To begin, I am not a model builder who focuses on vehicles or on 1/72 scale. This project was a bit of a challenge to me personally. While building it, I discovered some surprising drawbacks, which I believe would be a bigger challenge to less experienced builders.

Box and Contents

Packed in the typical side-opening white box, the box features eye-catching artwork of the ZiL-131. The ZiL is a general 3.5 ton 6x6 army truck produced in the Soviet Union / Russia between 1964 – 2012. This kit depicts a Ukraine Army version.

Contained in the box are three sprues of soft gray styrene, one clear parts, one tree of rubber tires, a fully-molded cab, and a cab interior piece. There is one decal sheet for two camo schemes. The instructional guide is three pages and has no numbering or call-out errors. They are very easy to follow. The last page shows two full-color illustrations of the camo options.

The catchily-titled Air Power and the Arab World, 1909–1955 Volume 10 THE FIRST ARAB-ISRAELI WAR BEGINS 15-31 MAY 1948 continues the story of the men and machines of the first half-century of military aviation in the Arab world. This volume tells the story of the first two weeks of the first of the Arab-Israeli Wars in May 1948. While part of an ongoing series, this volume also stands alone as a history of the period covered.

KLP Publishing is based in Australia producing digital guidebooks aimed specifically at the modeler. This is #4 in the “Modellers Monograph Series” and covers the camouflage painting/schemes of the Royal Hungarian Air Force from inception (post WW1) to 1945.

The e-book consists of 417 pages, with a color “cover” and loads of photos of aircraft, source documents and aircraft relics. In addition to the 200+ photos, there are 46 color profiles with very detailed explanations of the individual paint schemes.The author,Károly Magó, served with the Helicopter Defense Forces in Hungary and currently works at the Szolnok Aviation Museum doing restoration and research.He is also involved in search and recovery of aircraft wrecks within Hungary. Finally, it is worth noting that he is a modeler, and is Head Judge of the Moson Model show.

From the Back Cover

The A-10 was specifically developed as a close air support aircraft, and a replacement for the A1 Skyraider. The intended mission of the A-10 decided the looks of the aircraft: the forward fuselage was built around the avenger gun, while the cockpit was placed in a titanium armored tub. The engines were placed high on top of the fuselage and the wings equipped with a lot of pylons in order to take a huge weapons load. Some have suggested several times to retire the almost 50 year old jet, but soldiers on the ground have repeated that it is a lifesaver.

This is the 30th book in the Duke Hawkins series of aircraft Photobooks from HMH publications. The book includes very high-quality photos of almost every detail of the May 10. Unfortunately, few photos are included of the GAU-8 Avenger gun.

Cross & Cockade International is a non-profit UK based group known as the First World War Aviation Historical Society that publishes their journal four times a year. Issues are available as printed as well as digital copies (or both).They also provide a free newsletter (sign up on their website) and occasionally publish WWI themed books like the Sopwith Dolphin monograph I reviewed earlier for IPMS USA. This Journal is the sister of the US Journal, Over The Front.