​THE SHORT VERSION:  Academy’s ACA14220 1/700 Titanic MCP kit will make a nice Titanic model for the experienced modeler or the adventurous casual builder.  With attention to accuracy and intricate details by Academy, it’s not for beginners.  Glue will be needed.  But it’ll look great without paint and amazing if the modeler decides to go to more effort.

We realize that some of you might not be regular model builders, or previous visitors to our site.  Those of you who are more experienced, please indulge us as we mention some very basic modeling info here in conjunction with the review for this kit, which was designed to achieve a fairly realistic result without much of the effort that is typically expected to get a nice-looking model.  We want to help those casual hobbyists make an informed choice if they decide to purchase this kit and provide some tips to improve their building experience.

At time of publishing, the model was purchased from Hobby Lobby for $39.99 before a discount with a 40%-off coupon.  This pretty much brings purchase price equivalent to the lowest offered by discount international sellers at places such as eBay.  Note the window in the box allowing the potential purchaser to see the colored parts.

We plan to give the ship and the subject Titanic the “Dem Brudders” Treatment eventually with a series of web articles and some possible "jackass-stunts" on YouTube featuring your favorite Titanic model kits.

An original version of this kit first appeared in 2007.  This first iteration was hailed as being easy to build for the casual hobbyist, yet it had plenty of fine detailing to satisfy the avid model builder.  In 2012, to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Titanic sinking, Academy re-engineered the same tooling so that even less painting would be required to render a very nice looking model right out of the box.

Here's a view of the open box.  We count no less than SEVEN colors among the plastic parts comprising this kit.  Dem Brudders get a kick out of the empty cardboard spacers that make the box appear somewhat larger than the contents.  OK, it's a "Fit-The-Box" effort.

Who can build this model?  Academy recommends this kit for ages 14 and up.  A slightly younger builder who is mechanically inclined and has experience building some models with glue could probably handle this.  Lego enthusiasts who are not thwarted by any “Technic”-level Lego sets might also be ready for this kit.  There are a number of tiny parts that will require dexterity, and quite a few parts are delicate.  A child younger than 12 will most likely need help from an adult with some mechanical ability or experience building model kits or other intricate mechanical devices.

Regarding tiny parts, there are ten capstans that are about 2mm small and 35 individual benches not much larger.  Masts, ratlines, anchors, cranes, stack piping, and quite a few other parts are delicate and can easily be broken if not removed from the sprue very carefully.  So the model will require the builder (or helper!) to come to the table with some experience handling fragile, small components.  An X-Acto knife with a #11 blade will be handy, and a sprue-nipper or small pair of side-cutter pliers (“dykes”) might be helpful to cut parts from sprues without breakage.

Waterline builders, take notice!  Minicraft's MCP treatment has made your job a lot easier.  Stay tuned after the review for some details about the history of this kit and some cool perks of the MCP/Centenary release.

Perhaps I’ve left the habitual/experienced modelers wondering if the kit will have enough fine detail to satisfy them, and the answer is a resounding yes!  The inset promenade deck bulkheads all have open windows.  Hull details appear a level of detail better than those executed on the 1/700 Revell of Germany kit.  The aftermarket has produced wood deck sets and photoetch sets to enhance this model and there is no reason why a showstopper model can’t be produced from this kit if one wants to apply intermediate or advanced modeling techniques to the build.

Three hull connector pieces were already installed in manufacturing.  How well do they work?

The bottom hull has been dry-fitted (no glue) here.  Fit of the two parts is very precise.

I had to look hard to find a small handful of sinkholes, with the tops of some lifeboats being the worst offenders.  Experienced modelers will default to their filler putty of choice to deal with this.  The casual builder might not even want to bother paying a few bucks for a tube of putty when a small dab at most might be needed.  The sinkholes I found probably wouldn’t even be noticeable by any other than a modeler who builds for contests.

Black plastic sprue includes an extra set of props.  Read on to see why.

Many fine deck details are included on the white parts sprue.

Academy Models is known for its precision and the tooling here certainly fits that reputation.  The main superstructure piece and funnels were made using state-of-the-art slide-mold techniques and implementation in this model was expertly done.  I couldn’t see any flash and parts will need only minor cleanup such as removal of sprue attachment points and a quick pass with that #11 X-Acto knife to shave down those mold-parting lines if you’re doing a contest-build.

Four deck pieces are included on this tan sprue.

Masts and benches are included on the brown sprue.  LOTS of benches.

Perhaps the sole weak point of the kit in my opinion are the vertical supports for the stand.  They are rather thin and wimpy.  Slots for wiring were added to the 2012 iteration.  If the builder chooses to use the stand, depressions on the inside of the hull bottom are cut through to accept the posts.  I’ll substitute some other post and support when I get to this part of construction on my particular kit.  This is a minor nit, of course, which does not affect the model itself, and if corners need to be cut anywhere by a manufacturer to keep the price low, or whatever, the stand is a good place to do it in my estimation!

