Frog F178 Me 410 - Finished!

[PeterB]

This is my first Group Build, but I was impressed by the recent “Classic Airfix” so when this Frog one was floated I decided to have a go. I thought a little background would help as I am a geriatric “newbie”. I built my first aircraft kit back in 1957 - Airfix Lysander as I recall glued together with something thick and brown called Croid and left in silver grey plastic with the wheels and props coloured with Indian Ink. The next one was the Hurricane, and this time I used tubes of oil paint. I have been building kits ever since, usually not very well.

 

In those young days I only went shopping with my mother so was limited to Airfix from my local Woolworths as there was no internet or mail order, and my only source of information was a small Ian Allan paperback on British Aircraft of WWII plus a booklet that came with one of my comics and actually showed me some planes of other nations. However, between 1960 and 1967 I started acquiring the small “War Planes of the Second World War” series of books by William Green and the occasional Airfix Magazine so I realised there were huge gaps in the Airfix range. I also found myself going past a good model shop on my way too and from school and discovered Frog and later Revell kits to fill some of the gaps, not to mention Humbrol paints and proper plastic cement! I have retired now and still have a dozen or so Frog kits and the odd Novo/Revell copies in my stash, so I thought I would start with the Me 410.

I originally bought this kit when it first came out in about 1966. It has been stripped down in one of my spares boxes for years, In the picture the original is in bright blue plastic, unlike the “new” one” which I intend to build as a the A1/U2 model similar to the one in the RAF Museum collection and will be using Green's Warplanes of the Third Reich, Osprey's Luftwaffe Viermot Aces, a Kagero book and the Mushroom book on the 410 as references. I have bought some replacement gun barrels, and will add an instrument panel and some bulkheads and might box in the wheel wells and bomb bay a bit, but otherwise it will be OOB. I would love to imitate some of the beautiful detailing that some of the modellers have done in previous GB but I have neither the skill or patience and anyway my hands and eyes are showing their age these days. That's partly why I prefer older kits as there are a lot less parts and they are mostly of a size I can actually see – no more Ratio railway buildings with individual door knobs the size of a pin head!

 

OK, that's the boring bit over - time to start building, if I can persuade my wife to put off decorating my study – probably have to buy her some plants for the garden to keep her otherwise occupied. More later – I promise to keep it brief and to the point from now on.

Edited May 26, 2019 by PeterB

[JOCKNEY]

Hi Peter

 

Welcome to the Frog GB, the Me410 will make a great addition, good luck with the build.

 

cheers Pat

[Greg Law]

Good choice. I was tempted to do one of these when I saw it on eBay last night. So you have saved me some money. ☺

[PeterB]

Hi Greg,

 

Plenty of other versions including the bomber and the one with the ruddy big BK5 cannon as in the kit.

 

Pete

[Rabbit Leader]

Great to see these individual threads up and running Pete. Seems like you'll get the hang of BM and posting in no time at all and it will probably take up a large chunk of your available time. This will be a great kit to see built and as I'm no Luftwaffe experten we'll enjoy seeing this coming alive as the GB progresses. 

 

Cheers and best of luck.. Dave 

[PeterB]

Hi Dave,

 

Like most kids growing up just after the war, German a/c held a great fascination for me. I bought the kit when it came out, and then, as with the He 219, I knew very little about it but what 15 year old kid would not want a plane with a ruddy great cannon sticking out of the nose? Later I decided I wanted a more "normal" version that was produced in greater numbers, and Green's War Planes of the Third Reich showed me the large variety of armament fitted both in the factory and in the field - up to 6 MG151 20mm cannon, or some replaced with 30mm! Spoiled for choice but I am going for one of the simpler version as I will explain once I start - don't you just hate having to wait!

 

Cheers

 

Pete

Edited May 27, 2019 by PeterB

[PeterB]

Don't you just hate waiting! To set the ball rolling I thought I would explain the version I have chosen to model. It took me years to understand the German naming system and in case there are one or two of you out there who still don't know this might be interesting – to the rest sorry!

