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Review Author
Mike Van Schoonhoven
Published on
Company
Model Art
MSRP
$23.63

Model Art Magazine is a monthly magazine that covers aircraft, armor, ships and car modeling. Model Art started releasing magazines in 1966 and has evolved from there over the past forty-six years.

This is a special issue released by Model Art covering plastic model aircraft of the IJA in scales 1/72, 1/48 and 1/32. The book is broken down into six sections. Fighters, Bombers and Assault Aircraft, Reconnaissance, Experimental and Planned, Trainers/Others and Foreign Made and Licensed product aircraft.

Each section includes photos of finished models, period photos, available kits, year released and a rating system for a lot of them. The ratings are from one to five stars and you find most of the older kits tend to have a lower rating, but this not always the case as some of the recent releases have some lower ratings.

The very last part of the article consists of ground support vehicles and personnel.

Review Author
Roger Rasor
Published on
Company
LPS Hobby
Scale
1/72
MSRP
$15.00

LPS Hobby is a Brazilian that recently added three more Republic P-47D decal sets to their 1:72 scale line. This set, # LPM72-16, provides markings for three P-47D Razorback Thunderbolts that sported Malcolm hoods late in WWII. The set includes two small decal sheets that provide all of the unique markings for the three aircraft and enough national insignias and stencil data to do two of the three (National markings from kit decals will be needed to do the third one).

As the photos below illustrate, the decals are nicely printed in vivid, opaque colors by Microscale and everything is well registered. They are printed on thin film like other Microscale decals, and should respond well to mild setting solutions such as Mr. Mark Softer. It is recommend that the decals be applied by ‘floating’ them in place with enough water to keep them from bonding to the surface before they are properly positioned…then gently blotted when they are in place.

The three aircraft are:

Review Author
Andrew Birkbeck
Published on
Company
Tamiya
Scale
1/35
MSRP
$87.00

With the invasion of Russia in 1941 by German forces, and their encounter with hitherto unknown powerful tanks such as the T-34/76 and KV-1, the German forces clearly required a mobile anti tank weapon to help counter these Soviet tanks. In February 1942 the arms firm of Alkett came up with a tank destroyer design (Panzerjager) that utilized components of the Panzer III and Panzer IV tank, and mounting an 8.8cm long barreled anti tank gun, the Pak 43/1. This was basically the same gun that was later to be mounted in the Tiger II tank.

Review Author
Bill Kluge
Published on
Company
Gallery Models
Scale
1/350
MSRP
$329.98

The Ship

Launched in April 1943 and commissioned four months later, USS Intrepid (CV-11) participated in numerous actions in the central and western Pacific from early 1944 until the end of the Pacific War, including Leyte Gulf and Okinawa. She was hit twice by kamikazes but was still on station at the end of hostilities. Intrepid underwent modernization twice during the 1950s, which enclosed her bow and gave her an angled flight deck. Reclassified as an Anti-submarine Carrier (CVS-11), Intrepid was the lead ship for the NASA’s Mercury Aurora 7 and the Gemini 3 splashdown recovery. From April 1966 to February 1969, she made three deployments to the waters off Vietnam. She ended her active career back in the Atlantic and Mediterranean, being decommissioned in 1974 with over 30 years of service. In August 1982, Intrepid was reopened as a museum ship in New York harbor.

Review Author
Mike Van Schoonhoven
Published on
Company
Master Model
Scale
1/32
MSRP
$8.00

These gun barrels and pitot tube from Master Model are made for the 1/32 Bf109F, G1 - G4. The model that I used them on was the Monogram "Pro Modeler" Bf109G-4, which is a Hasegawa rebox. They fit perfectly and are a superior enhancement versa the kit parts.

The set comes with two barrels and one pitot tube made from brass. The barrels are both the same size, but be sure to check your instructions when installing as my kit shows them off set.

I highly recommend this set, especially if you are looking to give your kit that little extra zing. I would like to thank Master Model and IPMS/USA for the opportunity to review this kit.