F3H Demon in Detail & Scale

by Bert Kinzey

For more than thirty-five years, the Detail & Scale Series of aviation publications was considered one of the best references on military aircraft available. Focusing on the physical details of the aircraft, such as cockpits, engines, avionics and electronics, armament, landing gear, and more, each of the sixty-nine titles in the series provided the most detailed look at a wide variety of aircraft dating from World War II to the present. The “F3H Demon in Detail & Scale” continues the well-established and respected Detail & Scale format as the first digital title in this series. It covers McDonnell’s Demon, a jet fighter flown by the U. S. Navy in the 1950s and 1960s, in extensive detail. There are 298 photographs, and of these, more than 140 are photographs of details covering the Demon inside and out. 95% of the detail photos are in color, and almost all were taken specifically for this publication.The almost 300 photographs are supplemented with 24 art profiles and and over a dozen detail illustrations, all of which were created just for this new title in the Detail & Scale Series. Every operational and test squadron that flew the Demon is covered in a special Demon Gallery chapter which provides information on the colors and markings used by each of these units.As with all books in the Detail & Scale Series, a special section is provided for scale modelers that reviews the model kits available of the Demon.

445 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 9, 2014

Reviews

[Cassibill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Classic Kinzey

This is a somewhat obscure aircraft, but coverage of both the actual plane and the modelling aspect are thoroughly enough covered for all but the biggest detailist. Anyone with an interest in aviation or wanting to build a model Demon should read this. A decent design was doomed to a brief, insignificant career, because the engine and the weapons didn't deliver like they promised. Even the SEAT had to be switched to a different one with a short period.

[Steve · Rating 2 out of 5]

I bought this as a Kindle eBook and use either PC's with 1080p 23" monitors or Google Nexus 7" tablet.

I've got dozens of Bert Kinzey's Detail & Scale books going back decades. They're a great resource for model building, but I'm not sold on the transition to e-books. The quality of the content is the same as his older books which I've always enjoyed, but the electronic version isn't as useful to me.

There seems to be a loss of detail in the photos in the eBook version vs the old printed book and the only reason to buy these is the photos. I also have issues with the eBook software when viewing "picture" books. No zooming on the PC, and often the photo captions end up on a different page than the photo. The tablet apps are a little better, but why bother with a trying to look at photos on a 7" tablet when I have a 23" monitor available. I also dislike trying to click through the e-book to find a specific picture.

Not the fault of the author, but it impacts my experience with the book. I don't mind e-books for reading, I haven't bought a paper novel in a couple years, but for a book with an emphasis on photos they aren't my first choice. For this type of content I find e-books lacking, a .pdf would be better. I could zoom as I like and the mouse wheel would allow quick scrolling through pages.