Avis EADS Barracuda drone

Drones have some advantages as models. They don’t require canopy masking, for one. A great comfort to the Lazy Modeller ™. And there are a growing number of them available as 1:72 models. I’ve already completed an RQ-1, RQ-4, RQ-9, D-21, and have the Attack Hobby RQ-7 in the stash.

But today’s completion concerns the Avis EADS Barracuda. The program is a joint development between Germany and Spain and, at least according to Wikipedia, it is meant to be an equivalent of the RQ-9 Reaper. EADS wants to make some inroads to American domination of this market sector.

The kit, which was only released a couple of months ago, definitely falls into the short run category, but it is not crude by any means. Test fitting will be rewarded, but you should still expect to use up some putty in the process. The landing gear is probably the only thing one might find to be complicated. The rear fuselage / exhaust bits didn’t fit very well on my example. Decals all came from the kit, and include the various manufacturer logos.

I used Xtracolour X126 for the overall grey, based on the fact that they are apparently painted the same color as the Luftwaffe’s Eurofighters. There was an issue of paint adhesion on parts of the underside – maybe some stubborn mold release agent? A quick buff and respray fixed that.

As long as manufacturers continue to make kits of drones, I’ll be there to buy and build them. It’s an interesting little byway of aviation history. According to photos, the nose pitot does in fact droop that way. 

This is completed aircraft #475 (8 aircraft, 2 ordnance, 7 vehicles for the year 2017), finished in May of 2017.