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Yokosuka D4Y2-S Judy Night Fighter (AZ7843) 1:72 AZ Model by Kovozávody Prostějov Intended as a replacement to the ageing Aichi Val, the Suisei, or Comet in English, was delayed by development issues that meant the Val had to soldier-on in service, where it racked up a substantial tally of Allied ships and other assets in the dive-bomber role. Initially powered by a license-built Daimler Benz DB601 engine, the aircraft had a high top-speed that gave it an advantage when avoiding defensive fighter screens on the way to the target, but like many Japanese designs, it lacked armour and self-sealing fuel-tanks that meant one burst of fire stood a good chance of turning it into a flaming wreck. It wasn’t until the later radial-engined 4 variant that such niceties as armoured glass and cockpit armour were introduced, too little, too late, as all the experienced pilots had already met their doom. Although it was intended as a dive bomber, its speed led to its use as reconnaissance aircraft, as well as a night fighter, and late in the war it was also used in kamikaze attacks, having the unfortunate distinction of being the aircraft used in the last attack of the kind of WWII, ironically just after the Japanese surrender documents had been signed. It was equipped with a pair of forward-firing .303 machine guns throughout its service, and a rear machine gun for the gunner in the back of the long greenhouse canopy, which was upgraded to a more powerful 13mm weapon in later variants to improve its destructive capability, firing upward through the canopy at the bomber streams overhead. Its bomb load was only 500kg, often stored in the internal bomb bay, or as two 250kg bombs under the wings. The Kamikaze variant carried 800kg, as it wasn’t expected to make a return journey. The D4Y4 was the last version, configured to the unique requirements of kamikaze attacks, having its rear gun removed, the bomb load increased, plus windscreen and cockpit armour added, along with some protection for the fuel tanks. The end of the war curtailed the development of the D4Y5 that mounted a more powerful 2,000hp radial engine and a four-bladed prop. The Kit This is a reboxing of a kit that was originally tooled in 2012, although additional parts have been added since then, and a new decal sheet is provided for this issue. It arrives in an end-opening box, with a painting of the type on the front firing on a high-flying B-29 Super Fortress that’s part of a bomber stream, but isn’t taking it lying down, firing back from both the remote turrets on the underside. A full set of profiles can be found on the rear of the box, using Gunze paint codes to call out painting instructions. Inside the box are two sprues of grey styrene, a sprue of clear parts in its own Ziploc bag, decal sheet and instruction booklet, all tightly wrapped in a resealable clear foil bag to prevent chaffing of the parts. The instructions consist of an A5 booklet of two pages of folded A4, with spot colour on the front page, and a set of stencil profiles on the rear. Detail is good, with crisp engraved lines on the surface, and plenty of raised and recessed details incorporated on the sprues. Construction begins with the cockpit, which is assembled on a long flat floor with a raised portion in the middle that accepts the pilot’s seat and decal seatbelts, adding the control column in front, and painting the moulded-in rudder pedals. In the rear section, a single tall bottle and a rack of three more squat bottles are inserted into depressions, as is a box, and later on the rear crew seat on a rotating gun-mount frame with more decal belts applied is fitted in front of the box, and is shown facing forward. In between the crew are two radio boxes that are fixed to the upstand behind the pilot’s seat and on the floor just behind it. There is mention of Photo-Etch (PE) parts in the cockpit, but this is a generic Judy instruction sheet, and refers to another boxing. The instrument panel is blank, and has two decals applied to depict the dials instead of PE, and these should be applied after painting the panel, as the dials are printed on a clear carrier film. The cockpit and instrument panel are sandwiched between the two fuselage halves along with the tail wheel, and here there is some ribbing and other detail moulded into the interior that will benefit from some careful painting to accentuate them. The lower wing is a single-span part that incorporates part of the lower fuselage, and this has the two gear bays inserted from within along with a clear window in the cockpit floor before it is joined to the upper wings and mated with the fuselage. The gear bays also have some ribbing moulded-in to add detail to your model, as well as sockets for the gear legs that are installed later. First, a choice of large or small tail fins is butt-jointed with the fuselage, as are the elevators, and all these would benefit from pinning for extra strength, even at this scale. The larger fin is appropriate for this boxing, so toss part 8 into the spares bin early on to avoid confusion. Both cowling types are included on the sprues, but you can ignore step 9 for this issue, as the early Judies had in-line engines. The cowling is made from two halves, into which the exhaust stacks are slotted into grooves at the sides, adding the three-part chin intake below, then applying the spinner to the three-bladed prop and inserting the shaft into the hole in the nose. The diagrams all have their appropriate variants included in text on the left, so making a mistake would require some effort to ignore them, which is good. The main gear is next to be made, fitting the wheels to the end of the struts, and adding the captive bay door over the open side to trap the wheel in place, doing the same