Here are photos of my Japanese type 2A freighter. Dazzle Modelworks, in releasing this model, have helped fill a void that most manufacturers have, up to now, ignored.   The wartime 'standard' types of freighters were Japan's very late reaction to horrendous shipping losses caused early in the war by a combination of a poor, almost non-existant convoy system, abysmal ASW counter measures and far flung, island based garrisons that often necessitated single ship re-supply. The 2A was one of many Japanese 'Liberty ship' equivalents. Unfortunately the program was started very late in the war and many of the ships were sunk after only a few months in service. Some however, did survive the war and went on to provide a base on which to re-establish the Japanese merchant fleet.   The resin kit went together extremely well with only minor clean up required of the parts on the resin wafer. I particularly like the fact that Dazzle Modelworks included various deck housings and gun tubs so that alternative versions could be made. As a 'craftman' kit, accessories such as armament etc.need to be added. I used:

Pit Road 'X' sprue for the heavy weapons, Fine Molds for the twin machine guns
PE railings from GMM Auxillary ships set
PE boat davits from BJ Modellbau
PE crew from Eduard

Rigging is caenis line and the model was painted using a combination of Vallejo and Citadel (Warhammer) acrylics. I am indebted to Scott Reigels at Dazzle Modelworks for the model and Iwashige-san for the excellent examples of colour schemes and variants on his website.  

Jim C Smith January 2012