 

The Me 410 was fitted with a variety of weapons over the years. The modifications fell into 2 groups, the factory fitted ones known as Umrüst Bausätze and the field modifications known as Rüstsätze hence the “U” and “R” seen in designations. Mine will be an A1/U2 with the mod allowing the addition of an armament kit which included 2 MG151 cannon with the breeches and ammo mounted in a container which could be bolted into the bomb bay. I will put a blob of Milliput in the bay to help support the cannon and the brass tubes I am using to represent the extensions fitted to the MG17, though I doubt they will be visible. I will also drill holes for the MG151 cannon in the troughs at each side of the fuselage though I might have to cheat and use MGFF barrels to get the flash cones. This pic shows the one in the Museum at Cosford and is from the excellent Mushroom Models book on the 410, included with their kind permission - the red notation is of course mine.

 

 

You will see that Mushroom have described the outboard gun as MG17 but I have made enquiries and am 95% certain I am right. The MG 17 were under the cockpit floor and fired through extension tubes either side of the centreline. The much larger MG151 breeches were against the fuselage side with access hatches for the armourers according to the Luftwaffe manual I have seen.

 

I could have gone overboard and modelled one with 4 cannon in the bomb bay and 2 in a fairing under the fuselage but I thought I would keep it simple.

 

By for now.

Edited June 22, 2019 by PeterB

[jean]

what a great choice. Not the easiest of kits, but O so interesting.

One thing that bothers me with this "410" is that I am not sure Frog did a 410. I suspect that it is more a 210, as far as the engines are concerned.

Not that many people would notice the difference. And I may stand to be corrected!

I have this kit in the proverbial stash and the trickiest area is likely to be the canopy, that Frog have cut in an heretical fashion!

 

But this are mere details! I am looking forward to follow your build!

JR

[spaddad]

14 minutes ago, jean said:

One thing that bothers me with this "410" is that I am not sure Frog did a 410. I suspect that it is more a 210, as far as the engines are concerned.

Not that many people would notice the difference. And I may stand to be corrected!

Hi Jean,

I bought one of these when they first came out & I don't remember anyone querying the accuracy of the kit. At the time I was an IPMS member & the kit was reviewed in the magazine, Airfix magazine & Flying Review without elliciting any negative responses. Also none of the branch members slagged it off, at least 2 of whom were rivet counters. I will admit that there wasn't the amount of reference material available then but people weren't completely in the dark either.

[jean]

4 minutes ago, spaddad said:

Hi Jean,

I bought one of these when they first came out & I don't remember anyone querying the accuracy of the kit. At the time I was an IPMS member & the kit was reviewed in the magazine, Airfix magazine & Flying Review without elliciting any negative responses. Also none of the branch members slagged it off, at least 2 of whom were rivet counters. I will admit that there wasn't the amount of reference material available then but people weren't completely in the dark either.

Hi Spaddad,

 

as I thought may happen, I have been corrected!

I will have to pull the kit out and check it against some scale drawings. To be honest, any shape discrepancies do not bother me at all. The weird canopy breakdown though, remains vividly on my mind as something I had no idea how to tackle, knowing I would end up smearing glue all over the show!!! 

A vacform canopy would be tempting in such a situation!

 

Cheers

JR

[PeterB]

Hi Guys,

 

There certainly are a few discrepancies - watch this space for details part way through the build but as a teaser, the wing profile is that of a 210 at least in some respects so you are partly right Jean. The other main difference is the fuselage length, and by lengthening it they managed to cure most of the 210's handling problems.

 

Pete

[PeterB]

Ok I have made a start and inserted the cockpit floor and the bomb bay rear bulkhead. The combination of the dark grey plastic and the age of my camera make close up pics tricky.

The good news is that I have decided not to bother adding a rear bulkhead or boxing in the tailwheel well as they wont be visible. I will however put in a representation of the instrument panel , close up the stand slot and put some milliput or something in the nose of the bomb bay to represent the container the extra guns were in which will help to  support the gun barrels I will be fitting later - bit less bother than the ruddy He162 I am also trying to make. I presume the cutout in the floor was to allow the pilot to look out of the lower nose window when bombing or something, as shown in the museum pics above.

 

Pop in later - I may have made progress.

