Hi all,

Just wanted to put a few words together regarding this new kit from Italeri. It is a beautiful kit which is mainly made up of the parts from the S-100 Schnellboote.

Some will say the hull halves are identical.. they're not. Italeri have added some slots into the "fences" on the upper sections, this is because there is material to be cut away to make the S-38. The parts are still marked 5603, which is the S-100 kit number.
The main deck has more holes to be drilled and these are marked out in the usual way of blind holes being moulded in.
Some of the sprues are common across both kits and are marked 5603, but the moulds have been altered to make different parts in localised areas?? Does this mean an end to the S-100 kit?

There is a whole new sprue for the Bofors Gun which is numbered 5613 and 5617? Interestingly, this sprue is actually for the Italeri PT 109 conversion kit, 5617.. so you also get a spare 20mm Oerlikon and the mounting parts to mount the Bofors to your PT boat.

One of the sprues, G, is actually a much lighter grey in colour and has the Bow gun tub removed from the sprue, I can only assume this is to stop the other parts getting damaged in transit.. which leads me on to the negatives of the kit.

Once again, as with the S100, the packaging is awful!! If you have the S100 kit you'll remember the small box just "thrown in" with the sprues, well at least you get a lid on this one and the instructions, painting guide, screws and PE are in the box, although my PE still managed to get bent!! The rest of the parts, including the hull halves are free to float around in the box and crash into one another. Both my hull halves are damaged and split open at the torpedo tubes and the inside of the box is damaged as the hull halves have been bashing around in there. Unbelievably there is no damage to the sprues, other than a couple of parts being broken off.

Come on Italeri, you package your other boats beautifully, why is this and the S100 so bad?

Would I recommend this kit? YES!! I'd like to see an S-2 to S-18 next please..