Blackburn Kangaroo Completed -Modified Contrail 1/72 vacuum-formed kit

The Pterodactyl or -even better- the Archaeopteryx in all its glory.

 I am very grateful there is even a kit of the Kangaroo but...

Many moons ago Contrail released this now somewhat outdated vacuum-formed hefty kit. It is surely not state of the art, and has many inaccuracies, but it is nevertheless a starting point, if you are willing to spend time and effort. Many of its shortcomings, some subtle and some not, are spotted and corrected in the step-by-step building article:

http://wingsofintent.blogspot.com/2016/08/contrail-172nd-scale-blackburn-kangaroo.html

No little time was spent on this one. Uncountable hours of research and building and no little grief has been endured in correcting the various kit's faults, let alone the complicated building and subject to start with.

This rather basic kit was given a full interior and a very high number of details not present in the molds.

Needless to say the almost inexhaustible jungle of struts and rigging was the happy occasion of many a well-deserved Martini.

There are myriads of pieces of advise I could list regarding this kit. Look at the notes on the building process. The kit has some obvious but fixable mistakes.

Retrospectively there are two things you shouldn't do: do not follow the kit's pre-marked locations for any of the struts, they are misaligned and will cause frustration. Measure and drill your own strut locations, and try to be as accurate as you can.

And do not use the white metal exhausts, radiators and props (I used the radiators and props). They are way too heavy and will give the engine gondola too much weight and mass, making it prone to detachment at the least provocation and almost surely during transport or handling, since its securing frame is too fragile. The radiators are easily scratchbuilt, the props may need plastic or resin substitutes. Able modelers may cast the kit's metal props into resin ones.

The Arctic Decals set fortunately facilitated an accurate and pleasant decoration providing its usual well-researched, easy-to-handle, well printed graphics.

There were many civil Kangaroos, each one with its own quirks. Fun is to be had by those wiling to take the bold step.

The British did actually design very beautiful planes, but this one is more, er, sculptural one may say...looking for some redeeming adjective, and that's precisely why we love it so much.