[PeterB]

I think it was a Roman General who said something like “the best laid plans seldom survive the first few minutes of a battle” and boy was he right! 6 weeks ago I was planning to build the 410 and 110 pretty much out of the box to give me time to do a bit of detailing on the Shackleton. Then, in a fit of temporary insanity I decided to enter 3 more kits, and now I have decided to tart up the 410 cockpit a bit. OK it is not in the same league to what some of the modellers on the recent Airfix build did which was jaw-droppingly good, but better than nothing and it gets my hand in for the He162 which is going to need a lot of work.

 

I have made a crude representation of the instrument panel, which was a bit unusual because of the need for the pilot to be able to see out of the nose glazing. As a result the instruments were mounted on 2 vertical panels, one on each side of the cockpit with a gap in between. As there was not enough room the engine instruments were at first actually mounted on the inboard side of the engine nacelles as in the Hs129. However later (Mushroom say 1944) they were placed on a small panel which fitted in the cockpit on the floor between the rudder pedals. So here is what I have made, painting a few white dots on for instruments. As it is visible through the nose glazing I have also bent a bit of wire to look a vaguely like the joystick ( yes the hand grip is far too big) and a cut a couple of pieces of plastic for side instrument panels. Finally I have put a bulkhead in behind the pilot and painted the seats.

 

 

I have mentioned previously the container bolted into the bomb bay which held the breeches, firing mechanism and ammo drums for the added 2 MG151. Fortunately Frog provide a similar sort of thing for their BK5 long 50mm cannon version as shown in the front of the pic, so I will use that with a bit of filler added to the front. Once I get these bits in I will paint the cockpit. It should probably be RLM66 which is a very dark grey but I am going with a slightly lighter colour to match the one in the museum.

 

I'll be back - once I have done a bit of work on the Shackleton interior.

 

Edited June 22, 2019 by PeterB

[PeterB]

There were some questions earlier about accuracy. The French Frog Cocardes site mentions that there are a few problems with the general shape including ' wings with a change of angle in the trailing edge non-existent in reality, main gear too far forward, poor shaped gear doors, inaccurate propeller blades. '. What this means is that the wing seems to be based on the earlier Me 210 and has a change in angle on the trailing edge which should not be there, the spinners are too long and pointy, whilst the blades need to be narrower at the root.

 

Also the engine supercharger intakes should be on the engines not the wings and the shape is wrong. The exhausts are over simplified as in real life there were the usual individual stacks, covered by a shroud at the top, though they were all visible from underneath as you will see from the pic of the one in the RAF Museum Cosford included by kind permission of Mushroom Models but as I am building several of other kits against the clock I will leave things as they are.

 

As the engines stick out in front of the nose, I will check the dimensions once they are on. The 410 had a longer and deeper rear fuselage that the 210, which was the main reason the handling went from dangerous to adequate, together with slots on the leading edges of the wings. I just hope Frog did not model the 3ft shorter 210 length fuselage to go with the wings!

 

Back later - hope you all having fun.

Edited June 22, 2019 by PeterB

[PeterB]

Ok I have added the various bits mentioned last time together with the mountings for the remote controlled rear guns, and I have painted the cockpit interior and the tail wheel. The one in the museum has light grey wheel and bomb bay interiors, wheel doors and legs which look as if they may be the same colour as the undersurface but I am sticking with RLM02 Grau.

 

Well as you can see I have joined the fuselage halves remembering to trap the tail wheel. I have not as yet fitted the bomb bay doors as I will need to do a little more work in that area. The instruments look passable from a distance but not that good close up. However the canopy is typical Frog and nice and thick.

 

Still not quite got the knack of close ups - need some sort of stand to hold the camera steady. Now I will move on the the wings and tail.

Edited June 22, 2019 by PeterB

[PeterB]

Some more progress today. I spent some time cleaning up and adjusting the locating lugs on the wings so they now stand a chance of fitting the fuselage reasonably well. I then added the underwing radiators and the main wheel doors. They are a strange design and actually fit into a cutout on the wing, and needless to say they are not a very good fit. Plenty of filling and sanding coming up. The same applies to the engine cowlings which have the undercarriage legs trapped in them - Frog are not too clear in their instructions but I think I have got everything the right way round as both the legs and the cutouts for the front wheel doors are "handed".

