Mushroom Model Publications released a new book in their “White Series”, devoted to the Argentinean designed and manufactured “Pucará” (“Stone Fortress” in the Quichua native-american language).

The Pucara is an indigenous design of a twin ending light attack/COIN airplane. It has seen service in Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia, Sri Lanka and the UK (captured). The list of countries that explored –and even placed orders- for them is much larger, but for different reasons the export orders never materialized.

The book breakdown is, as you can expect, based on the chronology of the airframe: It begins with “Origin and Development”, then moves into “Further Development”, it has a very detailed chapter of the “South Atlantic Conflict” (which includes multiple color profiles and color photos); “Pucara in Uruguayan Service and Elsewhere”, “Post 1982 developments” and it wraps up with a full color “Walk-around” section and a chapter devoted to “Weapons and Stores”. Finally there is a section with digital art, covering all the “What if”, based on cancelled export orders.

This book is the only English language reference that I am aware of and it has been so carefully researched that it took about 10-yr to write. Both authors are modelers, and wrote the book with a “modeler mindset”.

Some of the Uruguayan finishes are very interesting, as they have added “boar faces” and also “horse faces” to some of their airplanes. They are very well researched and documented in the book.

This book is probably one of the best references on the Pucara, in any language. Highly recommended.

What is out there?: For such an unusual and obscure subject, actually there are several options when choosing to model a Pucara:

• 1/144 Pucara by Airalex (Resin)
• 1/63 Pucara by Puky (injection molded)
• 1/72 Pucara by Special Hobby (mixed media)
• 1/72 Pucara by Airfix (injection molded)
• 1/72 Pucara by Gran (injection molded)
• 1/72 Pucara by Rare-Plane (Vacuform)
• 1/48 Heritage Models (Resin)
• 1/48 Aconcagua Models (Resin)

There might be other kits out there. I’m listing those that I am aware of.

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