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Dubena
Introduction
DUBENA kits are based on the moulds of SIKU solid plastic models in 1:250 scale.
Naturally I must have them in my collection as SIKU models had such an importance in the recollection of my early days of modelling .
I got to know DUBENA kits from a letter to the editor in Avia Mini IV magazine.
"...... a number of [SIKU] models, namely the civil airliners, were re-issued as plastic kits by the Czech firm DUBENA; they were absolutely identical to the original models, down to the letter/numeral code (but of course the Siku logo and the mention 'Made in Germany' were deleted); on a few models though (Caravelle, Lockheed L-1649A) the Siku code itself was deleted; it would appear that Dubena had to provide their own decal sheets, for instance, the TWA livery for the L-1649 instead of the original Lufthansa or Air France, or CSA instead of Aeroflot for the Tu 104. "
I did a comparison of the code section moulded into the belly of the Siku models resp. Dubena kits which proves the SIKU origin.
I aquired the first lot of Dubena kits in August 2003 from a US seller in an  auction. Later on in 2003 and 2004 duplicates were added. These are the kits I found:
Boeing 707
Convair CV-440
Convair CV-880
DeHavilland Comet IV
Douglas DC-7B
Fokker F-27
Lockheed Electra
Lockheed Constellation
Tupolev Tu-104 (see Picture 1 right)
SE-210 Caravelle
They are listed in more detail here .
Plastic Aircraft Kits of the Twentieth Century - PAK-20 (Burns 2003) lists exactly these 10 airliner kits in its entry for Dubena.
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Picture 1 Dubena Tupolev Tu-104 © cjk
SIKU has two more ailiner kits in their range . The Vickers Viscount and the Douglas DC-8 which obviously were not issued by DUBENA.
As background information we read in Plastic Aircraft Kits of the Twentieth Century that:
" Eight of these [airliner] kits were originally issued in the
mid-1960's in bags by an unknown Czech manufacturer.
Dubena acquired the molds, added two of their own ... and issued them in boxes during the mid 1970's ".
John Burns also lists four 1:72 ex-Boleslav vacuum-formed kits which were issued by Dubena in the early 1980's.
YakovlevYak-15
YakovlevYak-17
LaGG-3
Lavochkin LaGG-5
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