History 

The SF-260 is a light acrobatics/trainer aircraft developed by SIAI-Marchetti of Italy; it made its maiden flight in 1964. Widely adopted by both the military and civilians, it is still being manufactured today. Originally equipped with a reciprocating engine, the turboprop version, the 260TP, made its first flight in 1980. The military version is equipped with either two or four hard points, and is used as a light attack aircraft. 

In the box 

The kit comes packed in an end opening box, with a photo of one of the kits marking options on the front cover.

The rear of the box shows the four marking options available in this boxing.

Inside the box are two grey sprues packed into one bag, a clear sprue, thankfully in its own bag, a set of instructions and a surprisingly small decal sheet, considering there are four marking options on it.

Ejection pin marks look to be in places that won't cause an issue, and flash is not a major issue, but a lot of the parts will need some form of clean up, as per normal for a short run kit. A scrape with a scalpel should be enough to remove this.

Exterior detail is quite nice with engraved panel lines, which in the pics look massive but are in fact quite subtle.

All the control surfaces are moulded into the wings and tail in the neutral position. 

The wings are one piece.

There are quite a few ariels missing from the kit, which are found on the real aircraft, so adding these with some plasticard will be needed.

The interior is not too bad, with the seat bases moulded onto the cockpit floor, and some non descript boxes where the rear passenger seats normally go.

The instrument panel is blank but decals are supplied for the dials and switches. Two decals for the instrument panel is supplied but they don't actually tell you which one to use for which marking option.

I know for a fact that the Philippine's version has a HUD on the cockpit coaming cover, but that is absent from the kit.

The seats have decals for the belts.

Some detail for the sidewalls is supplied.

Rudder pedals, control sticks and the backs of the two seats complete the interior and once built up and painted should look quite adequate.

Too make the most of the tooling Kovozávody Prostějov have opted for a separate front end, so the various types can be produced, but this does make more seam lines to contend with.

The engine cowling is made up of four parts, then a three bladed propeller and spinner.

A set of exhausts for the underside which are partially hollowed out complete the front of the aircraft.

Weight will need to be added into the nose as the plane will be a tail sitter.

The undercarriage bays have a T shaped spar moulded into them, but other then that detail is pretty devoid.

The main wheels are nicely detailed, and the legs have a bit of detail, but do look quite sturdy. The gear doors have a little detail moulded onto the inside of them.

The nose wheel and leg are one piece.

External armament in the form of rocket pods, and another pod/tank that I can't actually figure out what it is. The inner pylons are faired into the wing leading edge, and KP have got round this with the inclusion of a separate part. Of course adding any external stores is optional.

All the schemes have the wing tip fuel tanks.

The clear canopy is one piece and is opaque, but my canopy does seem to have a flow line through the top. 

Rather prominent frames are moulded onto the canopy, but this should help with masking.

Decals, markings and instructions 

The kit's decals are quite nice, in register and look to be good in colour. There is a little access carrier film around some of the decals that might need removing.

Quite a few stencils are supplied for the airframes, and the black wing walks are also supplied.

The white wing markings for the Philippine aircraft are also supplied as decals, along with the shark mouth.

The instructions are printed on a folded A4 size paper, and consists of 2 pages for the build, with the front cover having the history of the aircraft and the stencil guide on the back page.

The build takes place over 7 steps and are CAD designed drawings.

Colour schemes and decals for Zimbabwe, Philippine, Sri Lankan and Haitian air forces are provided, with a nice mix of colour schemes.

Conclusion

The kit is a short run, and this shows in the quality of the kit, with the plastic having a grainy appearance and some of the detail of the parts a bit questionable.

Comparing it to the Special Hobby kit, the Kovozávody Prostějov is a bit more basic, and doesn't have the finesse, but the one good point is that SH don't produce the TP version of this aircraft, and KP have produced several boxings with loads of marking options.

Mfg. ID - KPM0214

Suggested Retail - 10.70 €

Related Link - https://www.kovozavody.cz/produkt/siai-sf-260tp-light-attacker/

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