Airco DH 9, Spanish Civil War trainer, 1/72 scratch conversion from Maquette kit

[JWM]

Hi,

My next Spanish Civil War subject - obsolate Airco DH 9 serving as dual control trainer. They were used on both sides of conflict, mine is from Franco (Nationalists) side. The starting point was model of Polikarpov R-1 by Maquette. R-1 was DH-9A produced in Russia. As you know DH9A had larger wing span and longer chord of wing while compare it to DH 9.

So in my conversion I started with cuting wings... The build was conducted within GB (Brits Abroad). There is thread showig conversion. It is here:

 

At the outbreak of SCW in July 1936 still 30 DH 9 was serving as trainers at Alcala-Madrid. In first months of war four machines run to Nationalists and they formed Grupo 34 in El-Copero- Sevilla.  

Here is the real thing

 

And model:

 

Prop is rotating if you blow:

 

And here is Airco on shell with other Britts from SCW. Above is shelf with US, Dutch and Soviet machines from SCW, below is with French ones (all separately were already on RFI):

 

Comments welcome

Regards

Jerzy-Wojtek

 

 

 

 

[russ c]

Very nice, `off the beaten track` build as usual and great collection

[Artie]

You've doen an excellent work with that Airco......and of course, nice collection of spanish subjects there...!!! I specially like that little Martinsyde Buzzard....

Cheers

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Great looking SCW subject 

[Pedro1]

Nice work on the DH9 conversion Jerzy! I may have to do a nationalist version as well 😉

 

Peter

[John_W]

Nicely done. That rigging looks complex.

[KRK4m]

I'd rather go for the Airfix DH.4 instead (at least all the wings, tail and rear fuselage would be the same), but you always liked challenges :)

Well done, Brother...

Cheers

Michael

[JWM]

25 minutes ago, KRK4m said:

I'd rather go for the Airfix DH.4 instead (at least all the wings, tail and rear fuselage would be the same), but you always liked challenges

Well done, Brother...

Thanks, but Airfix DH-4 is rather difficult to get. BTW - this Polikarpov R-1 kit I've bought from you

 

5 hours ago, John_W said:

Nicely done. That rigging looks complex.

Thank you. The riging is very similar to that of Wapity or Wallace, the link between them is clearly seen here. It took me only 3 days, but actually I made mistake in logistic. It will be more easy to end riging of tail after painting, not before as I did.

 

5 hours ago, Pedro1 said:

Nice work on the DH9 conversion Jerzy! I may have to do a nationalist version as well 😉

 

Peter

Peter, thank you. I remeber very well your very nice DH 9 also from Spain. You can do a bit different since there are many numbers to chose for Franco side machines (34-10, 34-2, 34-12, 34-14...)

 

5 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Great looking SCW subject 

Thanks!

 

6 hours ago, Artie said:

You've doen an excellent work with that Airco......and of course, nice collection of spanish subjects there...!!! I specially like that little Martinsyde Buzzard....

Cheers

Thank you Artie. Buzzard was on RFI some months ago. Of my Spanish Britts I like Miles - both were scratch conversions of Frog Magister . Envoy was done by casting in resin wings, tail and fuselage from Pavla Oxford...

 

6 hours ago, russ c said:

Very nice, `off the beaten track` build as usual and great collection

Thank you Russ. All together (with German, Italian, Polish and Czech not seen on the photo) I have almost 40 items from SCW but only 6  still  left in stash, so if I will not bought new I can soon complete this set.

 

Best regards

Jerzy-Wojtek

 

[Spitfire31]

Excellent model and indeed 'off the beaten track'.

 

Your collection is a visual reminder of how in the Spanish civil war, both sides made use of whatever was available. Interesting aspect of that sad chapter of 20th century history.

 

Kind regards,

 

Joachim

[JWM]

 

8 minutes ago, Spitfire31 said:

Your collection is a visual reminder of how in the Spanish civil war, both sides made use of whatever was available. Interesting aspect of that sad chapter of 20th century history.

Joachim, thank you for this interesting general remark. Each war is a sad story but civil wars are particulary sad.

The race of weapons very fast moved the old machines into trainer role, but DH-9 were also used for first line operations at begining of war. I have not found any photo documenting this.  At the outbreak of war the phased out from Polish army Breguets XIX (or adopted passanger machines) were use as valuable bombers but soon the standards were given by BF 109, Do 17, Sb 2 and I 16 - so the fastes machines of the date in whole world!

Regards

J-W

 

[TheBaron]

I continueto be fascinated by the range of schemes that you produce your aircraft in Jerzy: they really stand out in the memory and this continues in that tradition.

Superb sir.

Tony

[Andwil]

Unusual subject and brilliantly executed.

 

AW

[JWM]

9 hours ago, TheBaron said:

I continueto be fascinated by the range of schemes that you produce your aircraft in Jerzy: they really stand out in the memory and this continues in that tradition.

Superb sir.

Tony

Oh, it is too kind of you  Many thanks.

6 hours ago, Andwil said:

Unusual subject and brilliantly executed.

Many thanks.

 

Searching for dome other SCW subject in Net I jumped on  such info today morning:

"In AIR WAR OVER SPAIN by Rafael A. Permuy Lopez (Classic Publications, 2009), on page 5, there is a photo showing partly a camouflaged De Havilland DH-9 in Republican service as trainer. " (https://ww2aircraft.net/forum/threads/spanish-civil-war-nationalist-republican-training-aircrafts.23813/)

So there is a photo of Airco DH 9 from Republican side! Anybody has it? How it is "partially camouflages". I am asking just for curiosity since I will rather not go to another Dh 9 build...

Regards