Search the Community

With a couple of weeks left of this GB I should have time to get this long stalled build finished. DSCF2007 by timothy jones, on Flickr DSCF2009 by timothy jones, on Flickr I started it at Christmas 1995 but didn't get any further than sticking the wings together and some painting so it should qualify under the 25% rule. DSCF2008 by timothy jones, on Flickr It'll be a wheels up out of the box build so shouldn't take long.

As my Stuka did not take long, I thought I would try a 7th and final build for this GB (assuming you count the trio of Emils as 3 not 1). I was considering my Italeri He-111 but it is an H-6 version which I believe did not enter service until 1941. Ok, I could probably convert it and I have decs for an H-2, but I decided to go with this instead. AFAIK this is the old Frog kit which I built shortly after it was released in 1971, a year ahead of the Airfix inline engined E/F version. It was released again by Revell from about 1977 onwards, but for some reason they also reboxed it as Matchbox for this 1992 version! I know it will not be anything like as detailed as the 2014 Airfix offering, though that is also said to have some accuracy issues but my old one did not look too bad. I will do a bit of work in the cockpit, probably roof in the wheel bays, and have a think about replacing some or all of the guns, but otherwise it should be a fairly quick OOB build as I am busy on another GB as well and the Heller Classic is getting ever closer! I was going to use the Xtradecal sheet for the markings but theirs in a Z-1 so I will have to think about that. The kit markings are for KG 2 in 1941 and KG3 in "1941/42" so there could be a bit of "mix and match" and perhaps some DIY decs as well. First bit of the history now. As you will probably know, after Hitler came to power the German aircraft industry was encouraged to start producing military aircraft again – discretely! Bombers were to be described as transports so the He 111 was built in 2 parallel versions, but the Do-17 was actually genuinely designed as a transport, or so we are led to believe, being a response to a Lufthansa request for a high speed mailplane carrying 6 passengers. Well, the Dornier response was certainly fast, and the passengers could be accommodated in two small compartments, one behind the cockpit for 2 persons, and another for 4 behind the wing, but as Green says “Unfortunately, the passengers virtually to perform acrobatics to enter these diminutive compartments” so although the first of 3 prototypes first flew in the autumn of 1934, Lufthansa turned them down, and they were left sitting in a hangar. However, fate took a hand, or so the story goes, and a former Dornier employee Flugkapitän Untucht, who was working as a senior pilot for Lufthansa and was their liaison with the RLM, happened to see them when paying a visit. He suggested that with some more keel area for stability the design could be turned into an effective fast bomber, and the Luftwaffe agreed. The V4 prototype emerged with twin fins and rudders instead of the original single central fin, provision for a radio operator's compartment and bomb bay and various portholes blanked off, and was the progenitor of a family of bombers with a variety of engines, BMW inlines initially, then Hispano Suiza, and then BMW again in the production E bomber and F recce planes. The follow upto the F series were intended to have Daimler Benz engines but these were needed for fighters so instead the M had BMW-Bramo Fafnir 323 A-1 radials but the P had slight less powerful BMW 132N radials. These last two types were still in use at the start of WWII in relatively small numbers, principally with recce units. The M had a top speed of 255 mph at 13000ft and could carry a bomb load of 2200lb internally with a “tactical radius” of 310 miles according to Green and had an armament of 3x7.9mm MG 15. More as and when I start the build. All details from Warplanes of the Third Reich by William Green in around 1970. Cheers Pete