Messerschmitt Bf 109E-4 'ProfiPACK'

In the box you will find one clear and four sprues of dark grey-coloured plastic, along with a fret of pre-painted photo-etched and die-cut, self-adhesive masks. Construction remains unchanged, so you have the option of the complete cowl and cowl guns with the cowls off, or the cowl can be attached, but that does mean missing off a number of parts and grinding down the front edge of the engine. From personal experience the latter option is a bit tedious and bulkheads for the exhausts stacks and a mounting pin for the propeller would have been a lot better, as you end up doing almost as much work for the engine to be covered as it takes to have it exposed. The kit comes with the option of having the canopy open or closed and you have the periscopic sight used by Galland to go with the decals offered in this edition. Overall though the detail is most impressive, making this E-series kit still the choice for the type in 1/48th.
 
The kit offers five decal options: 
• W/Nr.5587, 'Yellow 10', flown by Ofw. F. Beeck, 6./JG51, Wissant, France, 24th August 1940
• W/Nr.5344, 'Black <-', flown by Maj. H. Wick, CO of JG 2, Beaumont, France, November 1940
• 'Yellow 13', flown by Lt J. Eberle, 9./JG54, The Natherlands, August 1940
• W/Nr.1480, 'Black <', flown by Oblt F. von Werra, Gruppenadjutant II./JG3, Wierre-au-Bois, France, 5th September 1940
• W/Nr.5819, 'Black <-', flown by Obstlt A. Galland, CO of JG 26, Audembert, France, December 1940
The decal sheet is printed by Eduard and has excellent colour and register. As usual the swastikas are split in two on the main sheet but complete in the bottom right-hand corner, as these latter items will be removed by the importer into those countries that ban the Nazi symbol. There is also a separate sheet offering a full set of airframe stencils, with wing walkways in either red or black.

Conclusion
This is an excellent kit and apart from the overly complex exposed engine option the overall product is excellent and it is therefore highly recommended to all Luftwaffe modellers.

Our thanks to Eduard (www.eduard.com) for the review sample, UK modellers can obtain this kit from Hannants here.