Periscopio Publications have released an interesting and useful volume on the Hawker Hurricane. Produced in conjunction with Squadron/Signal and written by well known author and illustrator, Richard Caruana, the 90-page softback should appeal to both aviation enthusiasts and modellers alike.

The book breaks down into four main sections:

• 1. History
  
• 2. In Detail
  
• 3. Colour Profiles
  
• 4. Scale Drawings
  

The History section gives a brief background to the Hurricane, before describing its operational use. Obviously, 25 pages doesn't allow an in-depth account of any particular campaign, but the author has written in an engaging style and the section provides an effective overview to the type's service life. Not only RAF versions are covered - the text also details foreign users. Rounding off the section are useful tables of RAF and Commonwealth Hurricane units and a breakdown of Hurricane production batches, with contracts, serial numbers and manufacturers listed.

The In Detail section is going to be one that modellers head straight to, as it offers 22-page walkaround of several preserved machines:

Hurricane Mk. IIa, Z3055/HA-E, Malta Aviation Museum
Hurricane Mk. II, NX96RW, Lone Star Flying Museum
Hurricane Mk. XII, Z5140, Historic Aviation Collection

The photography throughout is excellent and the individual photos are produced large enough to make out plenty of detail. The undercarriage, engine and cockpit are all well covered, but watch out for some of the colours used on the preserved machines (the grey cockpit and wheel well, in particular, are not consistent with period finishes). The shots are clearly captioned and should prove very useful to anyone building a Hurricane model.

After reading the Colour Profiles section you need never be lost for inspiration for a Hurricane to build again! 33 pages with 4 profiles on most of them makes this the most comprehensive set of colour schemes I've yet seen gathered together for the type. There's pretty much everything yo can think of covered, from pre-war "rag-wing" Hurricanes, through the Battle of Britain to night intruders and ground attack aircraft. Along with Sea Hurricanes, there are "specials" such as the all-red P2992 used for calibration trials and a fine selection of export schemes. Each scheme is captioned with details of the colours used. In addition to the profiles themselves, there's a very useful section devoted to the size, colours and style of roundels and lettering.

Rounding everything off are 6 sides of Scale Drawings. Unfortunately, these aren't quite as useful to modellers as they might have been, because they appear to have been sized to best fit the page, rather than produced in any of the most common modelling scales (the scale isn't stated, but a scale-bar is included and they appear to be around 1/100 scale). Nevertheless, they serve well as a ready-reference for the differences between the Hurricane versions and anyone with access to a scanner and graphics software can re-scale them to print out as required.

Conclusion

Periscopio Publication's "Famous Aircraft Of the World - Hawker Hurricane" isn't the last world on the Hurricane, but it doesn't set out to be. Instead, it is a well balanced and useful guide to the aircraft that should have particular appeal for modellers with its walkaround section and profusely illustrated selection of colour schemes.

Please remember, when contacting retailers or manufacturers, to mention that you saw their products highlighted here - on AEROSCALE.