Picture of the Week 115

USS Enterprise (CVN-65) and USS Vicksburg (CG-69) transit the Bab el-Mandeb Strait 2012. The “Big E” served from 1961 through 2017 and was the longest warship ever built.

Nakajima B5N Type 97 “Kate” Part I

The Nakajima Type 97 Carrier Attack Bomber (kankō) made its first flight in January 1937. The B5N1 version was powered by a nine-cylinder Nakajima Hikari 2 radial engine which produced 700 horsepower for take-off. The prototype featured Fowler flaps and hydraulic wing-fold mechanisms, but these were removed at the request of the Imperial Navy to make the aircraft easier to maintain. Pictured is Ko-345 assigned to the Naval Air Technical Arsenal for trials.

Kankō B5N1 Ka-302 of the Kasumigaura Kokutai showing details of the wing fold and standard anti-glare paint on the cowling. The Kate was designed to carry either bombs or a torpedo. This aircraft is fitted with bomb racks for the level-bombing role.

Ka-310 being re-positioned by ground crewmen. The Type 97 was assigned to carrier air groups as well as land-based units.

Another Kasumigaura Kokutai B5N1, Ka-320 is seen climbing out while retracting her gear. Overall finish is natural Aluminum with black tail codes. The Kasumigaura Kokutai was a training command, these B5N1s are unusual for having unpainted tail surfaces.

Seen over the wing of another Type 97, Ka-310 now sports the more common red tail surfaces applied to uncamouflaged B5N1s.

Kasumigaura Kokutai B5N1s seen on 18APR42 in the immediate aftermath of the Dolittle Raid. The Kokutai had received orders to arm their aircraft and sortie to find the American carriers, but the orders were rescinded before the aircraft could launch.

Ie-312 is seen outside a hanger at Hiyakurigahara Air Base with a Yokosuka K5Y “Willow” trainer in the background.

This perspective shows the bomb racks fitted to the B5N1 to advantage, one loadout option was six 60 kg bombs. Yo-335 was assigned to the Yokosuka air group in 1939.

In 1938-39 the aircraft carrier Soryu participated in strikes against the Chinese mainland, her Kankō being very active in the level-bombing role. Here W-323 is seen from another Type 97 with her wheels and tailhook down, ready to recover aboard Soryu. The “shark fin” seen on the wing in the foreground is a gear down indicator which gave the pilot visual confirmation of the position of the landing gear.

Something which has caused much confusion is this photo of a B5N1 loaded with a torpedo, seen with a carrier island covered in crewmen’s hammocks in the background. The island is to port, indicating the ship is either Akagi or Hiryu, the hammocks were fitted to catch shell splinters when combat was expected. However, both carriers had replaced their B5N1s with the improved B5N2 Kankō in time for the Pearl Harbor raid and were lost in June 1942 at Midway, but the dark camo with yellow wing stripes on this B5N1 indicates a post-September 1942 time frame. While there are various claims regarding this photo in references and on the Internet, it is almost certainly a still from the wartime movie production “Hawaii / Battle of Malaya”.

A Type 97 over China with a pair of Yokosuka B4Y Type 96 “Jeans” in the background. The Kate is seen in a field-applied green and brown segmented camouflage scheme. For those interested in obscure trivia, the Jean is technically a Battle of Midway aircraft. Eight Jeans operated from the light carrier Hosho as part of the Main Body, and one of them took the famous photos of the damaged aircraft carrier Hiryu adrift after the battle.

B5N1 Kankō of the land-based 14th Air Group is seen over China. Shore-based units in China painted their Kates in green and brown segmented schemes and were used as level bombers. The limited Chinese opposition did not reveal the liabilities of the Type 97s limited defensive armament nor lack of self-sealing fuel tanks.

KaSu-315 is a B5N1 assigned to the Usa Naval Air Group during 1943-44. This Kankō wears dark green upper surface camouflage and yellow wing identification stripes. As the war dragged on Kates of all types were increasingly relegated to second-line duties such as anti-submarine patrol.

Ku-320 is an interesting aircraft and something of a mystery. Her paint and markings indicate she was photographed after September 1942. The inscription on her fuselage is illegible in this photo, but is most likely a Hokaku donation inscription. The significance white square background to her fuselage Hinomaru has been described in various ways. Most Japanese references just note its presence without attempting to assign a meaning.

