Thank you very much to the wonderful folks at Osprey Publishing for providing this new publication for review. Thanks are also due to the IPMS Reviewer Corps for allowing me the opportunity to explore a wonderful documentation and fascinating historical description of the earliest super carriers.

On opening the book you will find 48 glossy pages filled with text, 30 color photos, 11 black-and-white photos, 2 black-and-white drawings, and 7 color painting and diagrams. The softcover binding is 9.75 x 7.25 inches and a little less than a quarter-inch thick, with a color photo of the U.S.S America off the starboard bow. In 8 chapters, Mr. Elward provides a brief historical introduction explaining the roots of these early super carriers, and focuses on the Forrestal, Kitty Hawk and Enterprise classes. I appreciate the thorough bibliography and index.

This is part two “The Build”, of my review; the kit review can be seen in an earlier posting.

I followed the instruction sheet using Fishers guide for colors and building sequence. The first thing I did was take inventory of all parts. I found I was missing a couple of struts. I emailed Paul Fisher of Fisher Models and within a few days had the replacement parts in hand. Excellent customer service. As suggested, I thoroughly washed all parts using Dawn soap and warm water and let them dry overnight. It took about an hour to “clean up” the parts; this involved some molding lines and a little flash to be removed. One thing about Fisher kits, his molding is excellent and you should have very little clean up to do.

Academy's first release in a new series of 1/48 scale Phantoms is an F-4B in VF-111 "Sundowners" markings. There are 15 spectacular sprue with one being clear. The rest are colored to the specific areas of the plane. the bottom parts are white, the top gray and metallic parts black. Panels lines are fine and there are some real innovations. For example, the engine exhausts are molded as a complete tube so there are no seams to fill and they look great. There is also a complete set of weapons with the needed bombs and missiles and a full set of drop tanks.