Lifelike Decals

1/72 Type 97 Fighters Pt. 3 decal sheet

Product # 72-036

Product Article by Steve Bamford on Jan 14 2016

 

      

This latest release from Lifelike Decals features seven different Type 97 Ki-27's.  This is Part 3 of  a series dealing with the Ki-27 in during WW2 in Manchuria and China and later in Japan.  This sheet includes aces and also involves aircraft located at historical events in China during WW2.

The 7 aircraft include 

  • Ki-27 Otsu (s/n 326) flown by Sgt. Moritsugu Kanai, 11th Sentai, 1st Chutai. Nanking/China in 1940.  Sgt. Kanai has seven victories at this time from the Nomonhan incident and survived the war with 26 victories.

  • Ki-27 Otsu flown by 2nd Lt. Iichi Yamaguchi. Leader of the 68th Shinbu-tai, Tenryu AB/Shizuoka Prefecture on March 30 1945.  2nd Lt. Yamaguchi perished on Apr 9 1945 in a special attack against a US Task Force near Okinawa.

  • Ki-27 Otsu of 13th Sentai, 3rd Chutai, Taisho AB in Osaka Prefecture in the summer of 1942.

  • Ki-27 Otsu of 47th Sentai, 2nd Chutai, Chofu AB in Chiba Prefecture in 1944.

  • Ki-27 Otsu flown by Capt. Kenji Shimada, Leader of the 11th Sentai 1st Chutai, Manchuria on May/June 1939.  Capt. Kenji Shimada had 27 victories from the Nomonhan incident and went MIA on Sept 15 1939.

  • Ki-27 Otsu flown by 2nd Lt. Kawabata, 1st Sentai, 2nd Chutai. Harbin/China in January 1941.  This aircraft force landed in January 1941 near A cheng.

  • Ki-27 Otsu flown by Capt. Shigetoshi Inoue, leader of 1st Sentai, 1st Chutai. Nomonhan/China in Sept 1939.

Click on images below to see larger images

For modellers there are different reasons we build aircraft models.  So love the machine or the markings or the historical story behind a certain aircraft .

Some of these aircraft mark key places during WW2 and will appeal to the history buff.  Nanking China, we all know as the Rape of Nanking when Japanese forces killed a massive number of Chinese civilians.  Harbin China is where the Japanese Unit 731 operated with it's barbaric human experiments by the Japanese on Chinese civilians.  Nomonhan, China is an isolated village that was the location of a crushing defeat of the Japanese by Soviet Forces.  The battle of Nomonhan in 1939 foreshadows the whole war for the Japanese and is a turning point for the Japanese and Soviets during WW2.  Lessons not learned by the Japanese at Nomonhan would be repeated in many of their defeats during WW2 and reading about the battle of Nomonhan in 1939 and the mistakes made by Japanese forces that lead to their defeat is quite eye opening.

The quality of these decals is of very good quality.  The decals themselves are clearly printed and in perfect register.  

This sheet captures some very interesting Ki-27's during WW2 and the selection of markings is quite the pleasure to see and the historical aspect of this sheet captures the imagination when you ponder the events so long ago.  

You can purchase these decals either directly from Lifelike Decals at fax number is +81-3-5680-6733, and e-mail is lifelike@eos.ocn.ne.jp. or from HobbyLink Japan.    

Other shops that stock Life like Decals are *Hannants/UK, *Mister Kit/Italy, *Revi (publisher)/Czech Republic, *SkyGrid/Canada, *Roll Models/USA, *Great Models Webstore/USA, *FlightDecs/Canada, *Victory Models/USA
*M & Models/USA, *AB &S Enterprise/Australia, *Desert Miniature/USA. 

I would like to thank Lifelike Decals for providing me with this product sample.

Steve Bamford

      

Photos and text © by Steve Bamford