Part II here: https://inchhighguy.wordpress.com/2026/03/25/nakajima-b5n-type-97-kate-part-ii-pearl-harbor-raid/

Hobby Boss Yakovlev Yak-3 of LCOL Anton Yakimenko HSU in 1/72 Scale

Anton Yakimenko was credited with 3 personal and 4 shared victories against the Japanese in 1939 in Khalkin Gol. His total eventually reached 15 victories and he was awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union. The model represents the Yakovlev Yak-3 of Lieutenant Colonel Anton Dmitrievich Yakimenko HSU, 151st GIAP in May 1945. The inscription on the banner reads, “To the Homeland with Victory”.

Construction here: https://inchhighguy.wordpress.com/2026/02/13/hobby-boss-yakolev-yak-3-build-in-1-72-scale/

Dragon Wagon Book Review

Dragon Wagon: A Visual History of the U.S. Army’s Heavy Tank Transporter 1941-1945

By David Doyle and Pat Stansell

Softcover, 120 pages

Published by The Ampersand Group Inc., 2013

Language: English

ISBN: 978-0-9895547-0-1

Dimensions: 11.0 x 8.5 x 0.3 inches

“Dragon Wagon” was the unofficial but widely used nickname for the U.S. Army’s M25 Tank Transporter. Produced by Pacific Car and Foundry the Dragon Wagon was developed during the Second World War and served until 1955. The M25 designation applies to the M26 armored tractor and M15 40-ton trailer combination, as well as the later unarmored M26A1 tractor and improved M15A1 trailer.

This book is aimed squarely at the scale modeler. Authors David Doyle and Pat Stansell draw on U.S. Army technical manuals as well as period photos to show every detail of these interesting vehicles throughout every stage of their development and service lives. Included are descriptions of a bewildering array of tools and equipment issued to these vehicles to assist in their recovery operations, as well as how all this equipment was to be used and stowed. Photos from the technical manuals are reproduced several to a page, while portraits of the vehicles in service are generally given full page spreads. All are annotated and captions provide additional information.

This book presents numerous insights into how the Dragon Wagon was used in service and the wide variety of tasks which it could perform in the field. There is ample information here for the modeler to depict any version on the M25 engaged in specific recovery or transport operations. Details of the tools and equipment as well as the standard stowage are particularly useful. This is a valuable reference for the military vehicle modeler, highly recommended.

AM General Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV) Walk Around Part I

Photographs taken on 12JUL25 at the Fort Wayne Air Show, Hosted by the 122nd Fighter Wing “Blacksnakes” of the Indiana Air National Guard

Women Warriors 361

Lieutenant Michaela Curtis NZ Sea Sprite Pilot

OPERATION ENDURING FREEDOM — (Clockwise from lower left) 1st Lt. Alison, Capts. Heather and Waynetta and, Senior Airman Lyndi, all from the 376th Expeditionary Air Refueling Squadron, flew an all-female KC-135 Stratotanker air refueling mission over Afghanistan on Jan. 31. (U.S. Air Force photo by Capt. Elizabeth Ortiz)

USN Explosive Ordnance Disposal Technician 1st Class Petty Officer Nichole Robinette

A-10 Thunderbolt II pilot, Lt. Col. Martha McSally. She later became a US Senator.

Cpl Alexandra Roy, 430 Tactical Helicopter Squadron door gunner onboard CH-146 Griffon

Roza Shanina, Soviet Sniper with 59 kills

ww441CanadianHannaBohmanKurdishYPG — **Canadian YPJ volunteer Hanna Bohman**

ww441f_LCC19_BlueRidge — **US Navy sailor aboard USS Blue Ridge (LCC-19)**

ww443_Poland_MiG29_Lt Katarzyna Tomiak-Siemieniewic — **Polish MiG-29 pilot Lt. Katarzyna Tomiak-Siemieniewic**

ww444_Stefania Cecylia Wojtulanis-Karpińska_Polish_ATA — **Polish ATA pilot Stefania Cecylia Wojtulanis-Karpińska with Spitfire**

ww244USCGSPARs — **US Coast Guard SPARs, WWII**

ww044wasp — **WASP mechanics work on a PT-22 trainer**

To see more Women Warriors, click on the tags below:

Ilyushin IL-2 Stormovic Comparison Build in 1/72 Scale Part IV

Priming marks the last step of filling and sanding (boo!) and the first step of painting (yay!). Here is half the batch on sticks after a light coat of thinned Mr. Surfacer 1000. Given the size of the batch and poor fit of some of the kits there were a few more iterations of fill / sand / prime to go through before these were ready to paint.