 

 

 

I have also glued together the horizontal stabilizers which are rather small looking, though they will be better when the elevators are on. Once everything has dried I will clean them up and add the engines together with the u/c supporting struts Frog provide and then it will be ready to go together. I might even be able to start painting a week into the build.

 

Thanks for watching.

Edited June 22, 2019 by PeterB

[Pete in Lincs]

An interesting build. I made a couple of these years decades ago. I still have one, complete with embarrassing paint job.

As you say, back then we didn't know any different and assumed that the shapes, markings and paint schemes were well researched.

Thank goodness for the internet. Though it probably causes much anguish that we can't match the skills of others!

Pete

[PeterB]

4 hours ago, Pete in Lincs said:

An interesting build. I made a couple of these years decades ago. I still have one, complete with embarrassing paint job.

As you say, back then we didn't know any different and assumed that the shapes, markings and paint schemes were well researched.

Thank goodness for the internet. Though it probably causes much anguish that we can't match the skills of others!

Pete

Hi Pete,

 

I agree wholeheartedly. It's almost depressing at times to realize that after over 60 years modelling I am still not much better than an amateur compared with some of the people in this and other builds. As to the internet, both a blessing in terms of finding out things, and a curse when you realize you got it wrong! Good job I am from God's Own County (Yorkshire) and therefore by definition always right.

 

Pete

Edited June 6, 2019 by PeterB

[PeterB]

 

Another gloomy day in the South Wales Valleys (sounds a bit like the start of Postman Pat which I watched with my kids donkey's year ago). As expected the engines were not a brilliant fit - at least on the bottom where they almost join the wheel doors. Perhaps I should have put them on before the doors, but then the doors would have been harder to adjust - anyway too bad. The wings have fitted quite well though they will need filling no doubt once set. In the foreground is my attempt at a Waffen Behälter 151, the container holding 2 Mg151 20mm cannon with firing mechanism and 250 rounds per gun - probably too long but it is going to be mostly hidden in the bomb bay when the doors are closed. So next I will put on the tailplanes, put the container in the bomb bay and glue on the doors, and prime it.

 

 

 

In the meantime I need to start painting the spirals on the spinners which will probably be tedious. A few months ago, after spending over a week painting multiple stripes (badly) on the spinners of a Ki-45 I treated myself to a couple of sets of Maketar masks. They received good reviews but when they arrived there were no instructions and the yellow tape stripes are so tightly printed that I cannot see what is what with my ageing eyes. The vinyl cockpit etc set is a lot easier to see and has two sets of spinner masks which are about the right width. Unfortunately both of them are for props which revolve in a clockwise direction when viewed from the front but -guess what - the ruddy 410 revolve anticlockwise! Pity they did not have one set for each direction of rotation. After I stopped swearing I tried some Tamiya 2mm flexible tape and that might work well enough to make hand painting a good bit easier.

 

As you will have noticed, in spite of being retired I am not as fast as some of our fellow modellers, and certainly not as good on detail, but I am getting there. When I first built this kit 50 odd years ago I would have finished it by now, even using slow drying enamel paints, but perhaps this build will be just a little better.

 

Following on from my recent conversation with my namesake in the lovely if a little flat county of Lincolnshire - sorry Pete, grew up at near the top of the Pennines.

 

Ah'll Sithee.

 

 

Edited June 22, 2019 by PeterB

[PeterB]

Just a short follow up on the matter of accuracy - it is pretty close size wise - maybe a scale 6" too long and too wide. It is all closed up and filled now so tomorrow I should be able to post a pic of it primed at least.

[Greg Law]

I wouldn't worry to much about speed. I have been taking almost the whole time period to do my GB projects. 

In the Specialist GB most of the guys have finished theirs and I'm only painting mine now with three weeks to go. 

[PeterB]

Hello again.

 

Ok, not the best of backgrounds but as you will see below I have primed the 410.

 

 

 

Normally I use grey car primer from a rattle can but this time I have a white band to paint on the fuselage so I used white primer and will then mask it off. You can see where I have used a heated pair of old dividers to open up the gun trough on the side of the nose as Frog just moulded an oval outline. I have also added the mountings for the remote control rear guns and partially filled the oversize gaps around the moveable control surfaces - good old "Frog Special Features".

