But this is what sticks in my mind while building the Maquette ACY-57 aka ASU-57 1/35 kit.
It’s like the movie “Plan 9…” in the sense that it’s so bad that it’s actually a lot of fun to watch (or in this case, build). I
was shocked when opening the box to look at the contents:
One side of one page with instructions, consisting of a composite drawing with a couple of cut-away views.
The parts are numbered on the instruction sheet, but there are no numbers found anywhere on any of the sprues or the parts themselves.
The main gun barrel (I use the term loosely) is warped beyond recognition. The muzzle break is only half molded. There’s also a spot on the barrel where there wasn’t enough plastic to fill the mold entirely, leaving a unsightly cavity. I had to cut the gun into three pieces to work on it.
Major surgery was required to fit the upper and lower hull pieces. I even spilt a little of my blood on it in the process.
Talk about flash…this kit is no flash in the pan. It’s got more flash than the last three kits I built combined.
On the positive side, the kit was very inexpensive.
As I was telling my son, this kit is so bad that it became a personal challenge to try to craft a good build out of it. And in the process so far…it’s a lot of fun. It’s a very small vehicle and if I keep at it, I should be able to complete the build, start to finish in 1 week.
He he he he! That’s quite entertaining Larry. And I like your way of seeing things. I like challenges and you seem to have found the ultimate one. How can a company trow something like this on the market?
This is an AER/Moldova kit also boxed by TOM and Toga. I got one in a trade about 6-7 years ago, tracked down the Model Point barrel (a beauty) and the Aber PE (another high quality set). Couldn’t bring myself to add such high quality parts to such a crappy kit. Glad I didn’t spring for the Model Point support roller set.
I built the Tom’s kit of this about 8 or 9 years ago. That was pretty rough, too. I remember replacing the barrel with aluminum tubing since it was so warped. As I remember from reading about it, they were delivered to the front slung under the wings of large Russian bombers.
Hey - Thanks for sharing your memories of this great kit with me.
Seeing how few parts this has, I thought for sure I could build it in a week. Well, it’s taken me a bit longer than I had planned. I’ve finished everything except for the indie tracks that come with the kit. These indies are so small and light they fly away just by looking at them. I got a little frustrated, so I thought I’d cool off for a while and build a good kit. So I’m working on the Trumpeter KV-2. I guess I’m on a Soviet kick lately. Finished the SU-152 and have these two in the works.
I’ll try to post some pics of the ACY-57 in its current state tomorrow. It actually doesn’t look too bad…as long as you don’t look too closely.
