Heinkel He 219 Uhu, vol.II
Authors: Marek J. Murawski, Marek Ryś
Series: Monographs 3D edition, issue 50

Aeroscale review of the Heinkel He 219 Uhu, vol.I

After five months since release of the first part of the famous German night fighter monograph we get the second volume. Coincidentally this is also the 50th issue of the series so my congratulations and big thanks to Kagero Publishing for keeping pace and quality of the series. We are waiting for the next 50. If you are interested in the content of previous number of this series, which was He 219 Uhu volume I, hit the link above.

Right, what is in the volume II? Format of the book is kept the same as its predecessor – it is an A4 size (210x297mm) of 112 glossy pages. Historical part of the book takes only 30 pages. It focuses on the He 219 service with the Luftwaffe and describes the history and combat record of all units flying the Uhu. It is illustrated with 52 black and white archive photographs taken at the end and shortly after the war. Photographs presents mostly damaged or even destroyed machines on the German airfields captured by Allied forces. Few shots were taken during German Aircraft Exhibition in Farnborough and depicts A-7 version with the British roundels – quite extraordinary combination of aircraft type and national markings. Photographs reveals also a lot of details of original German painting and colour schemes.

Main body of the book are colour 3D renders drawn by Marek Ryś depicting He 219 airframe with all its structural details. Drawings will surely enable to discover and understand aircraft design. Publisher have included 219 (is it just coincidence with the depicted type?) exquisite 3D renders. In this volume we can look into the back cockpit of the radio and radar operator. General views is not all the illustrator provides also a lot of close-up of particular devices and equipment on the side panels or radio block. Few following drawings depicts cockpit glazing from different angles, including internal equipment of locking mechanism and Schräge Musik gunsights attached to the canopy airframe. Lot of drawings shows fuselage central section with its framework and ribs, fuel tanks, wiring and plumbing, Pleil G6 antenna, rescue boat, skin and inspection panels and of course all the internal furniture like the Schräge Musik cannons and ammunition boxes, additional seat for mechanic, radio and navigation equipment and access door. Separate section of the 3D drawings is the aircraft armament mounted in the belly gondola, wings and fuselage. When you consider its total firepower it was a real battery of a flying artillery against the Allied bombers. Last three sections are focusing on tailplane, main wings, including engine gondolas and nacelles, and undercarriage legs in extended and retracted positions. This volume contains almost everything what was not presented in the previous part, making a 3D visualization of the planes construction complete.

Monographs contains also scale plans. Giant sheet in the A1 size, printed of both sides, contains 1:32 drawings of the Uhu A-2 version. There are views from all sides on the plane: both side profiles (with and without wings), top and bottom, front and rear views with different FuG installations; drawings of the gunsight, engine, armament, cockpit, propeller and few transverse sections.

Together with the first part the He 219 monograph is a very useful reference for us – scale modelers. With the historical background and archive photographs we get a full load of 3D drawings showing most probably every detail of the airplane. I bet most of it will not be even possible to be depicted in our scale replicas, at least until someone will not build a super-hiper detailed model based on the 1:32 Revell kit.

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