History

USS Lake Erie (CG-70) is a Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser of the United States Navy, named after the U.S. Navy's decisive victory in the Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812. She is the first U.S. Navy ship to be commissioned in Hawaii. The USS Lake Erie is a baseline 4 Ticonderoga class ship, with integrated AN/UYK-43/44 computers (in place of UYK-7 and UYK-20) and superset computer programs originally developed for the Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers. The Lake Erie also has an improved UYS-20 data display system and various decision aids, as well as the SQS-53C sonar and the SQR-19 sonar data processor.

Round Two revival of the Lindberg Line of table top ships offers an opportunity along a couple of different fronts. The first of these, and this is mentioned on the box, is the in-expensive way for table-top gamers to get their hands on a couple of ships that they might not be able to get their hands on. The kits are easy to build with minimal parts and while many-a-modeler will probably turn their nose up at such a prospect (as many do with Lindberg) these are perfect for handling and moving around a large map without too much worry of breakage.

The PJ Production company from Belgium makes some very nice resin aircraft kits as well as resin aftermarket accessories for aircraft and lots of pilot and ground crew figures. This set provides a very comprehensive set of weapons for the Mirage III/5 aircraft. The set includes; Matra R-550 Magic 2 and AIM-9B Sidewinder AAMs as well as JL-100, LAU-32 and LRF-4 rocket pods. Also included are a Barrax, a Barracuda 2 and a Phimat pod. I believe that the first two are ECM pods and the latter is a chaff dispenser. Finally, a pylon is provided for the centerline of the fuselage. This can carry either two STRIM Bombs or two Alkan P-65 Adaptors for bombing practice. In each case, the proper French pylon is included. This weapons set can be used to outfit several Mirage models and other French aircraft. These parts are nicely molded in resin and require very little clean-up.