Old Dog
Well-known member
Well, the long anticipated (by me anyway) Xuntong Il-4 landed on my doorstep today so here is a quick look in the box.
It comes in a box suitable to the size of the kit with a corrugated top and bottom. The kit is presented on five sprues in light gray and one in clear, each in its own cellophane bag. According to the box the kit contains 409 parts but a number of those won't be used. The molding is crisp with only traces of flash here and there. The surface has a slight texture to it but not so much as to be an issue. The surface detail consists of recessed panel lines and some rivet and fastener detail. The panel lines are OK for the scale by my criteria and the fabric surfaces though a bit overdone are better than most. The main control surfaces are molded separate. There is a good supply of external ordinance supplied. There is no PE or resin parts supplied. OK lets look at plastic.
A close up shot to illustrate surface detail
The kit has two nicely detailed engines and two sets of cowlings depending on version want or you can chose an optional cooling fan and hide the engines completely.
A nice set of ordinance is included
The clear parts aren't bad, thin enough with good frame detail but they are lacking a bit in optical clarity, hopefully future will help.
The decal sheet is huge, about 8 1/2" x 11" and contains marking for no less than 11 different aircraft in a variety of color schemes from one color top sides to three color top sides and both blue and black undersides.
The instructions are contained in a 38 page booklet which is quite comprehensive and includes useful cut a ways to help illustrate how some of the parts go together. I also contain a comprehensive paint chart and painting and marking diagrams. The photo below is an excerpt which also shows some of the level of interior detail.
All in all it looks like a nice kit of a mostly unpublicized aircraft that was built in fairly high numbers (over 5,200) and were used extensively during the Great Patriotic War. Xutong took a beating on their Tu-2 series due to shape errors and if there are any on this one I'm sure we'll hear about it but I do not have any good references to compare so I'll abstain on making any judgements on that issue.
If you would like to see a more comprehensive review of this kit in the future please shout out.
Thanks for looking !
It comes in a box suitable to the size of the kit with a corrugated top and bottom. The kit is presented on five sprues in light gray and one in clear, each in its own cellophane bag. According to the box the kit contains 409 parts but a number of those won't be used. The molding is crisp with only traces of flash here and there. The surface has a slight texture to it but not so much as to be an issue. The surface detail consists of recessed panel lines and some rivet and fastener detail. The panel lines are OK for the scale by my criteria and the fabric surfaces though a bit overdone are better than most. The main control surfaces are molded separate. There is a good supply of external ordinance supplied. There is no PE or resin parts supplied. OK lets look at plastic.
A close up shot to illustrate surface detail
The kit has two nicely detailed engines and two sets of cowlings depending on version want or you can chose an optional cooling fan and hide the engines completely.
A nice set of ordinance is included
The clear parts aren't bad, thin enough with good frame detail but they are lacking a bit in optical clarity, hopefully future will help.
The decal sheet is huge, about 8 1/2" x 11" and contains marking for no less than 11 different aircraft in a variety of color schemes from one color top sides to three color top sides and both blue and black undersides.
The instructions are contained in a 38 page booklet which is quite comprehensive and includes useful cut a ways to help illustrate how some of the parts go together. I also contain a comprehensive paint chart and painting and marking diagrams. The photo below is an excerpt which also shows some of the level of interior detail.
All in all it looks like a nice kit of a mostly unpublicized aircraft that was built in fairly high numbers (over 5,200) and were used extensively during the Great Patriotic War. Xutong took a beating on their Tu-2 series due to shape errors and if there are any on this one I'm sure we'll hear about it but I do not have any good references to compare so I'll abstain on making any judgements on that issue.
If you would like to see a more comprehensive review of this kit in the future please shout out.
Thanks for looking !
I saw that Spruebrothers has 2 of these in stock right now. Just hope they still have one tomorrow when payday rolls around 
