Mi-8/9 Hip in Detail

by Frantisek Koran, Jaroslav Spacek, et al

Wings and Wheels Publishing

Reviewed by Saúl García

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Wings & Wheels Publications made a name for itself many years ago by releasing incredibly detailed walk around photo series. Over the years, the books have grown in size but are not to a set limit of pages. This is a major selling feature as some other walk around photo series have set page limits.

This Wings & Wheels publication, from their Blue Present Aircraft line, is the perfect companion to anyone building Mi-8 Hip kits. Note that this book only covers the Hips with TV-2-117 engines such as the Mi-8 and Mi-9. The others, such as the Mi-17, will be covered in a future volume. Inside the softcover, we find 132 pages full of in focus photos. Four hundred forty seven (yes, 447) color photos cover every detail of the helicopter in seven variants listed below.

The book measures 9 by 9.5 inches in a landscape format with heavy card stock covers. The heavy pages have a semi matte finish which reproduces details well.

The first twelve pages of the book begin with a simplified history of the helicopter and proceed to introduce each of the versions it will cover. Then the book goes into a walk around of each version:

• Mi-8/8T Hip pp. 4-35 with 50 photos for the Mi-8 and 13 for the mi-8T

• Mi-8TBK pp. 36-42 with 25 photos

• Mi-8/9 Hip interior, exterior, engines, etc. pp. 43-83 with 62 interior photos, 74 exterior photos, and 18 color illustrations

• Mi-8PPA Hip pp. 84-101 with 74 photos (perfect for those converting the 72nd scale Hip with Ciro Models set)

• Mi-8S Hip pp. 102-122 with 78 photos

• Mi-9 Hip pp. 123-132 with 40 photos

The hangar workshop photos go into great detail of the various systems of the helicopter including in depth looks at the weapons and how they are mounted. The various photos in the hangar are also inspirational for those daring enough to pull off a maintenance setting and some good information is gleaned from the text. While it is not perfect English, the gist of the information is there.

For those interested in foreign use of the helicopter; Czech, Indian, Polish, and Slovak guises are included.

This book represents and excellent value for hard to find large format photos of the Hip, especially the armament mount details for the Mi-8TBK.

More images can be found on Wings & Wheels web site:
http://www.wwpbooks.com/index.php?lang=en&page=showbook&book=46

Highly Recommended.

Thanks to Wings and Wheels Publishing for the review copy.

This book is available from the North American exclusive distributor; 4+ Publications North America.

Author Frantisek Koran, Jaroslav Spacek, et al.
Editor Frantisek Koran
Artwork Dusan Simek
Drawings N/A
Format Landscape format softcover.
Pub. year 2005
ISBN 80-86416-55-0
Price ??.?? USD
Availability In print