old and new kit



Parts to position the wings in different modes reveals this kit to be a static model. This means you can't change the position of the wings once the kit is completely build. You will need to decide what position you want your Klingon Bird of Prey displayed and keep the rest of the parts as spare. The old kit  come with only two modes, Attack mode (top left) and Cruising mode (Bottom left) while the new kit shares these 2 modes like its predecessor, it also has the Landing mode.



Here are the parts for the landing gear and exit ramp. The landing mode rib section parts are also included in this spruce tree.



Display space pieces along with the metal landing gear parts



Over here, you can see the new display base (top mid section) with its parts as compared against the old issue's display base which only has 2 pieces.



There are no changes done to the clear parts. To see this Klingon Bird of Prey assembled, please refer to my earlier highlight on Jaws6266 review HERE.

In conclusion, this version is of course definitely better as she now comes with more details and better decals. The metal landing gears was a nice touch, designed to hold the weight of the kit so she won't look lopsided during display. I highly recommend this kit, and if you're a Klingon Warrior, you definitely need to get a few of these.

Qap'La!!

4 comments:

  1. You're spot on. The new kit in green definitely makes life a whole lot easier for people like me. I'm a fan of the Klingons(villains are more colourful and have more fun)and that little baby has caused some severe damage to the Feds. How about doing a little coverage of the old K'tinga class battlecruiser? Are there any pre-painted kits of Klingon dreadnoughts and battlecruisers around? Qap'la in assembling your kits and if you drop by Penang, we can go for some Rokeg blood pie or Gagh (Macoroni pie or spaghetti). Hahaha.

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  2. Hi Ben

    K'tinga highlight will come a little later. I want to try to tie the reference materials to available model kits at the moment so modelers have access to them

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  3. Hi Bruce,
    Any chance you have the instruction sheet from that AMT BOP kit laying around somewhere? I just picked up the kit at a yard sale, had everything but the instructions.Possible to scan and e-mail???

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  4. Hi Angie

    I have both the earlier and reissue kit. Which one did you need? You can email me at brucetgt@yahoo.com and I'll send it to ya.

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