Lifelike Decals from Japan has released its 4^th installment in a series of Ki-27 “Nate”. There are a total of 9 aircraft, with 7 of them being of the Japanese “Gray Green” color, which the instructions suggest to replacing with German RLM 02. The other two aircraft are painted in Japanese Dark Green over Gray-Green.

The decals provide squadron codes and fuselage art for all aircrafts. However, you don’t have enough national markings for all aircraft. This is not a big problem as you can use the national markings and stencils from the decal sheet in the original Hasegawa kit. The set also provides templates -in regular paper- for masking of cowlings

Decals have been printed by Microscale and they have a well-earned reputation for thin decals and in-register sheets. These are no exception. Decals are glossy, look thin, and likely will adhere well to a gloss surface.

The only word of caution is that some white areas (like white bands around the Hinomaru, or white background on tail surfaces) have to be painted and then the red Hinomaru or red-strips for a tail marking applied as a decal. Honestly, I prefer it that way, as at times large decals might not quite conform to a fuselage and leave a small gap somewhere.

A very interesting feature of this decal set is that the instructions include references for the aircraft profiles and a short -but very well detailed- history of each aircraft, including in some cases details on the pilot(s) that flew that plane.

This sheet is a welcome addition to the resources for a Ki-27 Nate fan.

Recommended.

I would like to thank Lifelike Decals and IPMS/USA for the review sample.