in mirror-image for the other leg. It is worth noting however that the upper end of the bay door should be cut off to create a small additional door that rests almost flat against the wing once installed, so cut those before you glue them to the legs. A few scrap diagrams help you with the correct alignment of the landing gear parts, and show the angle for the inner bay doors. A small pair of doors are fitted to the tail gear bay, with an arrestor hook only fitted to certain options, due to a dwindling number of carriers the Japanese navy had nearer the end of the war. There is a common roll-over bar with V-brace support fitted between the cockpits, then a choice of guns for a couple of specialised sub-variants of which this is one. The night fighter has a forward-angled upward firing 13mm machine gun mounted on the floor in the rear cockpit in a similar manner to the German’s Schräge Musik that was intended to take down bombers from beneath their poorly defended undersides, as evidenced on the box art. Three of the four canopy steps can be ignored, taking note of step 17, which has the canopy installed in the front of the cockpit cut-out with a telescopic sight projecting through a hole, and you must also drill in the main canopy to accommodate the machine gun in the rear cockpit. The canopy is a single part depicting the rest of the greenhouse, adding a radio mast around the mid-point of the framework, for which you’ll need to provide your own wire/thread to connect it to the top of the tail fin, as per the top diagram of the stencil profiles. Drilling the hole in the clear canopy may sound terrifying, but if you take care, make a pilot mark with a needle or awl to avoid slipping, and don’t press too hard with your drill bit, filling the canopy interior with a piece of Blutak to help prevent damage, it shouldn’t be too scary. Markings There are three options on the decal sheet, and although they all wear the same green over grey camouflage with a wiggly demarcation, their tail codes will separate them in a line-up. From the box you can build one of the following: The decals have been designed by Rising Decals, and appear to be printed using the same digital processes as Eduard are now using, having good registration, sharpness, and colour density, with a thin gloss carrier film cut loosely around the printed areas. I mention Eduard because from 2021, the carrier film on their decals can be coaxed away from the printed part of the decal after they have been applied, effectively rendering them carrier film free, making the completed decals much thinner and more realistic, and obviating the need to apply successive coats of clear varnish to hide the edges of the carrier film. It’s a great step further in realism from my point of view, and saves a good quantity of precious modelling time into the bargain. Conclusion A welcome re-release of this initial version of the night fighter Judy that is well-detailed, and from my own point of view is a more attractive option than the later radial-engined options. What amounts to carrier-free decals also adds to the appeal. Highly recommended. Review sample courtesy of

Yokosuka D4Y1/1-C Judy (AZ7841) 1:72 AZ Model by Kovozávody Prostějov Intended as a replacement to the ageing Aichi Val, the Suisei, or Comet in English, was delayed by development issues that meant the Val had to soldier-on in service, where it racked up a substantial tally of Allied ships and other assets in the dive-bomber role. Initially powered by a license-built Daimler Benz DB601 engine, the aircraft had a high top-speed that gave it an advantage when avoiding defensive fighter screens on the way to the target, but like many Japanese designs, it lacked armour and self-sealing fuel-tanks that meant one burst of fire stood a good chance of turning it into a flaming wreck. It wasn’t until the later radial-engined 4 variant that such niceties as armoured glass and cockpit protection were introduced, too little, too late, as all the experienced pilots had already met their doom. Although it was intended as a dive bomber, its speed led to its use as reconnaissance aircraft, and late in the war it was also used in kamikaze attacks, having the unfortunate distinction of being the aircraft used in the last attack of the kind of WWII, ironically just after the Japanese surrender documents had been signed. It was equipped with a pair of forward-firing .303 machine guns throughout its service, and a rear machine gun for the gunner in the back of the long greenhouse canopy, which was upgraded to a more powerful 13mm weapon in later variants to improve its destructive capability. Its bomb load was only 500kg, often stored in the internal bomb bay, or as two 250kg bombs under the wings. The Kamikaze variant carried 800kg, as it wasn’t expected to make a return journey. The D4Y4 was the last version that appears to have been tuned towards the unique requirements of kamikaze attacks, having its rear gun removed, the bomb load increased, plus frontal and cockpit armour added, along with some protection for the fuel tanks. The end of the war curtailed the development of the D4Y5 that mounted a more powerful 2,000hp radial engine and a four-bladed prop. The Kit This is a reboxing of a kit that was originally tooled in 2012, although additional parts have been added since then, and a new decal sheet is provided for this issue. It arrives in an end-opening box, with a painting of the type on the front having just sent an American Wildcat spiralling on a journey to the ground in flames. A full set of profiles can be found on the rear of the box, using Gunze paint codes to call out painting instructions. Inside the box are two sprues of grey styrene, a sprue of clear parts in its own Ziploc bag, decal sheet and instruction booklet, all tightly wrapped in a