This set includes seven replacement pieces for the landing gear on Academy’s F-8 Crusader. There are three parts for the nose gear including the retraction brace and the main strut and two parts for each of the main gear. The parts are designed to be drop-in replacements for the kit parts.

The first step is to remove the casting seams of each of the parts. I use a small wire brush in my portable Dremel tool at low speed, to polish up the parts and remove these seams. I prefer to do the cleanup before I detach the smaller parts from the casting tree as it is much easier to handle them while they are still on the tree, plus they are much less likely to bend or go flying when they are still attached.

Likelike Decals from Japan just released a few new sheets, and this one covers the P-51 Mustang.

This is the forty sixth volume in the Weapon series. This volume deals solely with the 45 cal. M3 sub machine gun, which was commonly called “The Grease Gun” because of its resemblance to the mechanics grease gun familiar to so many young men in the army. It has also been called Americas Sten Gun because like its British counterpart it was designed to be made with stamped metal welded together. This simple design made it really cheap to manufacture with a net cost of $33.33 to the government. It is hard to believe that this weapon was used by the military for almost 50 years.

This 80 page paperback book is full of pictures and illustrations. Both B&W and color. There is a picture or image on practically every page. The full color illustrations are in the fine detail that the Osprey books are known for. The five chapters cover the development, use and impact of the M3 “Grease Gun”. There is an extensive bibliography for additional resources for research.