Release the Beaver! Japanese Battleship "Super Yamato" 51cm Gun Main Turret No.1 in 72nd scale

Beaver Corporation has launched its first plastic scale model in co-operation with Takom. We have the first pictures of the main turret of the paper project, the "Super Yamato" class, the 51cm No.01 gun turret. See what we have on the forthcoming kit in our preview...

Release the Beaver! Japanese Battleship Super Yamato 51cm Gun Main Turret No.1 in 72nd scale.

Japanese Battleship Super Yamato 51cm Gun Main Turret No.1

by Beaver Corporation

Kit No #72001

1/72nd scale

Plastic & photo-etch kit

Price: ¥4,011 JPY / $35USD / €30 EUR / 26 GBP from Hobbylink Japan

Beaver Corporation is well known to you as a Japanese wholesaler as an offshoot of Hobbylink Japan. They have continued their foray in plastic scale modelling kits with this the two-gun No.01 turret of the Yamato in 1/72nd scale. Let's look at the real thing, and then what we know about the kit.

The Subject: Japanese Battleship Super Yamato 51cm Gun Main Turret No. 1 - The turrets that never were...

Japanese design A-150, popularly known as the "Super Yamato" was a planned class of battleships for the Imperial Japanese Navy during WWII. In keeping with the Navy's long tradition, they were designed to be qualitatively superior to battleships that might be faced in battle, such as those from the United States or Great Britain. As part of this, the class would have been armed with six 51-centimetre (20.1 in) guns, the largest weapons carried aboard any warship in the world. Design work on the A-150s began after the preceding Yamato class in 1938–1939 and was mostly finished by early 1941, when the Japanese began focusing on aircraft carriers and other smaller warships in preparation for the coming conflict. No A-150 would ever be laid down, and many details of the class' design were destroyed near the end of the war.

Artist's impression of an A-150-class battleship

There is little information available for these 51cm guns, but it appears that two guns and one gun mount were ordered from Kure Navy Yard in June 1941. Construction was halted with the start of the Pacific War at which time the first gun was having its breech fitted and the second gun completed up to the 4A tube. The gun mount and the fittings were mostly complete, but unassembled. All of these were left as they were, and no further work was undertaken during the war. 

After some study - and perhaps a dose of reality - these ships were redesigned as slightly larger Yamato class ships armed with six main guns in three twin turrets. These ships were never officially ordered and all plans were destroyed at the end of World War II.

The Kit:

Beaver Corporation has released their first plastic scale model in co-operation with Takom. This is a thoroughly Japanese subject that fits in well with Takom's own three-gunned Yamoto Turret we built in a review a while ago. This is the two-gun No.01 turret of the Yamato in 1/72nd scale.

The twin gun turret No.1 is seen here in CAD form. It would not surprise us to know that Takom had a hand in the design phase, as the CADs look so similar to their earlier kit. One would think that with their help, Beaver Coorporation's first plastic kit would be as nice to build as the Takom kit was.

Both of the guns have two elevation/depression angles, either loading or firing up high. The nameplate for the front is include din photo-etch also. There is the deck base included for a nice diorama. There is only a single marking choice provided, but knowing the "What-if?" nature of this kit, you could make it as fruity as you like!

 Beaver Corporation's new kit is already available to purchase through the Hobbylink Japan Website.