Decals

Afterburner decal sheets are jammed, literally, with detail.  In these sheets are all the schemes you could imagine for this jet.  Also, proper, well-researched stenciling is provided for both high- and low-visibility jets. They even have the sled that was operational at my favorite perch, RAF Mildenhall, in the 1984-86 timeframe!  Ah, the days of standing in the mist just after sunrise, watching and feeling the dual afterburners blasting everyone out of the rack early in the morning as the bird departed and climbed out at a ridiculous angle!

Sheet 48-078 has markings for 11 jets from the mid-1990’s to retirement.  Included are NASA and operational combat birds with mission markings/tail art. 

Sheet 48-079 covers 14 jets, including the YF-12 in 2 schemes and an SR-71B with the high-visibility markings for the early years.  Also included on this sheet are Vietnam, record holder, and test jets.

A big thank you goes to Yellow-Wings Decals for this review sample and IPMS/USA for allowing me to review it.

Aircraft design and development was changing rapidly in the 1930s. As the dark clouds of war were beginning to form in Europe, the effort to improve military aircraft quickened. A new era of low wing monoplanes with retractable landing gear and enclosed cockpits was dawning. The British Hurricane was ordered into production in June 1936 and the Messerschmitt 109 made its public debut during the 1936 Berlin Olympics. At the same time American's front line fighter was the open cockpit, fixed gear, wire-braced P-26. It would remain so until 1938 when America finally entered the new era with the Curtiss P-36A Hawk.

This set provides decals for four Curtiss Goshawk section leader’s aircraft, and includes a few surprises in the way of markings that are pretty rare for the Goshawk.

The aircraft covered include:

Acreation is one of several aftermarket companies that offers Pan Am decals for the new Moebius kit of the Orion III Space Clipper.

The small sheet is well printed and in register.  It offers the Pan Am Globes, Pan American titles for the fuselage, and Pan Am titles for the wings.  These last are not seen on the model used in the film but I have seen builds with them in the past.  Also included are several small markings including "No Step" markings and some that are included in the kit decals, if you don't use them, to depict the panel lines.

The sheet has a continuous carrier film so make sure you cut the images close, especially the globes.

The only thing missing from this set are some instructions to tell you where to place the smaller markings.  I even went to their website where they have a space for Instruction Guides, but they are listed as Coming Soon so no help for me.

I would like to thank Yellow-Wings Decals for this review sample and IPMS/USA for allowing me to review it.

The U.S. military had some of the most colorful aircraft ever prior to WWII. There were bands of bright colors on the fuselage and chevrons on the upper wings to identify section leaders. The rudders had red, white, and blue stripes. Bright tail colors were added to identify squadrons or assigned carriers. The national insignia was a large blue roundel surrounding a white star with a red roundel in the center. Added to all this were the orange-yellow wings and horizontal stabilizers. The color schemes could not get more garish. But, they did. Enter the Boeing P-26.

Designed and built by Boeing in the early 1930s the P-26 was the first all-metal monoplane production fighter aircraft used by the United States Army Air Corps, USAAC. However, it was a transitional design retaining the wire-braced wings, fixed landing gear and open cockpit of previous designs.

If you attended the Nationals in Omaha and had occasion to stop at the National Office Managers Table, you have probably seen these on display with a notice that they were soon available.  Well, soon is now.  Fellow IPMS member Ray Beyers has beautifully crafted this set of markings to fit the 1/32nd scale Trumpeter F-100D in both schemes (P32-025 for the 1965 show season and P32-026 for 1967).  Each set of markings comes with 4 separate sheets and a partial containing the extremely complex flag markings, as well as the Thunderbird logo.  Even a pilot’s helmet decal with the logo and scallops is included.  These decals are custom-printed by Microscale Decals.

 This series of decal sheets is long overdue, and covers an area that modelers have needed for a long time.  I have had experience with Aviaeology’s products in the past, and have found them to be excellent quality decals.  One advantage that this company offers is that they always do their homework in historical research, getting things right.

Wingnut Wings has released yet another decal set with multiple marking options for their Albatros D.Va kit.  Oh…so many Albatros schemes…so little time!

There are two sheets in this set.  These decals, like all of the others from Wingnut Wings, are packaged in zip-lock sleeves along with a comprehensive full-color 4-page instruction booklet that includes application instructions, aircraft profiles, top and bottom wing plan views, historical information, and a number of period photos of each of the aircraft covered by the decal sheets.  This set exhibits the same high level of quality as all of the other products marketed by Wingnut Wings.

The Centennial celebration of Naval Aviation has brought about some really colorful modern aircraft, emulating their predecessors from the yellow wing days, and, in particular, the distinctive unit markings of World War Two aircraft.  They have made for some truly one-of-a-kind aircraft, and Bob Sanchez has managed to capture them for us enthusiasts.  This particular sheet takes us back to the early days of aircraft experimentation and weaponry tests.  When you first look at the colorful instruction sheet, you see a red, grey and white F/A-18C of VX-31 at China Lake.  This aircraft hauls around a lot of weapons and weapon sensors under its wings, doing a lot of experiments.  The second is an F/A-18A of VFA-204 out of NAS JRB New Orleans as it was painted during an air show tour at Ft.

For nearly fifty years, the Bell UH-1 Iroquois was the workhorse of the Army, especially during the Vietnam War.  It has also served in countless countries, in countless colors and configurations, doing everything imaginable.  Now we have Sikorsky’s UH-60 Blackhawk taking over that role in even more configurations and colors worldwide, and performing even more varied missions.