Thank you to Andrea Lindell of Specialty Press for providing a review copy of their new release, Vought F-8 Crusader, Development of the Navy’s First Supersonic Jet Fighter, by William D. Spidle. Specialty Press has sweetened the debut of this new book by providing an author-signed limited-edition of the book directly on their website or by calling 1-800-895-4385. As always, I appreciate all those in the IPMS Reviewer Corps, whose work is critical to sharing new and exciting modeling products with the world.

The Beechcraft 17 Staggerwing and later D17 was a versatile family of aircraft that ended up serving in for more roles than originally envisioned by Beech. Renowned for its attractive lines and good performance, it was designed to be an executive aircraft. But it soon found a role as a racer, liaison, and a utility aircraft in both military and civilian livery. In the US Army Air Force it was the UC-43, in the US Navy the GB-1 and 2. In addition, it flew with 15 other air f orces.

Roden answered the call of many modelers to release a nice kit of the Staggerwing, finally supplanting the old AMT kit which is still available through Round 2. The AMT kit was a specific post war variant however, and required modification to backdate it. The Roden kit represents the most common D17S variant and while Roden provides different liveries/markings in its multiple releases, there were many more schemes not covered; plus Roden decals can be a challenge.

Extreme gratitude from IPMS USA and this reviewer to Hobbico for providing us this kit… it’s been a while off the radar and we’re pleased it’s back!

This kit was originally released around 1997 or so, if I remember correctly. At the time it was (and still is) the best of the 1/48 kits of this famous British fighter, and was considered to be the “UK Sabre” of its day with maneuverability, speed, and overall “it looks right” appearance.

This kit continues Italeri’s current trend of releasing warfighting aircraft with specialized color schemes. In the box you get the Hunter F.6 and FGA.9, with two different lower nose cannon covers, and the different size/shape exhaust area required for each version based on the engine installation. The F-6 was designed as an air-to- air fighter, whereas the FGA.9 incorporated ground attack capabilities with rockets and bomb delivery capability.