Fouga Magister
By John Miller
Author: Tine Soetaert
Publisher: Mushroom Model Publications
ISBN: 978-83-63678-38-8
Binding: Softbound
Pages: 132
With its distinctive V-tail and high-pitched whine the Fouga Magister is an airplane that makes an impression when first seen and heard. It's a neat airplane with an interesting history. If you're a Fouga-phile or interested in the development of one of the more out-of the ordinary airplanes to ever break ground, this new addition to the MMP White Series is for you.
The book begins with an in-depth review of the initial single seat, V-tailed designs developed under the leadership of Gaston Fouga. He was clearly thinking "outside the box." His early designs incorporated a small jet engine with the nacelle mounted on the dorsal fuselage behind the canopy similar to the Heinkel He-162. A twin fuselage version of this airplane was produced complete with two sets of engines and V-tails and looking as though it could have fallen out of Burt Rutan's notebook.
The next sections entitled "Technical Description" and "Variants" feature a nice melding of diagrams and schematics from the Magister maintenance/technical manuals interspersed with appropriate pictures of the airframe. Armament options are nicely detailed here as well.
Use of the Fouga by its birth country France and the many countries that have used the type in some capacity are covered next in the "Fouga Around the World" section. Thirty-four beautiful side-view color illustrations by Chris Sandham-Bailey are provided that should spur many ideas for the adventurous scale modeler. Of note, is the Finnish Fouga (serial FM-38) with its boars-head nose art complete with tusks.
The last section "Fouga Magister in Detail" is packed with detail-oriented photos compiled with the scale modeler in mind. The sub-sections are arranged like an aircraft "walk-around" series with the last devoted to front and rear cockpits and seats. This section provides all the detail photos required by the scale modeler: truly well done.
The Fouga is well served in 1/48 scale with kits readily available by Kinetic, AMK, and Wingman (Kinetic kit with added resin). In 1/72 scale, both Airfix and Heller have produced Fouga kits although both are rather old with raised details. Valom has recently released a new-mold 1/72 Fouga with resin and PE goodies that looks to be a beautiful kit. With this many Fouga's needing to be built, I suspect many will be quite happy with this new offering from MMP books. Highly recommended!
Thanks to Mushroom Model Publications for the review copy.