A quick way to add detail to your FW-190A-5 through D-11 is to open up an access hatch or two. These are often found open or missing on crashed or abandoned aircraft. Aires provides you a way to do that now on your late FW-190.

Packaged in a self-contained baggie with a cardboard backing to prevent damage are three light grey resin pieces. They show exquisite detail and are flawlessly cast. A fret of photo etch pieces is also included. The instructions are printed on light blue paper with easy-to-follow directions. The first part of the addition is the parts prep, which is easy to do. This will just take some painting to bring alive.

The Do-217N-1 is a unique night fighter variant of the Do-17/215/217 series. This set is an easy addition to the ICM model. The set is packaged in typical Quickboost fashion. A resealable package with card stock backing to protect the parts. The parts are flawlessly cast in light grey resin. There are four exhausts and four exhaust ends. The exhausts feature hollow ends with beautiful molded on detail. The four separate front portions have exquisite detail in the front. It is just a simple matter of removing them and adding them to the front of the exhaust parts. One of mine exhausts was slightly out of round but a quick bath in hot water allowed me to straighten it.

Adding them to the kit is simple and easy enough to do. The important thing is to pay attention to what you need to remove. Leave the exhaust stacks on the underside on the part. It would be easy enough to cut them off, so pay attention.

The HK B-17s are really good kits. They could use some details added here and there. One of those places is the props. They are slightly misshaped. They are wider than they should be at least to my eye and to obviously Quickboost as well. Judge for yourself with the photos.

There are four prop hubs and 12 prop blades. They are all packaged in the resealable packaging that Quickboost uses with a card stock backing to protect the parts. There are 16 flawlessly cast light grey resin pieces included, four hubs and 12 blades. The blades are keyed to the hubs so there is no need for an alignment tool. The detail on the hubs is flawlessly executed and the blades are suitably thin and correctly shaped.

The only real work is to drill out the back of the hub and insert your own mount or wire.

Painting is easy enough with the yellow tips and the hubs and blades being flat black. You will have to supply your own decals as none are provided.

Helion & Company continues to expand its series “Latin America @ War”, with its 23^rd installment devoted to the Argentine Navy operations during the Falklands/Malvinas War.

The author is the son of an Argentine Navy officer, and himself was a cadet of the Argentinean Navy. As such, he can speak to the Argentine Navy culture like an “insider”, which provides insights often lost by regular historians.

The book is divided in 4 sections:

• Culture and the Argentinean Navy (12 pages)
• Culture, Strategy and the Falklands/Malvinas War (15 pages)
• Culture and Operations in the South Atlantic (31 pages)
• Conclusion (5 pages)

The first section is about the history of the Argentinean navy (the book goes all the way back to the mid-1850s) and mainly describes it’s tradition and the skills desired in their officers.

Lifelike Decals from Japan has released its 5^th installment in a series of Ki-27 “Nate”. You get a total of 8 aircraft, with 6 of them being of the Japanese “Gray Green” color, which the instructions suggest replacing with German RLM 02.

One of the other two aircraft is painted in Japanese Dark Green over Gray-Green, while the last one is an attractive disruptive camouflage of dark green, green and brown over Grey-Green.

Decals are provided for squadron codes and fuselage art for all aircraft. However, there aren’t enough national markings for all aircraft.  This is not a big problem as the national markings and stencils from the decal sheet in the original boxing from the Hasegawa kit can be used.

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