135th Construction Battalion (a VLS Creations Company) continues it's series of plumbing kits with kit #CO 0102, Plumbing Fixtures (LARGE). As with the related kits (CO 0101) this looks like another well needed kit.

Packaging

When you receive your kit you will get a small baggie with a hard stock header. It’s about 2”x3”.

There is a nice, very solid, heavy card stock piece inside the bag to give it support against breakage and for nice solid display of the parts inside.

Inside the main bag are two small ziplock bag to further keep the fittings tightly packed.

I think the fact that there are two baggies speaks to the fact that VLS reads reviews of its products and listens. I mentioned in previous reviews that the interior packaging was a bit light. In this round VLS increased the number of bags to protect the product from movement during shipping - win one for the customer. Good Job VLS

All are easily visible from the front for easy inspection without even opening it up.

What you get

The kit is labeled “2 of each type per set” and that includes

• 2 “Y” connectors at a 45 degree angle.


• 2 “T” connectors at a 90 degree angle


• 2 open end caps (short)


• 2 bent corner sections at a 90 degree angle


• 2 shallow bend long length connectors


• 2 short straight connectors


• 2 shallow bend short length connectors

There are 14 pieces all together.

All are cast in resin. All of them come with the typical resin block. The Y and T pieces come on their own block, the other end pieces (or pieces without joint) are combined with other similar pieces on one large block. There was a small amount of flash on a couple of pieces. This is easily removed and can be scratched off simply with your fingernail.
There was a bit of extra molded on resin on the majority of the pieces. This amounted to a small 'clump' where the mold 1/2s came together.

Impressions

Again, you don’t see plumbing very often in dioramas. This is your chance to add some indoor plumbing to a diorama and really take it up a level on detail. There are a lot of pieces in this kit. It appears to be a nice mix of bends, corner bends, and end caps to do almost any normal plumbing job. 135th Construction Battalion has done a bit of planning that will make your job easier. They have integrated the pieces nicely with related kits. You can use these with thier outside Gutter and Downspout kits as well as thier plumbing and fixture kits.

I mentioned the extra resin on some of the pieces. No big deal, you can either sand it off or leave it as if some kind of weld was overdone or there is some kind of hard water build up on the joint.

The LARGE designation represents the overall diameter of the pipes. The 135th Construction Battalion has two other kits, one SMALL and one MEDIUM. These kits all work in conjunction with each other.
They have been designed with that in mind. This makes for a nicely integrated product line.

I have loose fitted some of these parts and as stated, they do in fact work in conjunction with each other.

I continue to try to find competition for this type of kit and it remains a difficult task. Customized niche parts is 135th Contstruction Battalion's market and they have it nailed down.

This kit will become a standard kit for diorama builders. In order to truely complete a building from WWII to the present you can't get away without some type of plumbing. Either interior plumbing or exterior drain pipes, there will be some use. You can also get creative with these and use them to transport things other than water. You can use these in a factory scene where there are pipe Everywhere. If you have any type of steam in something like a locomotive or river boat. You can also look at sewer scenes with a new eye. Inside those large 6' pipes you can run a series of smaller transport pipes inside.
The options are limited only by your imagination.
With this, and a bit of scratch building you can lay down a lot of pipe. This is one of those kits that pushes your good diorama up to the next level. You won’t be disappointed. This one gives you that extra detail you were looking for and lets you integrate your scratch skills with some after market products.


I'd like to thank VLS Corporation for supplying this product for review.