Fire Your Turbos! It's Viper time!

Of course no Colonial fleet is complete without the turbo charged, built to last, Viper! Another kit from Moebius models this sucker also practically fell together out of the box. Went on a merry hunt for the new Battlestar kits at the Orlando Megacon and this was the only one that turned up. Lucky find n a bottom shelf. When I got it back to the hotel room to check it out, wow I was surprised!

When I first cracked everything open I was actually surprised at how similar it was in parts breakdown to the old Revellogram kit. But that is where the similarities end! Molding quality is top notch and detail is precise and abundant, the thing practically snaps together! Moebius has really gone the extra mile to ensure that THESE are the kits people will be hunting for and building for the next 15-20 years when working on Battlestar subjects.

While not as ingrained into my psyche as the Galactica, I have also held a great love for the classic design of the Viper. It's got the charm and lines of the X-Wing and the raw power and weight of a Saturn V. Really just a brilliantly simple design. And I've also completely loved the later redesigns in the NuBSG (Mk II and Mk VII), they took that sleek power and refined and cleaned it up while also adding in an unmistakable real world design ethic.

 The Viper was built with all the bells and whistles!  The paint job falls somewhere in between studio scale nasty (The studio models looked like they flew through a coal mine) and full size prop pristine. The ship was fully painted in Model Masters and Tamiya Acrylics.

 New dome base allows me to position her in flight poses.

HIT YOUR TURBO! Lights on! When switched on the six LED lights from a cheap flashlight brighten up the room and make this baby look like she's hunting down Raiders! 

I was especially proud of the Paint chipping techniques I used all over the red stripes. There's only one decal on this entire model and it's inside the cockpit!

After spritzing with water, salt is applied to the model which is then painted over and brushed off revealing beautiful weathered stripes. Worked like a dream!

I wasn't thrilled with the pilots face so out came the Dremel! I ground out the face and hollowed out the helmet, then used a 1/35 scale military figure to perform a head transplant. Much better!

Here you can see the display screen lit up by a single LED. It is covered by the kit included decal for the screen.

I tried to give the guns and the end of the engine nozzles a bit different color/weathering to imply the super heating from repeated laser fire/turbo boosts.

Full on view of the rear end! I left the entire back panel removable to service the batteries and lights. Slides right off!

 The starboard aft landing gear cover is removable in order to access the push button switch which controls the lights. I do have to touch up two areas of missing stripe on the underside port/starboard. 

Here goes two generations of Viper. All in all I am super happy with my collection of Vipers from Moebius, they have really outdone themselves by producing tremendous kits from stellar television series. Soon I'll spotlight the modern Vipers I've built, as well as spotlights on the lighting of Galactica, and the modern Battlestar's Galactica and Pegasus.