Model Art Co, Ltd

Model Art Modeling Magazine No.723 April 2007

Reviewed By  Luke R. Bucci, PhD, IPMS# 33459

MSRP: 1050 yen (approximately $11) Pages: 156; Pictures: more than one thousand of article subjects (not counting ads); mostly color; Diagrams: none; Foldouts: none. Publisher: Model Art Co., Ltd, 3-11 3chome, Iidabashi Chiyodaku, Tokyo, Japan (www.modelart.jp). Model Art No. 723 features full hull 1/700 scale WW2 Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) warships. Cover photograph depicts three ships with full hulls - a Tama class light cruiser, Myoko heavy cruiser, and Fuyuzuki AA destroyer. The first 45 pages are devoted to building and converting full hull versions of various types of warships. New kit reviews are a 1/48 scale Russian Polikarpov I-16 Type 24 fighter from Eduard, a 1/72 scale F86H Sabre Hog from Hobby, a 1/35 StuGIII Ausf G German tank and a US Army M2A1 Half-track from Dragon, an Italian Camionetta AS42 Sahariana recon car from Italeri, a Ferrari FXX from Tamiya, and a 1/72 B-26C Marauder from Hasegawa. The rest of the magazine is devoted to the usual advertisements, convention reports and other modeling news in Japan.

As usual, Model Art magazines are almost entirely in Japanese and alas, I am not able to translate it. The paper and pictures are of top quality. Fortunately, the wealth of photographs of finished models and those in various stages of construction present a visual picture of how to build these kits and how they should appear when finished, so the inability to understand the text is less painful. Feature: Adding full hulls to 1/700 Waterline warships To build a hull from scratch, the base plate from the waterline kit is used, and plastic strips are used to form a framework of the hull. First, a longitudinal keel is attached to the centerline, and bulkheads attached perpendicularly. Putty is used to build the hull, which will require much sanding and eyeballing to get the smooth contours to look correct. Tips on how to make propellers and rudders out of a circular piece of strip plastic are shown. Skywave kits were used for full hull IJN destroyer models, and the Sealsmodel resin kit for the Nishiki Maru liner. The new Nagato and Myoko full hull kits were also built. This magazine would primarily interest aficionados of WW2 IJN warships. Adding full hulls to waterline kits seems counterproductive, but if you want a full hull version of a ship that has not been released in kit form with a full hull, scratchbuilding is the only option. The methods used in this magazine can work for just about all types and scales of ships. The Japanese language for the other kit reviews makes this issue of limited utility for modelers of other subjects. The quality of production is excellent, and this issue can remain as a reference guide for building accurate IJN warships.

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