The IL-2M3 Arrows all received three-tone camos in one of three different patterns. This example is getting the “puzzle” camo unique to Zavod 1, masked off with poster putty and tape.

Here is the paint photo showing the colors used for the green / black segmented schemes. The underside color is a mix as there is no direct match in the Mr. Color line, or most other paint brands for that matter. This is a problem with VVS colors in general.

This is the Tamiya kit in the three-color NKAP #2 scheme. I’m not going to claim to have the color mixes exactly right as the documentation is thin. You can use this as a starting point either way, if you think I’ve gotten it wrong you will have a better idea what not to do!

Two of the single-seat Stormovics were finished in a distressed temporary winter finish. I stippled on some liquid mask in high-wear areas over a glossy Future topcoat, then applied a light coat of white. When this had dried I pulled off the liquid mask with tape and thinned the rest of the finish down with fine sandpaper.

The Academy single-seat kit has an excellent decal sheet with ten marking options printed by Cartograph, which is almost worth the cost of the kit all by itself. I used decals from this sheet on the lower Stormovic in this photo. The upper aircraft is an IL-2M marked with the decals from the Hobby Boss IL-2M3, another miss match from the HB kit. For modelers looking for a good set of aftermarket decals I would recommend Foxbot sheet 72-035 which contains markings for nineteen Stormovics of all major versions.

After the decals were all settled in I applied another coat of Future and then Tamiya panel line wash. The excess will be removed with Q-Tips and standard paint thinner working in the direction of airflow, any remnants of the wash will form streaks which contribute to the final weathering effect. Before I start this process, I set aside all lacquer thinners, thin glues, and accelerators so I don’t dip my Q-Tip in them by mistake, I have learned this trick the hard way.

Most of the kits had the trim tab linkages molded on, a few used PE parts to represent them. I cut these off and replaced them with Evergreen rod.

The Hobby Boss IL-2M3 kit comes with underwing gondolas for the Nudelman-Suranov NS-37 37mm cannons, an armament option which was only carried by the straight-wing IL-2M. To make a standard IL-2M3 you will need to fill the locating holes under the wings and add the internal wing guns, here you can see the wing cannon barrel made from brass tube. The shell ejection ports are a bit harder as the HB wing is a solid piece so it would be very difficult to cut the slots into the wing. Here I have represented the ports with black decal film, something which I also did with the Zvezda kit.

The completed batch all in one shot. As I indicated in the first construction post, this batch grew bigger than I had intended and was made more difficult by the conflicting information in the references I had available. In many cases sources did not even agree on broad questions like camouflage colors or Stormovic version for the various marking options although these could often be sorted out, at least in broad terms. Some of these kits tested the limits of my mojo and others were excellent. In the end this batch took longer than anticipated so I am glad to finally get them into the case and move on to something completely different.

SUMMARY

The SMER kit represents an early single-seat Stormovic, it has finely engraved surface details and the option for ski or wheeled undercarriage. It comes with a small PE fret but I didn’t use much from this as the flat PE parts wouldn’t look right in many applications anyway. Cockpit detail is sparse so plan on some extra work there if you want to open the canopy. The kit fit together much better than I was anticipating and it looks good when complete. Overall, I was pleasantly surprised with this kit!

The Academy single-seat IL-2 is an excellent kit and just falls together. The cockpit looks great right out of the box and the canopy can be posed open to show it all off. It includes an excellent Cartograph decal sheet, just be careful using this as the camo color call-outs are erroneous. The one “gotcha” is the panels on the horizontal tail surfaces are represented as lap joints but this is easy to correct. Academy also boxes an IL-2M two seat version of this kit which I have no doubt is equally good. If you want a straight-wing Stormovic this is the kit to look for.

The Dakoplast kits have some good reviews online, they feature fine surface detail on the metal panels and different kits contain parts to build any major version of the Stormovic. However, I do not like this kit. The wing to fuselage joint is a dumpster fire and is located such that it makes it difficult to finish both the cockpit AND the exterior. Repeated filling and sanding sessions kill the enjoyment of the build and eliminate the surface engraving, the best feature of the kit. The cockpit needs work but the thickness and poor fit of the clear parts will hide most of this anyway. There are better kits out there for all three Stormovic versions so save yourself a headache and give the Dakoplast kits a pass.

