DeHavilland Dh-89 Dragon Rapide, Heller 1/72

[Old Man]

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• The DeHavilland Dh 89 Dragon Rapide occupies a place in English aviation history similar to that of the Douglas DC-3 in the United States. It is the embodiment of a particular time in English civil aviation, and is the 'one that survived', being as much used after the Second World War as before it. The type was still being operated commercially into the 1960s, and still makes  appearances in movies and television shows requiring an 'old aeroplane', as a number are still in flying trim even today.

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  The Dragon Rapide went into production in 1934, as a short-haul airliner, capable of carrying up to eight passengers and luggage. It incorporated elements of two earlier designs, the twin-engined Dh-84 Dragon, and the ill-starred four engined Dh-86 Express. With two 200hp engines, it could achieve a speed of 170mph, owing to clean design and lightweight structure of wood, largely with fabric covering. It can be fairly said to be a machine which wrung the very best that could be got out of already obsolescent construction methods and materials, for already all-metal stressed-skin construction was being employed elsewhere on commercial transports of monoplane configuration.

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  The design was well suited for domestic air service in England, and sold well. It was also employed by English oil companies in the Middle East, for communication and transport duties in the Persian and Iraqi oil fields. A militarized version, with a larger vertical fin, armed with two machine guns (one fixed for the pilot, one on a ring atop the fuselage) and internal stowage for light bombs, competed unsuccessfully against Avro's monoplane Anson for a contract to equip Coastal Command. A few examples of the military Dragon Rapide were delivered to Spain, Iran, and Lithuania.

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  The Dragon Rapide was to become, however a leading trainer for the RAF during the SEcond World War. During the latter stages of the pre-war expansion of the RAF, much of the training of non-pilot aircrew was carried out on contract by private companies. This arrangement continued well into 1940. The RAF began to order its own Dragon Rapides, which were known as Dominie, but differed only in having somewhat less comfortable internal arrangements than the machines ordered by airlines had boasted. Navigators and wireless operators learned the trade on these throughout the war in England. Once the war was over, most Dominies were fitted out to Rapide standard, and sold off to commercial airlines in England, which then were taken over in the late 1940s by the national airline, British Empire Airlines.

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  This model represents a Dragon Rapide owned by Airworks, Ltd. operating at No. 6  Air Observers Navigation School at Staverton in June of 1940. Being still private property, it displayed its civil registration rather then an RAF serial. G-ADBW was originally operated by Jersey Airways Ltd., starting in the summer of 1935. When the RAF took over the Airworks school in July, 1940, G-ADBW does not seem to have been taken on charge; that it was broken up for spares is more likely than that it had been wrecked.

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  The model is the old Heller 1/72 kit. The build began as an entry in a 'weekend build' of Heller kits in the 1/72 forum over on HyperScale, and bears a few traces of that origin. I gave it my best shot, but still had a few bits, plus some clean-up and rigging to do when the time had elapsed. This is where I got it to after 48 hours...

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• There are some things I would have approached differently had I started this without concern for how long things would take. But it is a very nice kit, with good fit and the usual excellent engineering one expects in a Heller kit. I made no comparisons for accuracy, and indeed it may be that G-ADBW had a slightly different pattern of doors and windows. But I like the scheme, the mix of bright yellow and camouflage has an odd appeal. I have finished it with shadow-shading on the lower wing.

 

 

(this picture came out a bit fuzzy but I still like the view it gives)

Edited September 20, 2017 by Old Man

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Beautiful plane  ... i found out about these wonderful aircraft only about 15 years ago. Since then i have always had a liking for them.

[Alpha Delta 210]

Lovely model of a classic! I have fond memories of flying in the blue Classic Wings example in formation with Spitfire MH434. I tried to model the aircraft using the same kit as you, but it was not as good as your little beauty!

[bristol boy]

Lovely Rapide, I agree there's something about the design that warms the heart!

[Michael51]

A fine  job on the kit and a very interesting story.

 

Michael

[Head in the clouds.]

A fine build Sir of a classic. I took the family for a pleasure flight in one when on holiday in Cornwall and the pilot had a striking resemblance to Tom Cruise but the enduring memory for me was how ruddy noisy it was and at the end of a commercial flight the passengers must have suffered from noise fatigue, we were only airborne for fifteen minutes so not too much of a problem.

