The Ship Model Forum

A very good reference is a russian language book series, written by Apalkov
It covers each japanese ship, including very detailed line drawings, modification histories, and operational histories and was published in volumes about all major ship categories. Unluckily most volumes were printed in some 6000 copies only, so I was able to find only the cruisers and destroyers part 2 (large destroyers from Fubuki on) so far.

Cheers,
Petr

The best English language roundup of what's available is the reference section of Ed Low's site:

[url]http://www.ijn.dreamhost.com/Reference/Reference.htm[/url]

And something you will probably end up doing is buying books from Japan. The quantity and quality of sources there far exceeds what's available elsewhere. So one site you will want to know about is HLJ:

[url]http://www.hlj.com/hljlist2/?Dis=2&Category=BooBooNav[/url]

Hi,
Just to say a big thank you to the members that took time to answer my request.
Having just taken up this hobby I've no ref material what so ever so I need to start getting ref books together so I'm looking for books with scale drawings,good pics and history surrounding the Imp Japanese Navy in pre WW1 and WW2.
Thanks
Mark

[quote="RNfanDan"]My own inspirational book on IJN ships is [url=http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookSearchPL?ph=2&kn=&gpnm=&sgnd=&tn=Japanese+Warships&prl=&prh=&fe=&ds=25&dj=&pn=&sortby=&bu=Start+Search&bi=Any+Binding&an=A.J.+Watts&cty=-1&isbn=][i]Japanese Warships of World War II[/i][/url]
by A.J. Watts. While it does not delve into details to the degree you get with [i]Maru[/i], [i]Kojinsha[/i], or [i]Gran Prix[/i] profiles and monographs, it DOES give you one of the best general references available. It also contains enough line drawings to make it easy to decide on what ships you might want to model.

Back in the day, when people actually read books and wrote letters, this book was among the few I could get on IJN ships, and it served me well enough to scratchbuild two aircraft carrier models.

The book itself, predates the ISBN system, but you can still do a PC search and get this book at a very reasonable price, from a number of sources.

:wave_1:[/quote]

(See below)

Hi Mark,

Can you be more specific about what you're looking for. For example any specific ships or classes? And what sort of information - historical / technical / photographs / plans?

If you just want to start with one general book that covers all of the above, then that would have to be "Warships of the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1869-1945", by Jentschura, Jung & Mickel. It's currently out of print, but second hand copies regularly turn up on eBay and [url=http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0853681511]Amazon[/url].

Hi,
Can any member of the group give me some info on what books I should be looking at for covering the Imp Japanese Navy in WW2. I've only just started to build model warships and looking at the range of books available I just wouldn't know were to start with collecting ref material.
Therefore any help/suggestions would gratefully accepted.
Thanks
Mark