Kaburaya Books

Defenders of Nippon:  F-4 Phantom II

Product Article by Steve Bamford on Dec 31 2003

 

 

 

This new 134 page book from Kaburaya Books is a wealth of information and side profiles of the Japanese F-4 Phantom II.  The first fully licence-manufactured  Japanese F-4EJ first flew on May 12 1972.  The 140th and final F-4EJ was delivered to the JASDF on May 20 1981 and was the last fully built Phantom II in the world.  This book begins with an in-depth history of the F-4EJ and the formation of Squadrons equipped with the F-4EJ.  It then moves into what avionics these licence built aircraft are equipped with and what upgrades were done during the years.  The historical and technical side of this book is quite in-depth and sure to be a much valued resource for modellers interested in the Japanese F-4EJ.  Underwing stores are also covered in this book with colour drawings of the various stores carried by the F-4EJ to help illustrate the weapons text.

But the main focus of this book is it's over 400 colour profiles.  This covers regular schemes....Anniversary schemes and aggressor schemes to name a few.  The selection is truly overwhelming at first.....but very much appreciated as you settle into this very well laid out book. 

I must say.....the layout of this book is brilliant.  Providing one side view profile....although interesting....does not provide all the information a modeller needs to build a model of that particular camo scheme.  This book has a unique number beside each colour profile.....in the back of the book you will find each unique number for each profile with a few sentences about each particular plane and a single letter.  That letter directs you to a top view drawing of the camo layout for that plane's particular paint scheme.  There is also a page that contains 35 colour chips....beside each colour chip is the closest Federal standard # for that chip.  Most of the colour chips are Japanese colours and some are "one off" custom anniversary colours.....but the goal here is to provide FS#'s to assist the modeller using this book as a reference when building their next Japanese F-4EJ or RF-4E's.  All the colour profiles in this book were made from actual photographs to ensure accuracy.  The job of creating such a comprehensive book staggers me.....it must have been a gigantic undertaking to say the least. 

Included with each colour profile is info on the particular plane as well as information about it's paint scheme, squadron number and date of paint scheme.  Above is an example of one of the colour profiles.   Below I've include a tiny selection of some of the pages....out of respect to the artist's copyright, I am not providing larger scans.  The image on the left is an example of the many pages of colour profiles.  The middle image is an example of the colour profiles featuring artwork and the image on the right is an example of the top views of the different camo schemes.  There is also a page devoted to just "Shark Mouth" profiles.

Selection of colour profiles Nose art schemes Top views

Over 400 different F-4EJ colour profiles featured in this book

I'm quite impressed with the quality of this new book.  Although the cover is a soft cover....it is a heavy weight glossy cardboard cover.  The pages are heavy weight paper....this is a reference book sure to last a long long time.  I look forward to other books such as this from Kaburaya Books.  I recommend this book to anyone interested in the Japanese F-4's flown by the JASDF.  Peter Fearis, Peter Scott and Glenn Sands deserve much credit for producing such a well researched and wonderfully informative book. 

This book 'Defenders Of Nippon: F-4 Phantom II' is priced at £19.95 and is distributed in the UK by:

Midland Counties Ltd
Internet: midlandcountiessuperstore.com
email address:
midlandbooks@compuserve.com

or 

 

The Aviation Bookshop
Internet:
www.aviation-bookshop.com
email address:
info@aviation-bookshop.com

Steve

Photos and text © by Steve Bamford