I was expecting more from the Zvezda Stormovic given it is a VVS subject from a Russian manufacturer, but then again Zvezda still has some older kits in their catalog. This one has some simplifications of the contours under the fuselage as well as inaccuracies and gaps inside the ventral cooler, plus the cockpit is very crude and most modelers will want to put in some extra work to improve things there. Fit is not the greatest and filler is needed on the major seams. On the plus side Zvezda has done a good job molding the exhausts and the clear part is actually clear and fits well. This kit really shows its age, go with the Academy kit instead if you can find it.

The Eduard kit is now almost thirty years old and is an earlier example of their Profipack line. This one has a PE fret and several resin parts to enhance the appearance plus the plastic parts are excellent as well. I skipped most of the PE fret as I preferred to scratch the details from plastic. The kit has engraved metal wings and a wooden fuselage, but if you wanted to model a wooden-wing Arrow you could fill the panel lines on the wing. This is a good place to start for an IL-2M3 Arrow.

The Hobby Boss kit is from their easy assembly line and it is certainly easy to assemble. Surface detail is excellent as is the fit but cockpit detail is sacrificed. Clear parts are also excellent. The Hobby Boss research team is very confused though, they have included parts for the 37mm gondolas under the wings which are wrong for the IL-2M3, plus one of the marking options is for a well-known IL-2M instead of an Arrow. The internal wing guns are missing and the 12.7mm defensive gun in the rear position will need to be replaced. Still, I like this kit. If you are willing to correct the issues with the guns and put some extra work into the cockpit the HB kit can be made into an excellent Stormovic.

Tamiya kits have a reputation for outstanding fit and excellent detail. Their Shturmovik lives up to that reputation. I enhanced this build with the Kelik cockpit set and some PE parts as well as various surface details. I don’t think sales matched expectations as this kit was only issued once and is now hard to find. If you have any interest in the IL-2, the Tamiya kit is the best one to get if you can find it.

Construction Part I here: Part I here: https://inchhighguy.wordpress.com/2026/02/20/ilyushin-il-2-stormovic-comparison-build-in-1-72-scale-part-i/

Picture of the Week 114

A trio of Vought OS2U Kingfisher observation aircraft secured to the catapult atop the central 12” gun turret of the USS New York (BB-34). Photo taken while the ship was anchored in Casco Bay, Maine, on 16JUN43.

Maunsell Sea Forts

During the Second World War the British deployed several offshore fortifications to help defend the Thames and Mersey estuaries from German incursions. The British Army and Royal Navy each fielded their own distinct designs, both versions were named Maunsell Forts after their designer, civil engineer Guy Maunsell.

The forts were built at shipyards and deployed by towing them out to sea and then flooding their support structures, the towers resting on the shallow sea floor. The Army forts were constructed using steel lattice structures. (IWM)

The Army forts were arraigned in a circular formation. A central command tower was surrounded by gun towers, each equipped with 3.7 inch anti-aircraft guns. An additional structure held a searchlight platform. The towers were interconnected by catwalks.

An interesting view of one of the tower networks as seen from a supply boat. The tower to the left in the photo has pilings visible for a boat to come along side and an outrigger used to hoist supplies.

A second view from a supply boat showing the towers to advantage. The British Army built six forts in total, three defending the Thames and another three defending the Mersey. The Army forts were credited with downing a total of 22 German aircraft and 30 Buzz Bombs during the war.

Maunsell designed something completely different for the Royal Navy, although the mission was the same. The Navy design was constructed from steel and concrete and resembles the superstructure of a ship, it featured a large concrete footer to anchor it to the sea floor. Four Royal Navy forts were built.

A rather dramatic, although intentional, view of a Royal Navy Maunsell Fort being launched. One side was flooded first and this side was equipped with a concrete bumper to protect it from damage when it impacted the sea floor. The platform would level out as the remainder flooded. Note the platform is fully manned while all this is going on, the crew can be seen gathered around the gun to left of the photo. The Navy fort at Tongue Sands was credited with sinking a German E-boat.

After the war the crews were rotated ashore, but the platforms were maintained until the 1950s after which they were abandoned. Several still remain in place today and they have attracted squatters along with several pirate radio stations. Their locations offshore have resulted in rulings that British courts have no jurisdiction over them so they are in a special sort of legal limbo.

Armory Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-3 of Lt. Grigoriy German in 1/72 Scale

Lt. German opened his account on 16AUG41 by downing a pair of Luftwaffe Hs 126 reconnaissance planes. He was eventually credited with 17 and 1 shared victories and was awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union. The inscription reads “For the Motherland”.

Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-3 of Lt. Grigoriy German, 42^nd Fighter Regiment, Moscow, 1941. Armory kit and decals.