Here's another one for our new sci-fi section!

This is the Monogram kit of the Draconian Marauder from the feature film and subsequent TV series "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century". This kit was released (I think) around the time of the movie which would make it 33 years old (1979)!!
I bought two of these great little kits back then, one I built straight from the box but painted it in a personal scheme of white with pale grey camouflage, this is the second kit which was painted as per the film version.
As you can see, even back then I couldn't build a kit without having to super-detail the thing!
On this version I cut the basic kit about, removing some body panels and scratch building internal details and also constructing a full cockpit layout. (The curved thingy inside the wing section was once a half of the Airfix HMS Hood's funnel!)The other upgrade was to add the extra fins at the rear of the laser guns on the wingtips which were left off on the basic kit for some reason.
The scale of the kit was 1/35, as was the other kit of the Earth Defence Starfighter from the same film. I always thought about building a pilot for it from one of the 1/35 Tamiya Samurai kits out at that time (the Draconians looked very Samurai in their armour).
The final pictures show the Marauder's little brother which was scratch built completely from multi layers of plasticard all glued one on top of the other, the cockpit was a small scrap of wood carved to shape. Little Brother was painted up in the same white/grey scheme as the first kit.

This kit was very detailed for it's time, Monogram kits were pretty good as I remember, it must have been about £5-6 when first released and I looked on ebay a day or so ago to see if they were still about, they are .....between £50 to £75, and from America!

Hope you enjoy and lets have some more galleries from all the sci-fi lovers out there!