Review

Airfix has released a Jet Engine kit, part of their line of “Engineering Models”. This is an interesting kit, as it intends to explain the basics of how a jet engine operates and it introduces the modeler to some very basic electrical skills.

The kit is molded in red, white, blue, clear and silver plastic. It requires no paint and it actually is put together using (dare I say?) screws rather than plastic glue! It even provides you with a screwdriver.

There are about 50 parts which are well molded and the parts themselves require little clean up before assembly. The instructions guide you through the electrical connections of a handle, starter button and mini-electric motor/blower which actually spins the engine.

The J2M Raiden (Allied code name Jack) was designed by Jiro Horikoshi (of A6M Zero fame) and built by Mitsubishi for the Imperial Japanese Navy as a land-based point interceptor. It was designed to counter high altitude bombers. It relied more upon speed, climb-rate, and armament over maneuverability to perform this task. Initial production aircraft suffered from numerous problems with its Mitsubishi Kasei 13 engine, which in turn delayed production until solutions were found. The Kasei 13 was eventually replaced with the Kasei 23a engine on J2M2 and J2M3 production aircraft. The J2M5 Type 33 aircraft, represented by the model under review here, featured an enlarged cockpit and canopy and a Kasei 26 supercharged engine, giving this variant more speed at high altitudes with a consequent lowering of effective range.

Richard Marmo is publishing a series of ebooks under the name of “The Marmo Modelbulding Guide Series”. This is the 3^rd installment of the series. These ebooks are available in epub, .mobi and/or .pdf format, based on your preferences.

I have read this guide regarding to model math and scale jumping and honestly, I think there is good information on it, but the way it is presented makes it a bit difficult to follow.

The book mainly deals on how to convert scale drawings from one given scale to a different one. This book includes the “Marmo’s Three Laws”. While the name of them is grandiose, they are accurate from a mathematical point of view and helpful to avoid common mistakes.