F-21
IAF KFIR C1/
USMC F-21A Lion

Kinetic, 1/48 scale

Reviewed by Mick Evans

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Following on from Kinetic’s first release of the Kfir C2/C7 release, this kit is a nice and practical progression.

The Kfir is a heavily modified version of the Mirage V (built by IAI as the Nesher) manufactured by Israeli Industries to incorporate a General Electric J79 engine similar to that fitted to the Israeli F-4J Phantom or Kurnas.  The rear fuselage was heavily modified and shortened to fit the wider but shorter J79. 

The first version of the Kfir had very few aerodynamic changes and in many respects looked like as shortened version of the Nesher to accommodate the J79 engine and slightly different nose to the Nesher.  But due to the increase in weight of the upgraded avionics, engine upgrade, heavy-duty undercarriage and increased weapons carriage, the first version of the Kfir performed badly.  Initially, IAI developed strakes for the nose which slightly increased the performance but the fitment of the small canards onto the intake made the first really major improvement.  The canards were increased in size of the later C2/C7 and along with a dogtooth leading edge extension the later C2/C7 aerodynamic improvement was quite dramatic. 

The C1 version retained the standard aerodynamic slot fitted to the standard Mirage and this is one of the first major changes that Kinetic had to make to their original Kfir C2/C7 kit. 

The contents of this kit are essentially similar to the C2/C7 release that I have reviewed earlier on Hyperscale and as a complete C2/C7 kit is supplied along an extra sprue for the C1/F21 version I will only cover the new parts supplied in this kit.

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Thumbnail panels:

The upper wing is the non-dog toothed extended leading edge wing. In other words this is a standard Mirage III/V wing accurate for the C1/F21 version.  New intakes are supplied without the mounting ridges for the larger C2/C7 canards.  These intakes have some small holes to mount the smaller canards.  Two etched metal reinforcing strips are supplied to go above and below the canards to represent the reinforcing strips on the full size aircraft.  A new nose and aft rocked bay area are supplied on this sprue as well.  The aft rocket bay tank that contains the chaff and flare dispenser and strike camera is a great improvement as this setup avoids the nasty joint line down the middle of the strike camera window which was difficult to clean up on the earlier C2/C7 kit.  The sprue also contains the gun trough blanks for the F21 and a new instrument panel.

The short 110G supersonic tanks from the first releases of the C2/C7 have been corrected in the later boxings of the C2/C7 and this new kit.

My only criticism is the instructions which have many errors and exclusions as follows:

• Step 1 assembly of rear cockpit bulkhead G16, G12 and D79 which is the not used.

• Step 5 wing upper surface are the correct part number K4/K3 but illustrate the dog toothed leading edge extensions of the C2/C7.

• Instructions mention the gun trough blanks for the F-21 but there is no mention of fitting the standard gun bay troughs for the C1.

• I am not sure that the Doppler panel F1 drawing is correct for a C1/F-21.

• There is no mention of the rocket bay bomb racks which are supplied in the kit and were fitted to the C1, along with the centre line bomb beam. 

• Python 3 missiles are supplied but I am not sure that these were fitted to the C1. My Isradecal book details Python 2 and AIM 9 missiles for the C1.

The transparencies look great and crystal clear; most importantly they are the correct shape.

Markings

There are two schemes provided by Kinetic for this kit with the decals printed by Cartograf and the decals designed by IsraCast Studio.

The markings supplied are as follows:

• Kfir C1 number 710 ‘The Valley' squadron, Ramat-David AF Base, 1980 in the early 3 tone scheme of FS30219 Tan, FS34227 Light Green, and FS33531 Sand upper surfaces and FS35622 Light Blue under surfaces.  The aircraft has the large yellow and Black identification triangles painted on the fin and wing upper and lower surfaces.

• Kfir C1 number 727 ‘The Valley' squadron, Ramat-David AF Base, 1983 in the early 3 tone scheme of FS30219 Tan, FS34227 Light Green, and FS33531 Sand upper surfaces and FS35622 Light Blue under surfaces.  The aircraft has the large yellow and Black identification triangles painted on the wing upper and lower surfaces.
  F-21 Kfir number 06 of VMFT of the US Marine Corps based at Yuma Air Station in 1985.  This aircraft is painted a wrap-around scheme of FS36251, FS35237 and FS37307.

Once again a superb kit of the Kfir.

There is very little that I can criticise with this kit except for some inaccuracies in the instructions.  I have just completed the C2/C7 kit which assembled superbly so I cannot wait to build this kit as well.

With the inclusion of the Mirage III/V upper wings this kit does now lends itself to the release of a Mirage IIIE/V coming from Kinetic as the tooling is no longer specific to a Kfir and only requires a fuselage, nose and lighter undercarriage to produce a complete Mirage III/V hopefully soon. 

Big kudos to Kinetic for this excellent kit.

Thanks to Lucky Model for the sample

Review Text Copyright © 2013 by Mick Evans
Images Copyright © 2013 by Brett Green
Page Created 30 April, 2013
Last updated 11 February, 2014

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