[Ratch]

Nice...

[Meatbox8]

A lovely Rapide/Dominie. A great finish and rigging.  I'm always partial to a bit of flying Art Deco.  One still regularly flies over my gaff in South London on sight seeing trips.

[invidia]

thats a great looking build. love the old heller kit and it builds up well with a little effort. you have done a great job on that.

[Dazey]

Lovely model. Nice background, too.

Regards,

David

[RidgeRunner]

Very nice, 

 

Martin

 

[glatisant]

Superb.Great colour scheme

[Old Man]

On 9/20/2017 at 10:42 AM, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Beautiful plane  ... i found out about these wonderful aircraft only about 15 years ago. Since then i have always had a liking for them.

 Thank you, Sir. I have some hazy memory of a Frog kit long ago was my first look at one of these, and  a write-up somewhere in a modeling magazine about the military version that lost out to the Anson. i thought it very interesting.

 

On 9/20/2017 at 11:09 AM, Alpha Delta 210 said:

Lovely model of a classic! I have fond memories of flying in the blue Classic Wings example in formation with Spitfire MH434. I tried to model the aircraft using the same kit as you, but it was not as good as your little beauty!

 

Glad you like it, Sir. It was a pleasant surprise to see so many contemporary pictures when looking for insight on the rigging. When I got this kit, I was thinking to use it for conversion to an earlier Dh 84 Dragon, in military configuration, as the Iraqis used this in some numbers as a bomber/transport on policing duties. On close examination, it did not seem as feasible as it had on first glance....

 

On 9/20/2017 at 11:18 AM, bristol boy said:

Lovely Rapide, I agree there's something about the design that warms the heart!

 

Thank you, Sir. It is indeed a most attractive machine. I expect that made some small contribution to its longevity.

[Old Man]

23 hours ago, Michael Enright said:

A fine  job on the kit and a very interesting story.

 

Michael

 

Thank you, Sir. Civil aviation is not my strong suit, but it was obvious early on that this was a stand-out design. English civil design did lag behind that in the U.S., but continental distances were an important factor driving design this side of the ocean. Distances really are a lot shorter in England an Europe.

 

23 hours ago, Head in the clouds. said:

A fine build Sir of a classic. I took the family for a pleasure flight in one when on holiday in Cornwall and the pilot had a striking resemblance to Tom Cruise but the enduring memory for me was how ruddy noisy it was and at the end of a commercial flight the passengers must have suffered from noise fatigue, we were only airborne for fifteen minutes so not too much of a problem.

 

 

That must have been fun. Hard to really do sound damping when the covering is all thin plywood. Noise back then came wit flying, I gather from my reading.

 

23 hours ago, Ratch said:

Nice...

 

 

Glad you like it, Sir. Nice pictures of a genuine period scheme. I might have done the war-time airliner finish, but had on hand nothing to do the markings with. It would certainly ave been easier to paint that all that yellow....

[Old Man]

10 hours ago, Meatbox8 said:

A lovely Rapide/Dominie. A great finish and rigging.  I'm always partial to a bit of flying Art Deco.  One still regularly flies over my gaff in South London on sight seeing trips.

Glad you like it, Sir. Must be a treat to see one up and flying. I saw one not too long ago in an episode of Torchwood, I think it was....

 

9 hours ago, invidia said:

thats a great looking build. love the old heller kit and it builds up well with a little effort. you have done a great job on that.

 

Thank you, Sir. It is a good kit. I had a bit of trouble with the canopy, but suspect I may have inflicted it on myself by over-enthusiasm in dressing the seam at the nose.

 

7 hours ago, Dazey said:

Lovely model. Nice background, too.

Regards,

David

 

Thank you, Sir. I am reasonably happy with how it turned out. Trying to get it done in 48 hours started to seem like work....

[Old Man]

7 hours ago, RidgeRunner said:

Very nice, 

 

Martin

 

 

Thank you, Sir.

 

I see you are an aficionado of America's greatest lawn-dart....

 

57 minutes ago, glatisant said:

Superb.Great colour scheme

Thank you, Sir. I like the scheme myself, but getting all that yellow was a pain, especially with the original 'weekend build' deadline. It took at last four coats (in all the excitement I quite forgot...) over white primer, and it could probably have used another coat or two still, maybe with a tiny touch of red added in the last, even so.

