Matsuba Minoru was a Japanese designer born in 1929 in Osaka. In 1942 joined the "Osaka Furitsu Koku Kogyo Gakko" (Aviation Industry School of Osaka) to become an aircraft designer. After the end of the war he worked with Sanyo until 1989 when he retired. He passed away some years ago and his incredible scale designs of many Japanese and foreign aircraft types are left as his legacy.
Initially his work was featured in monthly issues of the magazine Aireview and then collected in the ten volumes of the series "Seimitsu Zumen O Yomu" or "Design With Precision". All the DWP volumes are out-of-print and highly sought after.
And finally some of the designs of Matsuba-san were reprinted with the same title but different cover in a four volume series. Unfortunately they include far less subjects than the original DWP series.
So, instead of hunting down and paying crazy money for the DWP volumes, another option is to locate the old individual Aireview issues. Some had been available through our on-line store but we offer now limited numbers at $US6 each (postage not included).
Each fold-out includes super detailed multi-view designs of a particular aircraft type. Since the majority of these magazines are fairly old, sometimes there is some wear on the cover but apart from this they are in excellent condition.
The designs are particularly useful for large scale scratch-building and RC models. Below is a sample:
Here's a list of the available issues and the aircraft types featured in the fold-outs:
AIREVIEW #305, Sept. 1972 - Nakajima Ki-84Ko "Hayate" scale 1/32
AIREVIEW #343, Mar. 1975 - Nakajima C6N1 "Saiun" scale 1/32
AIREVIEW #348, Aug. 1975 - Nakajima B6N2 "Tenzan" scale 1/32
AIREVIEW #352, Dec. 1975 - Mitsubishi Type 0 Seaplane F1M2 (Pete) scale 1/32
AIREVIEW #356, Mar. 1976 - Nakajima Ki-27 "Nate" scale 1/32
AIREVIEW #449, Jan. 1983 - Mitsubishi J8M "Shusui" scale 1/32
AIREVIEW #552, Dec. 1990 - Kawasaki Ki-64 scale 1/48
AIREVIEW #562, Aug. 1991 - Nakajima Ki-87 scale 1/48
AIREVIEW #570, Mar. 1992 - Mitsubishi Ki-83 scale 1/48
AIREVIEW #575, Aug. 1992 - Kawasaki Ki-5 scale 1/48
AIREVIEW #580, Jan. 1993 - Manpi Ki-98 scale 1/48
AIREVIEW #595, Mar. 1994 - Aichi E16A1 "Zuiun" scale 1/48
AIREVIEW #603, Oct. 1994 - Kawanishi J6K1 "Jinpu" scale 1/48
AIREVIEW #612, May 1995 - Mitsubishi J4M1 "Senden" scale 1/48
Email us if interested at:
Brilliant stuff! There are a few in that list I don't have covered in my DWP volumes. (Thank you again, G.)
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