When Hollywood makes a movie that captures our modeling interests it usually is pretty exciting (or really frustrating). For those of us who focus on the air war of World War One, there have been some great movies, like The Dawn Patrol, some good movies, like Flyboys, and some not-so-good movies, like Von Richthofen and Brown. One movie that has become an icon of this genre is The Blue Max. This movie featured George Peppard as German pilot Bruno Stachel and Ursula Andress as the seductive Countess Kaeti von Klugermann. The other star in the movie was the Pfalz D.III. It is this important WWI fighter that has captured the imagination of modeling companies. Encore Models, produced by Squadron Products, first released their Blue Max Pfalz D.III in 1/72 scale in a bagged econo-kit, using the Roden molding and adding the unique lozenge decal characteristic of the plane in the movie.

Master Model is a scale model metal detailing parts manufacturer located in Poland. Their lines include exquisitely detailed photo-etched and white metal replacement parts for aircraft and ships in the most commonly produced scales.

Master has produced replacement cannons of the early type, with uncovered barrels for any 1/72 Hawker Typhoon early Mk Ib kits. This item is intended to completely replace the plastic kit parts. My example kit (a Maquette issue from Russia) is a Mk Ib, and my research indicates it is the correct version that this particular part issue would be appropriate for. These cannons should generally be fitted to the earlier “car door” version of the Mk Ib as used early in WWII by the RAF. Later Mk. IB versions had full cover extensions over the cannon barrels.

Military Aircraft insignia dates to pre-World War I era, with France and Romania as the first two countries to have designated official military markings.

This book covers every country that I can think of, including a handful of little know countries like Transinistra and some major countries that over the years had multiple military air force insignia (like the US or the Regia Aeronautica).

Each country has a section devoted to the markings, the colors in the insignia and a small description of their aerial assets. In most cases there is a picture of an airframe showing the insignia. Countries like Spain, that had multiple insignia and even civil wars, the book covers the markings of both sides.

All the markings are printed in full color and most of the pictures of the airplanes are in color too (the only exception are period pictures that were originally taken in black and white).

History Brief

During the mid 1950's the U.S. Navy's need for an aircraft that could attack both ground and sea based targets in any weather, day or night, attracted a lot of proposals. In 1956, eight aircraft companies submitted at least twelve designs. Grumman Aerospace A-6 Intruder answered the call, design number 1280 was the winning entry and a contract was issued on March 26,1959. The aircraft was originally designated the A2F1, and the first flight of BUNO 147864 took place on April 19, 1960. The first A6A entered service with VA-42 in March 1963.

Every once in a while a book shows up on the “available for review” list which grabs my interest. This book is one of those. I was able to convince Dave Morrissette to send it to me because I have a personal interest in the KC-97. It was a KC-97 which took me on my first military flight, from Peoria Air National Guard Base to Lackland Air Force Base to begin basic training. I’ve had a lot of rides in various aircraft types since then, but there’s only one first one.

Bill Yenne covers the entire life of the Boeing 367/377 series, from the first airliners to the C-97 to the KC-97, then back to the mature airliner and the mature KC-97, and the last of the series, the Guppies. He does a very good job of tracing the lineage of the series from the B-29 and the B-50. The 367 was the C/KC-97, the 377 was the airliner.