I've been a fan of the ARC-170 ever since episodes 1-3 came out, sure the movies were not quite as good as the originals, but some of the new ships were awesome. Similarily I like the Republic Venator Star Cruisers.

Both of these models were made by Lego some time back, but as usual have been discontinued also for some time now.

Having missed the original releases I was left with the choice of buying either second hand or outrageously priced new ones off eBay. Until I came across a chinese knock-off on the AliExpress site when looking for Lego lighting (ask super lol). Anyway having found the ARC-170 being offered at the bargainous price of $16.99 with free shipping it was simply a no brainer to get one and see what the quality was like.

Well I'm glad to report it is superb, in fact you'd be hard pushed to tell the difference between this and the lego model unless you look closely and notice the studs don't have 'lego' imprinted on them.

While I usually prefer to buy the genuine Lego sets, when it is a discontnued model which I can't get hold of anyway apart from on eBay I don't have such a bad feeling about it, especially when I save so much cash.

Anyway here are some sample pictures;

If you are wondering about the size of the model when constructed it has a wing span of about 12" or more, to give you a clue the dark grey thing it is lying on is a laptop 🙂