resealable clear foil bag to prevent chaffing of the parts. The instructions consist of an A5 booklet of two pages of folded A4, with spot colour on the front page, and a set of stencil profiles on the rear. Detail is good, with crisp engraved lines on the surface, and plenty of raised and recessed details incorporated on the sprues. Construction begins with the cockpit, which is assembled on a long flat floor with a raised portion in the middle that accepts the pilot’s seat and decal seatbelts, adding the control column in front, and painting the moulded-in rudder pedals. In the rear section, a single tall bottle and a rack of three more squat bottles are inserted into depressions, as is a box, and later on the rear crew seat on a rotating gun-mount frame with more decal belts applied is fitted in front of the box, and is shown facing forward. In between the crew are two radio black boxes that are fixed to the upstand behind the pilot’s seat and on the floor just behind it. There is mention of Photo-Etch (PE) parts for the instrument panel, but this is a generic Judy instruction sheet, and refers to another boxing. The styrene instrument panel is blank, and has two decals applied to depict the dials instead of the PE, and these should be applied after painting the panel, as the dials are printed on a clear carrier film. The cockpit and instrument panel are sandwiched between the two fuselage halves along with the tail wheel, and here there is some ribbing and other detail moulded into the interior that will benefit from some careful painting to accentuate them. The lower wing is a single-span part that incorporates part of the lower fuselage, and this has the two gear bays inserted from within along with a clear window in the cockpit floor before it is joined to the upper wings and mated with the fuselage. The gear bays also have some ribbing moulded-in to add detail to your model, as well as sockets for the gear legs that are installed later. First, a choice of large or small tail fins is butt-jointed with the fuselage, as are the elevators, and all these would benefit from pinning for extra strength, even at this scale. The larger fin is appropriate for this boxing, so toss part 8 into the spares bin early on to avoid confusion. Both cowling types are included on the sprues, but you can ignore step 9 for this issue, as the early Judys had in-line engines. The cowling is made from two halves, into which the exhaust stacks are slotted into grooves at the sides, adding the three-part chin intake below, then applying the spinner to the three-bladed prop and inserting the shaft into the hole in the nose. The diagrams all have their appropriate variants included in text on the left, so making a mistake would require some effort to ignore them, which is good. The main gear is next to be made, fitting the wheels to the end of the struts, and adding the captive bay door over the open side to trap the wheel in place, doing the same in mirror-image for the other leg. It is worth noting however that the upper end of the bay door should be cut off to create a small additional door that rests almost flat against the wing once installed, so cut those before you glue them to the legs. A few scrap diagrams help you with the correct alignment of the parts, and show the angle for the inner bay doors. A small pair of doors are fitted to the tail gear bay, with an arrestor hook only fitted to certain options, due to a dwindling number of carriers the Japanese navy possessed nearer the end of the war. There is a common roll-over bar with V-brace support fitted between the cockpits, then a choice of guns for a couple of specialised sub-variants can be ignored, as can three of the four canopy steps, taking note of step 18, which has the canopy installed in the front of the cockpit cut-out with a telescopic sight projecting through a hole in the glass, and a single part for the rest of the greenhouse, adding a radio mast at around the mid-point of the framework, for which you’ll need to provide your own wire/thread to connect it to the top of the tail fin, as per the top diagram of the stencil profiles. Markings There are four options on the decal sheet, and although they all wear the same green over grey camouflage with a wiggly demarcation, their other markings are different enough to be interesting. From the box you can build one of the following: The decals have been designed by Rising Decals, and appear to be printed using the same digital processes as Eduard are now using, having good registration, sharpness, and colour density, with a thin gloss carrier film cut loosely around the printed areas. I mention Eduard because from 2021, the carrier film on their decals can be coaxed away from the printed part of the decal after they have been applied, effectively rendering them carrier film free, making the completed decals much thinner and more realistic, and obviating the need to apply successive coats of clear varnish to hide the edges of the carrier film. It’s a great step further in realism from my point of view, and saves a good quantity of precious modelling time into the bargain. Conclusion A welcome re-release of this initial version of the Judy that is well-detailed, and from my own point of view is a more attractive option than the later radial-engined options. What amounts to carrier film-free decals also adds to the appeal. Highly recommended. Review sample courtesy of

Hi Another - very old model of a bird of Japan Navy during WWII. Yokosuka D4Y3, model 12, Suisei. In Allies code - "Judy". I made it about 30 years ago... The kit was very basic- what peculiar - wih engraved lines for national insignia.... Model presents machine from 503 kokutai, 107 Chutai, Philippines, 1944. Painted with Airfix Matt 21 from the top Comments welcome Regards Jerzy-Wojtek