[Nigel Heath]

That's a most attractive scheme nicely exicuted on a very pretty aircraft.

[Spitfire31]

One of the most graceful and attractive airliners ever, as demonstrated by the beautiful model.

 

That last, out-of-focus photo would perhaps best have been deleted from the collection…

 

Superior modelling!

 

Kind regards,

 

Joachim

[Meatbox8]

2 hours ago, Old Man said:

Glad you like it, Sir. Must be a treat to see one up and flying. I saw one not too long ago in an episode of Torchwood, I think it was....

 

 

Thank you, Sir. It is a good kit. I had a bit of trouble with the canopy, but suspect I may have inflicted it on myself by over-enthusiasm in dressing the seam at the nose.

 

 

Thank you, Sir. I am reasonably happy with how it turned out. Trying to get it done in 48 hours started to seem like work....

Yes, I think I remember that episode.  It had disappeared in the 1950s and turned up in the present day. 

 

You could always tell when it was coming in London as you could hear it before you could see it.  A lovely sound and nothing like any sort of modern aircraft..

[Eric Mc]

3 hours ago, Old Man said:

 

Thank you, Sir. Civil aviation is not my strong suit, but it was obvious early on that this was a stand-out design. English civil design did lag behind that in the U.S., but continental distances were an important factor driving design this side of the ocean. Distances really are a lot shorter in England an Europe.

 

 

 

That must have been fun. Hard to really do sound damping when the covering is all thin plywood. Noise back then came wit flying, I gather from my reading.

 

 

Glad you like it, Sir. Nice pictures of a genuine period scheme. I might have done the war-time airliner finish, but had on hand nothing to do the markings with. It would certainly ave been easier to paint that all that yellow....

It wasn't just the distances that drove technical progress in US airliner industry, it was commercial rivalries between the airlines and the airliner manufactures. In the US, the airlines were in full commercial competition with each other so they often goaded the manufacturers into building faster and more economical aircraft. In Europe, most of the major airlines were state owned and there were not competing against each other in the same way. The Europeans did build some advanced aircraft, but the US was where the real advances in the civil field were happening.

[TheBaron]

Deft and delightful work OM!

Tony

[cngaero]

That's very nice indeed. Such an elegant aeroplane that looks good from every angle.

[Gerrardandrews]

beautiful model, name plate would really add to a already great project 😊

[Old Man]

21 hours ago, Nigel Heath said:

That's a most attractive scheme nicely exicuted on a very pretty aircraft.

 

Thank you, Sir. It is brush painted. I think the present Testor's acrylic Dark Earth comes out pretty well.

 

21 hours ago, Spitfire31 said:

One of the most graceful and attractive airliners ever, as demonstrated by the beautiful model.

 

That last, out-of-focus photo would perhaps best have been deleted from the collection…

 

Superior modelling!

 

Kind regards,

 

Joachim

 

Thank you, Sir. I agree that last picture is pretty fuzzy, but it was the best of the over-head shots, and I do like the whole pattern of the camouflage being on view. I' m still experimenting with using the light-box wife bought me.

 

19 hours ago, Meatbox8 said:

Yes, I think I remember that episode.  It had disappeared in the 1950s and turned up in the present day. 

 

You could always tell when it was coming in London as you could hear it before you could see it.  A lovely sound and nothing like any sort of modern aircraft..

 

Old things in the air are fun to see. It's been about twenty years, I expect, since I last saw it aloft, but Goodyear used to fly a large blimp, and it was quite a sight.

[Old Man]

18 hours ago, Eric Mc said:

It wasn't just the distances that drove technical progress in US airliner industry, it was commercial rivalries between the airlines and the airliner manufactures. In the US, the airlines were in full commercial competition with each other so they often goaded the manufacturers into building faster and more economical aircraft. In Europe, most of the major airlines were state owned and there were not competing against each other in the same way. The Europeans did build some advanced aircraft, but the US was where the real advances in the civil field were happening.

 

One of the main drivers, too, was government support through airmail contracts. If you don't mind the reference, here is a bit of the background, in presenting an earlier build...