1:35 Německý radio set s Enigmou

A cipher machine beside a radio set

In the Second World War a rotor cipher machine turned up everywhere orders were passed on: in command cars, in trench posts and on armored personnel carriers with a frame antenna. Together with a radio set it made up a post at which two soldiers took turns, one at the key and the other at the keyboard.

Seventeen castings and a photo-etched fret

The cases of the sets, the boxes and the stands come in resin, because a casting holds square edges and the fine delineation of the controls. The photo-etched part takes over what on the real thing has the thickness of sheet metal or paper: the keys, the plates, the frames and the fastening straps. Without the metal part a set like this would inevitably look coarse.

Fitting it into a model

• True the mating surface of the casting on wet-and-dry paper laid on a tabletop
• Fill and sand any bubbles at the edges before the part is glued into the interior
• Glue the photo-etched keyboard on only after the case is varnished, otherwise it sinks under a layer of paint
• Bring the black bodies to life by lightening the edges in dark gray; pure black swallows the detail
• Draw the lettering and the dials with a fine point; the set contains no decals

The different hardness of the two materials

A casting sands quickly and is apt to break off, while brass is springy and a file slides over it. When cleaning up, therefore, alternate your tools: fine abrasive backed by a hard plate on the resin, and short strokes with a needle file from the edge inwards on the metal.

The post can also be built away from a vehicle, on a table in a building or on a crate under a camouflage sheet. Neither a vehicle nor figures are included in the package; the set is intended for completing a model.