Azur Bloch MB-152 C.1 

Kit Review by Cliff Davis

I have always liked the looks of several of the French
WW II fighters like the Dewotine D. 520, the earlier
D. 510, the Potez 63 series twins and of course the
MB-152.  It was rather like a French version of a P-47
though not nearly as large nor as asesthetically pleasing.

Several French, Polish and Czech pilots became aces flying the MB-152 during the Battle of France.

I saw an ad for the 1/32nd Azur kit in the Squadron catalog and the following Saturday, lo and behold,
there was one on the shelf at our local Mecca - Colpar!

I got started on it on 16 October 08 and finished it on 30 November.

The Azur kit consist of 63 plastic parts broken down in the usual manner of fuselage, wings, stabilizers,
landing gear well, l/g covers, tires, etc. Thirty-one parts are resin but 16 of these are cylinders for the
Gnome-Rhone 14N-49 engine plus two spare cylinders, a fret of 24 photo etched parts, five clear parts
for canopy assemblies and navigation lights and a film sheet with  a gun sight transparency and landing
light covers.

As one finds with many short
run kits,  this one does not go
together as easily as some. 
Most major components fit fairly
well but there are some
considerable gaps to be filled on
the leading edges of both wings
but these presented little problem.
















The "biggy" was where the
resin cowling mated with the
forward fuselage  - this required
re-shaping with a Dremel tool to
make the contour of the forward
lower portion of the fuselage
match the rear of the cowling.






I also found it necessary to laminate
two layers of .010 sheet plastic to 
the lower radiator intake to get it to
match the lower joint of the fuselage. 












Additionally, a 4 mm spacer
which required sawing the cowl
ring in half had to be inserted in
the cowl ring to make it match
the cowl and then re-shape it
with putty and super glue. None
of these is traumatic but an
exercise you don't reasonably
expect to have to do.










The interior is well presented with a very nice resin seat with
photo etch braces. I decided to scratch build the instrument
panels and add after market dial faces, switches and bezels.



















































Electrical wiring and various hydraulic
lines were also added with fine wire
and solder to give a little "busier" look
to the cockpit area. The resin gunsight
is well represented.

The decals went on well but you must be sure to position them where you need them the first time as
they are very thin (but opaque) and do not move easily once in place even with liberal amounts of water
and decal solution.

During the final assembly I found that the crank case cover to the prop extended too far out of the
cowling, so it was necessary to shorten it by some 5 mm to get the spinner / prop back to the position
that looked correct.

I used Poly Scale Acrylic French light blue for the interior and underside of the model.

Wheel wells are Model Master light ghost gray, the engine, Model Master "jet exhaust" with a flat black
wash, the engine block and crank cover are Model Master gunship gray.

 Topside camo is Gunze Mr. Color
23 dark green, the bluish portions
are Poly Scale acryl French dark
blue grey and the brown is Gunze
French chocolate brown (now
discontinued), the spinner is Model
Master semi-gloss black and the
prop blades Model Master non-
buffing aluminum metalizer.

I also found that Aeromaster
U.S. blue grey is a very good
match for the Azur decals 
French insignia blue. Masking
except for the canopy was done
with "Silly Putty".


I found on the decal sheet that
the aircraft number for the tail
had one of the pair printed in
reverse, so it was necessary to
use a different a/c number for
the aircraft I had portrayed.

All in all, you'd really want to
build this kit in 32nd to go
through all the fiddling and
modifications necessary to
make it fit correctly, so I really
couldn't recommend it unless
you are willing to do all the "fixes".