A recent addition to the IPMS Review Corps suppliers is Mikro-Mir, whose kits remind me of what I am used to seeing with limited production manufacturers. This is not a negative comment, but more of a heads up that some building experience is required to end up with a nice finished model at the end of construction. The overall assembly of this kit was relatively easy with 23 plastic parts and 11 photoetched parts included. Modelers with some experience will enjoy this kit, which represents a one-off design that was the fastest submarine produced to date.
The Ben Franklin class was composed of twelve submarines, SSBN-640 to SSBN-645 and SSBN-654-659. The class was an evolutionary development from the earlier Lafayette-class of fleet ballistic missile submarines. This class can easily be identified by the fairwater planes' location halfway up the sail; the Lafayettes and James Madisons had the fairwater planes in the upper front portion of the sail. In 1993, Kamehameha was converted to a Dry Deck Shelter/swimmer delivery platform, reclassified as an attack submarine, and given hull number SSN-642; her ballistic missile capability was removed and thereafter she carried only torpedoes as armament. Following conversion, she was transferred to Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, for the remainder of her operational career. She holds the record for the longest service life of any nuclear submarine—nearly 37 years.
Thank you Osprey Publishing for providing a review copy of their new ship’s annual! I first thought that Osprey was publishing a new series, but in fact, Osprey is continuing the Conway imprint of naval and military books, which is excellent news. As always, I truly appreciate all those in the IPMS Reviewer Corps, whose work is critical to sharing new and exciting modeling and historical products with the world.
Overview
Warship 2018 is part of an annual series and follows historical event anniversaries, new analysis of naval engagements, intriguing operations, and more general ship topics. Each of the 11 chapters is a stand-alone study, accompanied by abundant images, drawings and data. All writing styles are slightly different, but each is appropriate and engaging for the chapter topic.
Content Coverage
Brief highlights of each chapter are included here. Short engaging descriptions of chapter content following chapter titles.
If you are looking for a unique addition to your WWII U-boat collection, let me direct your attention to the kits of Mirage Hobby. In one of their latest releases, the company offers a Type VIIC boat equipped with a pair of Biber mini subs, each carrying a pair of torpedoes. Shying away from the typical 1/700 and 1/350 scales for ships, Mirage Hobby offers this and several other submarines molded in 1/400 scale. Modelers with some experience with small parts will have no issues with the construction of this kit.
Mikro Mir has releases a series of submarine models from the first submarines through the Cold War. Most of these are in 1/350 and are subjects not seen on plastic or at all. When the IPMS review list came out I wanted to try one, but it was overwhelming and a hard choice of which subject to pick. Fascinated with warships of the turn of the 20th Century I opted for the first British submarine – the American designed Holland Class developed by Mr. John Holland and his company Electric Boat. For such a small submarine, Mikro Mir chose 1/144 scale, which turned out to be a good size.
This set of replacement barrels for the 1/200 scale Mikasa. It includes 4 305mm (12”), 14 152mm (6”), 20 76mm (3”) and 12 47mm (1.85” Hotchkiss Guns). The 305mm and 152mm barrels are machined from aluminum and the other 2 are machined from brass. The 305mm barrels include brass trunnions.
These are designed for Merit International IJN Pre-Dreadnought Battleship Mikasa.
The 305mm is a straight replacement. The machining is quite good, and the only difference is that the plastic piece has what appears to be a cover on the end of the barrel while the metal barrel is bored out to depict the barrel in action.
The rest of the barrels requires surgery to remove part of the old barrel and drilling out a locating hole for the replacement barrel to slip into.
Thanks to Eduard for supplying the set.
Bottom Line: At first glance these steel, foldable flags look bright and colorful, but there are a few limitations. On a real model, they are good enough. Not to mention the unspoken scandal of oversized flags for all 1/700 WW2 warships kits, decals or paper. In that case, Eduard’s flags are at least good enough, sturdier and more flexible than other options.
Project 628 was a design study, circa 1952-1953, to fit a Vladimir Nikolayevich Chelomei (Влади́мир Никола́евич Челоме́й) sub-sonic cruise missile to the 1,500-ton diesel-electric Soviet XIV series K-Class sub. The Russian Project 628 proposal is similar to what the US Navy did with a ‘Loon’ launching from a Gato Class submarine, the USS Cusk SSG-348. The original K-Class design was approved in 1936 as a long range "cruiser submarine" with a heavy torpedo and gun armament. The boats could operate as a "fleet submarine" working with the battle fleet or as long range commerce raiders. The double hull was divided into seven compartments. It was originally planned to carry a small floatplane for scouting but this concept was abandoned when the planned aircraft proved too flimsy. Twelve submarines were built, although seven of them ended up being trapped in Leningrad by the Germans, and were not finally completed until after the end of the war.
Thanks to Osprey Publishing for the review copy!
Mark Lardas is a real “rocket scientist” who has worked on Space Shuttle analytics and navigation. He is also an accomplished author with at least ten books on naval topics, and a model maker as well. See his website for more details (www.marklardas.com).
New Vanguard 259 covers the large number of WW I era US Navy destroyers known as the flush-deckers and four-pipers, another overlooked topic. Like other Osprey books, this issue is 48 pages (not counting the front/back covers) – enough for an excellent synopsis of design, characteristics and historical highlights of these warship classes.
Mark Stille is a retired Commander of the US Navy and has written a succession of books for Osprey Publishing on naval topics. He continues as an intelligence analyst at the Pentagon. New Vanguard 258 covers Italian cruisers of World War Two, an overlooked topic. This book joints Stille’s previous Osprey Vanguard 182 book on WW2 Italian Battleships (previously reviewed for IPMSUSA in 2011). Like other Osprey books, this issue is 48 pages (not counting the front/back covers) – not enough for an in-depth treatment of WW2 Regia Marina cruisers, but enough for an excellent synopsis of design, characteristics and history of each ship.