Review Author
Rick Bellanger
Published on
August 1, 2014
Company
Quickboost
Scale
1/32
MSRP
$8.50

Quickboost has come out with a direct replacement for the .50 Cal machine gun barrels on the HK Models 1/32nd B 17 Flying Fortress kit. You get 12 barrels, all the same length and style cast in resin. The packaging is quite adequate. There was nothing broken or warped. The quality of the casting is superb and there is no flash or pinholes. I would assume that the barrels are the proper length. They are a little fatter then the kit ones and look good. Another nice feature is that they are drilled out on the ends.

A word of caution may be necessary, on the HK kit, the kits gun barrels come in various lengths and some have flash suppressors. The quickboost are all the same length and style. A nice feature about these barrels is that they are somewhat generic in nature. I believe they can be used on any Allied Airplane that is 1/32nd and used .50 Cal machine guns.

Review Author
Ron Bell
Published on
August 1, 2014
Company
Trumpeter
Scale
1/350
MSRP
$79.95

The Ship

Heavily armed, shallow draft ships are known as monitors, named after the USS Monitor from the American Civil War. The USS Monitor carried two large guns in a rotating turret and had a flat hull with low freeboard. A later series of US ships that were designed for coast and harbor defense had a similar design and were generically called monitors. The term came to be applied to a ship that had main armament far beyond what would have been normal for a ship of its size and shallow draft to allow it to operate close inshore for bombardments. Monitors were used by the British during the First World War at Gallipoli and along the coast of occupied France and Belgium. A monitor was even used to shell the German light cruiser SMS Koenigsberg while she was laid up in the Rufiji River in Africa. No other ship type had a shallow enough draft or had heavy enough armament to deal with German cruiser.

Book Author(s)
Warren Thompson
Review Author
Pablo Bauleo
Published on
August 2, 2014
Company
Osprey Publishing
MSRP
$22.95

Osprey Publishing keeps expanding its Combat Aircraft series with its latest book, F9F Panther Units of the Korean War. I personally think that the F9F Panther is among the most beautiful jets of the early era—together with the F-86 Sabre—so I might be a bit biased on this topic.

Clearly, from the beginning of the book you realize the author, Warren Thompson, is extremely well versed in the Korean conflict, and he is a great researcher. The level of detail and accuracy in his narrative is outstanding. He is really good at combine first hand narratives and mission reports to allow the reader have a sense of the pilot experiences, as well as the overall combat record of each unit, and the strategic situation in the Korean Peninsula during the conflict.

This book, being from Osprey has plenty of pictures; about half of them in color. The book also has 24 gorgeous color profiles by Jim Laurier.

The book is divided in the following chapters:

Review Author
Jim Pearsall
Published on
August 2, 2014
Company
Dragon Models
Scale
1/144
MSRP
$28.99

The Aircraft

The SR-71 was a flying legend. Anyone who wasn’t directly involved with the aircraft knew little about it, and those who were involved weren’t talking. The aircraft’s existence was declassified in 1964, but not much else was said. The problem the SR-71 was created to solve was that the U-2 was too slow, and thus Soviet SAMs could reach it and shoot it down. The SR-71 was supposed to be so fast that SAMs couldn’t catch it.

During this project, I had the help and advice of Ray Knight who lives on the next street over, on the same block as I do. Ray was a fuels man on SR-71s at Beale AFB back in the 80s.

Review Author
Rod Lees
Published on
August 2, 2014
Company
HK Models Co.
Scale
1/32
MSRP
$220.00

Thanks to Neil at HK models for providing the IPMS/USA with this pre-release kit for review. We appreciate and value your contributions and look forward to more releases from your company. Thanks also to the IPMS leadership for trusting me to get this thing done!

As a pre-release kit, I received the HK Models Do 335 without instructions in a basic shipping box. This was a bit of a daunting challenge; could I do it? Of course I whined when I found out the engine compartments and some of the interior were a bit more complicated than I thought. I was subsequently sent a PDF of the basic instructions from the fearless reviewer corps leader, Dave, and I began to breathe again.

Review Author
Mike Van Schoonhoven
Published on
August 3, 2014
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.

Review Author
Bill Kluge
Published on
August 3, 2014
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
Andrew Birkbeck
Published on
August 3, 2014
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
Roger Rasor
Published on
August 3, 2014
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
Mike Van Schoonhoven
Published on
August 4, 2014
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.