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Squadron/Signal Publications
has sent us their latest book to read and show off to you – from the excellent
and detail packed “Walk Around” series that modellers seem to love this book’s
subject is on a very popular Luftwaffe aircraft – the He-111. We will take you
through what we like and maybe didn’t like in our review.
Written by: Ron Mackay.
88 pages
Illustrated with 228 photos detailed line drawings and colour
profiles
Product Code: SS65070
This book comes to me wrapped in hard cardboard from the USA and only in a few days I may add- The title sticks to the same format that you may be used to from this series. It is a landscape orientated book in A4 size full of glossy photographs and line drawings, there are also some period snaps and some excellent profiles of many aircraft included for inspiration and better understanding of the different variants as well. There are 88 pages and there aren’t many shots I have seen before, especially the walk-arounds which look like they were done especially for this book. There is a hardcover edition as well but the version we are looking at is a softcover version.
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Being a 1/32 modeller primarily I was pretty happy to see Revell’s
offering of the big bird last year, but the only book I had for close up detail
was my trusty “Aero Detail” book from Japan. These are long out of print and a
lot of the pictures are dark (blame the museum in Hendon partly for that) but
it is otherwise an excellent reference – it has many line drawings, mock up
pictures and photos, but the problem is that it is now out of print and rare as
rocking horse do-do. What’s a perspective modeller to do for an all in one
reference?
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Enter Squadron with yet another in their series of “Walk
Around” books – this one has at the centre the same Heinkel as the walk around
books – the “H-20” model from RAF Hendon Museum as well as the restored version
of the He 111P2 captured when it was forced down in combat over Norway. This aircraft
has been fully restored to a magnificent standard and now resides in the Museum
of Gardermoen Museum in Norway.
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Whilst the Norwegians restored aircraft looks like it could
fly out of the hangar doors at the museum the Hendon example looks a lot the
worse for wear. It is dusty, untouched inside and showing signs of corrosion in
other pictures but this I suppose is just as good a source of reference to
modellers – to have an aircraft in pretty much an untouched state is sometimes
better than an aircraft restored and sometimes lacking accuracy. This has happened
on the Norwegian Heinkel actually, but the author takes care to point out where
the errors were made in that restoration (not many of them I may add). You must
take into account however how the Ex Luftwaffe, ex 56 Fighter Group and now
Hendon museum’s airframe would have aged in the 70+ years since it’s
internment.
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The start of the book gives you the briefest of
introductions and explanations of the origins of the aircraft – from a
passenger plane designed by brothers to the more familiar role of chief German
protagonist of the “Battle of Britain” and the “Blitz” and then into later
service life the aircraft is shown throughout the book in it’s different guises
in several line drawings which help tell one variant from another.
The first twenty eight pages of the book give you an
internal walk ‘round (more like crawl inside) the Norwegian P-2 version and Ohh
what a treat this is! There are more shots than you or I may take if we got the
chance. Everything internal that the crew could see and get to is documented in
great photos – all in focus and properly lit. It seems the photographer went
from every panel to the next – nothing seems left out to me. The only problem
is sometimes you get lost! There is however excellent text backing up the
photos that explain what you are looking at and telling you where you are. I
still did get lost a bit and had to look again where I was from time to time.
The rest of the P-2 aircraft is shown in many pictures over
the next thirty odd pages and this includes pictures of the pristine looking
restored engines and the undercarriage which are most helpful. This really is
an excellently restored example and you can gain a great amount from the
careful research that has gone on to the restoration as well as the obvious knowledge
of the author of the text of the captions of the photos.
As are the insightful smaller scale diagrams of the
differences of certain parts of the aircraft and how they have changed from
variant to variant, type to sub-type. The gun positions, nose section, gondolas,
tail section and several other bits that separate one variant from another are
shown in detail here.
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The RAF aircraft is a good foil to the immaculate version we
have just seen. After not being small enough to transport to the states for
evaluation after the war this example eventually fell into the care of the
great museum at RAF Hendon in North London. Although this aircraft has not been
restored this is a blessing a you can see the original details – although worn
and faded at least you can see where this aircraft would have been weathered
during it’s service life – so a perceived weakness of the book I think in using
this aircraft is a strength.
This bird does need a dust down though! Years of storage
have seen it accumulate a fair bit of slight rust on the engines as well. These
are shown with and without the cowls and again there is evidence of how the
aircraft might “age” whilst in use. Although this is less of an issue with the
engines as they would have been well maintained. At least we got to see them
here.
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There are some excellent side on profiles of the aircraft
which give you a great source of inspiration and leave you hankering to make
other variants of the Heinkel. The variants here vary from the start of the war
to captured variants, desert birds, cable cutting oddities and V-1flying bomb
carriers. Great inspiration for modellers especially.
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The last part of the book shows some good period photos
which add to the evidence provided in the book - these are good but unnecessary
or maybe better for the start of the book when they aren’t showing a particular
part of the airframe or equipment.
All In all a better close up reference than the “Aero Detail”
book I own as the photos especially of the Norwegian based restored bird are
just the best I have seen. This is a great (and not to mention inexpensive)
detail book for those of you wanting to make this big winged bird. Nice work.
Adam Norenberg
Both hardcover and
softcover are available now from Squadron/Signal Productions and
we thank them for this book to read and review.