As with many Titanic kits, three of the funnel stacks are identical.  The fourth one was decorative on the real ship--it was inoperative!

A small sprue containing props is gold-colored.  The modeler who wishes to add paint might want to clean up the mold-parting lines and spray these with a brass or bronze shade.

My second-biggest beef with the kit concerns the plastic color chosen for the funnels.  They’re neon-orange!  They look like they’ll glow if you turn the lights off.  OK, I’ll concede that they give the model some visual punch at the expense of accuracy, but even the most casual fan of the ship knows that they are entirely the wrong shade and intensity of color.

The wing-prop shaft skegs should be hull-color; they are located on the black parts sprue.  There is a raised mark on the hull where these go; it's not quite as big as the skeg.  I lined up the rear of the skeg with the back of the raised mark.

These slugs protect those window extensions during the complex slide mold extraction process.  Be careful cutting them off.

Thankfully, this is easily corrected with a coat of paint, assuming the modeler can acquire or mix a more accurate color matching the “White Star Buff” shade that the funnels carried.  Younger modelers or casual hobbyists not interested in painting the kit anyway probably won’t be bothered much by this and that’s fine—the splash of orange will certainly make the model stand out!

A single, large foldout multilingual instruction sheet provides assembly steps.  It appears to be easy-to-follow.  We'd recommend that the builder has some experience successfully building similar types of kits before attempting this model!

A short history and the final steps comprise this side of the instruction sheet.  A nice inclusion is the parts diagram.

For builders who wish to take the kit beyond the “no-paint-required” route, an extra level of realism can be achieved by painting all parts—because if you are REALLY shooting for complete realism, plastic looks like plastic!  However, the plastic that Academy uses is high-grade with premium quality coloring agents, so all parts have less “plastic-y” translucence than many other kits.  A shortcut to consider would be to spray the plastic with a clear, flat finish which will knock down the plastic-look by a measure.  You need to be sure the clear paint you use will not craze the plastic.

Side of box #1.  Note that some extra detail painting has been done on the model in the photos here.

On the other side of the box, the model shown has not been painted; the photo there shows what the model will look like if no paint is used.

Box end shows a small photo of the model and the cover box art.

A contest builder will choose hobby paints designed for covering model kit plastic.  An airbrush will be the tool of choice, although rattle cans could be used and I know at least one champion-caliber contest modeler who can do amazing things with a simple paintbrush.
 

Many molded-in deck details can be painted; the breakwaters, for example, will look better if painted white, and the mooring bollards can be painted black.  One way to ease this paint work considerably is to consider an aftermarket wood deck set.  Tedious masking won’t be needed; deck details can simply be hand-brushed or airbrushed with the wood decks covering up any overspray or excess brushed paint that wandered onto the plastic deck surface.

Many online retailers sell these wood deck sets or they can be found on eBay.  Just be sure to order the correct set that matches the scale and it should also specify that it fits Academy’s kit# 14214.  The set designed for the Revell 1/700 kit will probably not fit the Academy 1/700 kit, for example.
 
For casual modelers or “part time” hobbyists who do not build a lot of models, but would like to know the best way to build one of these, I’d recommend buying a bottle of Tamiya Extra Thin Liquid Cement, TAM 87038.  The green-capped bottle has a thin brush for easy application of glue and the jar doesn’t tip over easily.  If you’re worried about tipping, I’d recommend transferring a small amount of the glue to a smaller glass bottle (clean out an empty Testors ¼ oz paint jar, for example) and use a fine 000 brush for the glue.  Simply touching a brush that has been dipped in the glue to the joint between parts will allow the glue to flow via capillary action along the joint.  You can get a much cleaner result than with traditional tube glue.
 
Dem Brudders recommend this kit with four enthusiastic thumbs up and kudos to Academy for making a great kit even better with their MCP treatment!



Academy cleverly printed one end of the box so that the graphics can be seen with the box set on its side.  Small hobby dealers with limited shelf space may appreciate this feature.

Learn more about Academy's 1/700 Titanic MCP at Amazon.com.  We are Amazon Affiliates; through the Associates program, DemBrudders.com gets a small commission on sales after purchasers click these links.  You can help out our website at no extra cost to you!

BONUS MATERIAL:  A CLOSER LOOK AT ACADEMY'S "MCP" RELEASE OF THE 1/700 TITANIC

What is MCP?  How did Academy observe the 100th Anniversary of Titanic’s Sinking?  In 2007, they released their 1/700 Titanic kit.  The model was hailed as being easy to build with many fine details that would satisfy the pickiest modelers.  It was a nice base to add aftermarket parts such as photoetch to create an award-winning contest model.

Academy added open portholes to the hull of their Titanic kit with the MCP (Multi-Colored-Parts) release of 2012.  This photo shows the 1/700 Titanic MPC parts right out of the box--no painting was done for this photo.

