Military Model Scene

Title:  Focke-Wulf Fw 190

Author: Krzysztof Janowicz

Publisher:  Kagero

ISBN:  978-83-66148-72-7

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A 272-page hardback book just packed with goodness. The Fw190 was one of the finest fighters in Luftwaffe service during WW2. Not the smooth lines of the Bf109 with its' inline engine, but altogether chunkier and more rugged, thanks largely to the big, powerful radial engine which was a characteristic of the whole design.
The introduction, well supported with archive photos, tells us about how the designer, Kurt Tank, got his inspiration and then through the various prototypes and plans for using the new BW engines. It then moves naturally on through the various production types and sub-types, detailing their differences for each one.  Some differences came from unit experience depending on their use, such as attacking US daylight bomber formations, when heavier armament or rockets were needed to bring a bomber down. Armament varied for ground attack, bomber attack and fighter-bomber/intruder missions. Other simple things, like good accessibility to the engine for the mechanics and so on. All this is followed by a section on colours and markings before reaching the significant part of the book detailing operational use in Western Europe: Africa, the South & North of Europe: Ostfront: Africa and Sicily: All Strak's Men, operating in the far North of Europe: Fire Brigade on the Eastern Front and  right through to the allied evaluation of captured examples. Marvellous detail for modellers in many photos throughout these sections, including some diorama ideas. A series of fine colour profiles are later followed by a whole series of scale drawings illustrating the many variants, and highlighting the differences between them, in both 1/72 and 1/48 scales. Tucked into the book are 3 larger, separate, fold out sheets with more plans in both 1/48 and the larger 1/32 scales.
In this Monograph Special number 12 from Kagero we get a first class resource for modellers and WW2 aviation historians alike. The whole book is filled with a collection of over 350 archive images, along with fine scale plans and a good selection of high quality colour profile artwork. Modellers in particular will just love this one. Excellent quality and well priced for it too.

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Distributed by Casemate Books, who kindly provided my review copy.

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Robin