New B5 ships

Friday I eagerly drove to my hobby store as he was unpacking his first
shipment of B5 capital ships. I am now the proud owner of 3 Hyperions
and 4 Vorchans.  Although I'm not an expert reviewer I thought I would
share my feelings of the models with you.  First I must say that I like
them.  The Hyperion is about 3 inches long and the Vorchan is half that
but much wider and higher.  There is assembly required of course They
are qood reproductions of the ships with only one obvious mistake.  The
3 thrust nozzles on the back of the Hyperion are wrong.  The model has
the central nozzle located below the other two triangular fashion
whereas the rear shot of the Hyperion going back out the jump gate in
Voice in the Wilderness ll  clearly shows them all in-line.

Nits to pick and things to watch for.  All four of my Vorchans had
slightly pitted and malformed left side of the "nose" but it was minor
and won't be noticed.  The Hyperion needs some work to attach it to the
stands.  They have a slight indentation in the metal for the stand stem
to go but you need to drill it out.  The problem is that point is
located between the two pulse cannons on the lower section which is a
narrow piece of metal.	The end result is after drilling it out the
stand stem is held only by the metal of the ship fore and aft instead of
being encased in metal all the way around and you will have to reinforce
it.  I would rather they distorted the way they did the Vorchan instead
of leaving it like that. Also I had to do some cleaning of the holes
they have for the thruster nozzles.  Another thing to watch is that the
nozzles are slightly squished so when attaching them make sure the
narrower part is at the sides so you can squeeze them in.
 
The Vorchan  has the hole for the stand stem on the bottom of the
central fin and they have thickend the metal there to accomodate it.
The central fin gets in the way of trying to put the hole in the bottom
of the hull.  This all results in the WHOLE ship being above where the
stem attaches.	I won't know for sure how well balanced the model is
until I've finished painting and mounting it.

The stands are clear plastic bases with metal stems.  You have to file
down the bottom of the stems as they are too long to fit into the bases
properly.  This is a design flaw and not an individual problem with one
or two of them.

Anyway despite the nits I like these.  They are nice representations of
the ships and they are sturdy.	I would recommend them no matter what
rules you use and I can't wait for the Omegas and G'Quans to come out.

David Best