The Modern Prowler Guide: The Grumman EA-6B Exposed

The book itself is excellent - Jake Melampy and Reid Air Publications have done an excellent job with this release. It covers all of the details of the modern A-10 including the latest C standard models and the pictures are very thorough. Already owning the F-16 and F-18 guides I would recommend this to any model makers or fans of the A-10....if you can find one in good condition.This item was listed as "new" at the time I purchased it here in the UK via the Amazon global store. I received it (a week earlier than estimated which was good!) and the packaging was still sealed however it was not new as the pictures show - the front cover was creased & damaged, the spine is wrinkled, the bottom corner is dog eared and the rear cover has a lot of scratches. It was disappointing to receive a supposedly new item in this condition.After some discussion Amazon have offered to refund the item once the original estimated delivery date has passed, so I will update the review if that happens. I have requested that the listing be changed to reflect the condition.TL,DR: Great book, well worth it as long as you find it in good condition

Great book in the series.

There's no denying that Jake Melampy has carved out a niche with his occasionally ludicrously detailed walk-around guides to modern American warplanes. This book features nearly a thousand color images showing a number of ICAP II and ICAP III Prowlers photographed shortly before and after the aircraft's requirement, frequently showing all varieties of wear and tear (chipped paint, scratched surfaces, flaking canopy coatings, fine layers of sand, etc.), which scale modelers will eat up.Again, the key word here is "detail," and with Jake Melampy's name attached, there's almost no end to it. Close-ups include images of the fold-out boarding steps, the interiors of the engine and avionics bays, the map lights and canopy defogging tube, almost every panel, switch and gauge in the forward and aft cockpits, each of the exterior navigation lights and antennae, the wingfold mechanisms, all of the inlets and exhaust ports, and no less than 15 shots of the nose gear well. We even get multiple views of both cockpits with the ejection seats removed, the pitot tubes, the deployed Ram Air Turbine, the slat-operating jackscrews, the pressure gauge for the arresting gear dashpot, the refueling control panel tucked inside the right engine inlet...seriously, you get the picture. I'm probably just skimming the surface with this list; it wouldn't surprise me if every single item of interest on the plane's exterior was covered to some degree here. The photo quality is exceptionally good, and you can make out details of every fastener and rivet, and read all of the instrument labels, provided you have a good magnifying glass, of course.Although a previous reviewer did a much better job pointing out errors than I could have ever done, this book, despite its incredible attention to detail, falls a little short of the standard set by other entries in the "Modern Guide" series. Overall views are somewhat scarce, and I sometimes found myself struggling to figure out exactly where on the plane certain items depicted in closeups were located. The captions are pretty good, but not quite on the same level as other Modern Guides, and considering the sensitive nature of the Prowler's specialized ECM gear, areas such as the ECMO positions, jamming pods, and tail antennae are largely skimmed over factually and photographically.Although it's not QUITE as good as, say, the author's A-10 and F-15 "Modern Guides," even a less-than-perfect Melampy title still delivers the goods. It obviously caters to a very niche audience, but if hyper-detail is your thing, you'll probably love it.

Authored by Jake Melampy and produced by Reid Air Publications this soft-cover effort is focused on providing scale model builders detailed photographs of every part of the EA-6B’s final two versions, the ICAP II Block 89A and ICAP III. The book features 163 pages of well-produced color photographs showing intimate details of the entire aircraft and stores. Production quality is high; photos are largely from official sources or the author’s own work. Captions are uniformly well written and accurately identifies antennas, intakes and other odd parts. The level of detail contained in this book is demonstrated by the presentation of twenty shots of wheel wells alone. It’s thin on Prowler history and operations and squadrons are barely mentioned, so you may want to pass if that’s what you’re looking for. (and it's not the purpose of the book!). There’s only limited mention of the versions prior to Block 89 and some confusion as to what the differences were however few people outside our community ever really understood the nuances of the five major versions (Standard/Basic, EXCAP, ICAP I, ICAP II, ICAP III) and four sub-variants (ICAP II Block 82, 86, 89, 89A) of the entire Prowler line.There is a comment that the search radar (either APQ-129 or APS-130) was tied to Anti-Radiation Missile (ARM) use, which was not the case. It also says on pages 7/8 that we carried AGM-45 Shrike prior to AGM-88 HARM, which was also incorrect as the HARM was the only offensive weapon the Prowler ever carried. Highly recommended for scale model builders who want to model the mighty Prowler late in its life.