In anticipation of the 100th Anniversary of the Titanic Disaster, Academy decided to make the model even easier to build, and this was the year they released their MCP (Multi-Colored Parts) edition.  How did they change the kit?  Were liberties taken that might streamline construction at the expense of scale fidelity?  These are valid questions that we’ll address here.

To commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Titanic Disaster, Academy made some modifications to their existing 2007 version of this kit.  The most significant were made to the hull.  Instead of the one-piece black hull, which could be potentially adapted as an RC model by an advanced builder, a new two-piece hull was engineered.  It’s split right at the waterline.  Yes, this innovation should delight those builders who choose to build the model on a water base.  The entire lower hull piece can simply be left off the model since the new black upper hull stops right at the waterline.  The lower hull is molded in a red-brown plastic that should look fine if left unpainted—it’s a pretty nice shade of hull-brown right out of the box.

These black funnel stack-tops are glued to the colored stack parts.  No masking required!

Another significant modification to the black upper hull is the inclusion of open portholes.  As mentioned, the 2007 one-piece hull would be suitable for an RC conversion and very watertight right up to deck level.  This new 2012 hull, however, begs for lighting thanks to the open portholes, and that is exactly what Academy has done with an alternate version of this kit, 14420, which is the same plastic plus wiring and LED’s.

Even though the stack tops are separate parts to simplify painting, the main stack parts are molded in one piece thanks to advanced slide-mold inserts.  Mold-parting lines are minimal.  Anyone but contest modelers will probably not even care about them.

The MCP version’s black plastic parts sprue was tweaked.  A new sprue with brown masts and benches was added, and the masts were deleted from their previous location on the black-plastic 2007 kit sprue.  The rudder was a separate part located there as well; it has been integrated into top and bottom hull parts split in the middle.  An electric switch retainer for the lighted version now occupies the space where the rudder formerly resided.

Four tan-colored parts comprise the deck.  The original 2007 version had the benches molded into these components.  This version deletes the benches (they are depressions here) and the new brown-plastic sprue has these.  Addition of these small, separate parts does complicate construction a little compared to the old kit, but the result adds quite a bit of realism to the model without painting.

On the original 2007 issue of the kit, the funnels were part of the white-plastic sprue.  No doubt Academy chose that location in the tooling to make them easy to paint with the light White Star-buff color.  Another notable feature is that they are molded in one piece using slide-mold technology.  The piping on them looks great!  Other than this diversion, the rest of the white-color sprue looks the same.  I like the way they depicted the promenade deck bulkheads.  They’re an example of the attention to detail that Academy put into this kit which will satisfy the most fastidious modeler in addition to the casual or non-modeler who will not be interested in doing anything more than gluing the pre-colored parts together.

Academy didn't blank out the black props from the original tooling--so you get two sets with the MCP release!  Keep 'em for your spares box!  You never know when they'll come in handy for another project.

The large promenade deck part is molded in white.  The 2007 edition had a couple molded-in benches that were blanked off in favor of the new separate benches.
 
When I was deciding which version to buy, I opted to purchase the non-lighted version and add my own lighting hardware to improve upon the quality and degree of lighting that comes with the Academy lit version.  Using the a Hobby Lobby 40%-off coupon put the price of the non-lit version comparable to discounted overseas eBay outlets and I didn’t even have to wait two weeks for delivery of a bent box.

A small amount of weathering should make these molded-in railings look great!  Advanced modelers may prefer to cut off the railing part and use photoetched rails from an aftermarket set.

In conclusion, Academy did not appear to take any actions with the MCP Edition  that would disappoint the contest modeler.  In fact, the opposite is true.  Opening the hull portholes gives novice and expert modelers alike an easier option to add lighting to a 1/700 Titanic model.  Providing a version of the kit that comes with the LED’s allows builders to create a lit model without needing the intermediate and advanced skills that such details normally require.  The new version makes it quite a bit easier to depict a waterline version of the ship than before.  If you’re an RC’er who wishes to add RC-capability to a 1/700 Titanic model, you might be more interested in the 2007 version of the kit since the hull is one-piece with no open portholes, but my guess is that most modelers will prefer to add the new MCP version of Academy’s 1/700 Titanic to their ship collections.

Learn more about Academy's 1/700 Titanic MCP at Amazon.com.  We are Amazon Affiliates; through the Associates program, DemBrudders.com gets a small commission on sales after purchasers click these links.  You can help out our website at no extra cost to you!

MORE TITANIC MODELS FROM ACADEMY

In 1/1000 scale, ACA14217 measures in at about 10.5" (27 cm).  It's easier to build than ACA14220 since it's smaller.

ACA14220 with LED's costs a little more, yet adds LED lighting to Academy's 1/700 Titanic kit. 

ACA14215 is a large model in 1/400 scale, or 26.5" (67 cm).  It will take intermediate or advanced modeling skills to complete.

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