Read Joe’s history of the Yahagi here.

Read Joe’s history of the Yahagi here.

Every couple of years, Joe Simon comes to FineScale Modeler with another magnificent ship model. This is a normally efficient turnaround time for Joe, who spends hundreds of hours and an average of two years on each model.

You could say his exquisite builds have a magnetic appeal; they attract metal — mostly gold. His Russian missile destroyer Otlichnyy (February 2010 FSM) and Japanese battleship Kongo (April 2013 FSM) have each won first place in their category at the IPMS USA National Convention.

And now comes his Hasegawa 1/350 scale Japanese light cruiser Yahagi (November 2017 FSM), loaded with all the accessories Hasegawa offers for it as well as Joe’s considerable scratchbuilding and general modeling skills. It has yet to compete at the IPMS nationals, but is sure to gain notice there.

The magazine article shows plenty of the build. Yet there still wasn’t enough room to show it all. We hope you enjoy seeing a little more of it.

But enough talk — let’s have a look!