The Ship Model Forum

So, this morning a weighty package arrived with MENG printed on just about every side, leaving no doubt that this was the model I had ordered last Saturday. The features list was intriguing, and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. The ship itself is described as a former Great Lakes steamer of 1920s vintage, and is meant to represent the ship from the John Woo film The Crossing. Unfortunately, this manifests itself in a lot of "woo" in the packaging and contents of the model.

Note: I haven't opened anything that wasn't already accessible (the box was not shrink-wrapped), so right now this is more of a first impressions. Later on I will post a follow-up with photos.

Opening up the shipping box, which was quite thick and sturdy cardboard but containing no packing material, I pulled out the model and I gotta say, the first thing that struck me was the over-the-top presentation of the product. The box itself is nestled into a paperboard sleeve with a very nice painting on the front, and there's a cutout in the inner box top that shows off the pre-painted hull. The top swings over like a book, to reveal a faux velvet lining for the "product manual" (meaning the assembly instructions) and cradle for the hull itself, with the "mounting" for the instructions coming off to reveal the various parts sprues.

Many of the parts are individually bagged, these being the main parts of the deck and superstructure. Not a bit of PE parts are to be found, save a pair of nameplates, as the ship's fittings are all molded in white or black plastic. There are some sprue-mounted railings, but all superstructure parts are molded with their railings fully integrated which will undoubtedly save a lot of time. There's also a bag full of railed ladders, with no assembly required save for attaching them to the actual model. All of this looks to be finely-molded and fairly well in scale, which at 1/150 is similar enough to N-scale that this vessel might also make an interesting addition to a railroad layout.

The kit comes with what I can only assume to be a USB-powered lighting system, consisting of a strip of LEDs that are mounted within the hull, with the decks and superstructures containing cutouts that will allow the light to ascend into the rest of the ship, which should provide an interesting spectacle. Clear parts are provided to fill all ships' portholes, which depending on how powerful the LEDs are, may provide a measure of scale for the lighting system. There is a hole in the bottom of the forward hull that the USB port might fit through, but it might not. I'm guessing you may need to scrounge a spare USB charger to provide illumination.

For the decks themselves, a number of "sticker sheets" are included to provide a sort of "wood" look, as well as a few black stickers for the tops of the ship's upper deckhouses. The wood stickers do have some texture to them, but I'm unsure as to the purpose of the black veneer, whether or not there's any texture to it. As for color, the wood could definitely benefit from a bit of light overspray with a very thinned coat of Wood Deck color and possibly given a faux shadow treatment. It may be possible to take colored pencils to the individual planks to add some variety, as they are nicely scaled.

The instructions (or "product manual") are in a hardbound, glossy-paged book that is a bit wider than standard paper, but only about a quarter the height (guesstimated at about 4"x10" or so). The instructions themselves are done in a 3D render style with English and Chinese instructions, and rather unfortunately, the parts descriptions, parts numbers, and instructions are rather small in all respects, and in my opinion there needed to be something that explained how to actually power the lighting system; though I may have missed something, the only instructions provided in that regard are how to mount the LED lights. A painting and marking guide is included, but rather oddly, application of the hull markings is the first step (since the hull is prepainted, this shouldn't be a huge deal I'm guessing). In keeping with the norm for Chinese kitmakers, a lot of parts are only identified by "use part XYZ on opposite side" notations. Fortunately, assembly seems to be fairly straightforward.

Overall, I'd say that this kit has some great potential to provide an interesting showpiece right from the box. If you're looking to make a representation of the ship as she appears in the film, then one might want to provide a fair bit of weathering. Though all the parts are molded in color, actual painting will no doubt still be necessary. Nevertheless, I'm fairly well-impressed with what Meng has to offer here, though if it were up to me, I'd have dumped all the woo in the packaging and used the savings to provide useful things like actual wood veneer decks rather than stickers, rigging twine, and a clearer instruction manual as well as an actual power chord.

Any questions, and I'd be happy to answer.

_________________
Sean Nash, ACG (aircraft camo gestapo)

On the ways:
1/200 Trumpeter HMS Nelson
1/700 Tamiya USS Yorktown CV-5

In the stash:
1/35 Italiari PT-109
1/35 Tamiya "Pibber" Patrol Boat
1/350 Trumpeter USS Yorktown CV-10