 

Frog offered two versions, a “bomber” one in the old two tone green uppers and blue unders (RLM65/70/71) which was probably correct for KG51 but very few other users, and a “bomber destroyer”one with the BK5 50mm cannon (A1/U4 ) again with 70/71 uppers but light grey unders or so they indicate – should actually be 3 greys 74/75/76 in fact. Ullmann, Merrick and other sources say there were at least 3 different versions of RLM76, ranging from a pale blue with a hint of grey, through a pale grey with a hint of blue to a colour I can only describe as pale duck egg green verging on RAF Sky which I suspect is the origin of the semi-mythical RLM84. Ullmann says the changes were due to the increasing difficulty in getting the correct pigments as the war went on, resulting in DIY versions being applied. The plane in the museum seems to use a greyish shade, but no doubt has faded.

 

Until recently I used enamel paints and still have over 300 tins, but I have started using some acrylics as, when I spray I don't need to use loads of White Spirit to clean the airbrush, which in spite of having an external venting spray booth stinks the house out – wish I had a man cave! I have had a single action Badger 200 for over 30 years (as well as a couple of cheap double action ones) and do sometimes spray multicoloured camo, particularly on larger planes but frankly on small kits I find the masking tedious so I use a “hairy stick”.

 

Back later when I have brushed on some RLM76.

 

Edited June 22, 2019 by PeterB

[PeterB]

Well, here we are again. As mentioned previously I am basing this build on the Me 410 preserved at the RAF Museum at Cosford, which is pictured in the Mushroom Models book on the 410. As many of you will know, lighting in Museums can be problematic and this is no exception, with one side washed out so that there almost seems to be no mottling on the fuselage, and the other in shade and looking rather dark. I have picked out this pic as being about right - by kind permission of Mushroom.

 

 

I have 3 different makes of RLM 76 Lichtblau, Xtracolour, Mr Hobby and Humbrol. The first is a light grey with a hint of blue, the last quite a definite blue, and the other is somewhere in between, so I have decided to use The Xtracolour RLM76 gloss enamel.

 

 

 

Stirred for a few minutes, it goes on rather well with a large brush though it can be a bit slow to dry. It has the advantage that when I mottle with acrylic paint, mistakes should wipe off the enamel fairly easily without damaging it (I hope). There are a number of possible colours I could use to mottle, the most likely being the RLM74 and RLM75 I will be painting on the wings etc., although RLM02 is another possibility. The one in the museum has fairly light mottling so I will start with RLM75 I think and see how it goes from there. As mottling is not one of my better skills it may be a while before I get back to you. Whilst waiting for the paint to dry I will get back to the Shackleton cockpit, or perhaps have a shot at painting the spiral on the spinners.

 

Bye for now.

Edited June 22, 2019 by PeterB

[PeterB]

Whilst waiting to start mottling I have printed out some decs. Don't know about you but my bog standard HP printer leaves something to be desired. My previous one could use a special photo ink cartridge which may have been better, but except for black the colour density on this one is a bit thin. Usually OK on light colours but on dark the DIY decs can be a bit see through when printed on clear decal film I have run off a test batch and we will see if they work.

 

 

If not then I will have to print on white paper, but then I have to touch up the surrounding white decal edging. I have found printing a background similar to the kit paint helps so I have a collection of DIY "colour chips" painted on card. Not perfect but it makes things a lot easier. I must admit the letters above are not as crisp as the RAF ones I printed a few days ago - perhaps the "Blockschrift fur Flugzeuge" Luftwaffe fonts I used are a bit rougher around the edges - I may have to carry out "surgery" pixel by pixel, to smooth them up a bit but would prefer not to bother, so I will see how they look.  On reflection it is probably the choice of letter "C" as the programme has difficulty with curves printing a sort of stepped edge. As the unit badge contains white that is on white decal paper anyway.

 

My experiment with using standard 2mm Tamiya flexible masking tape has worked quite well, though I will have to do a bit of touching up to get a decent spiral on the spinners. Now all I have to decide what colour to paint the prop blades. Official instructions say they should have been painted in RLM70 Schwarzgrun, but the one in the Museum almost certainly has black ones so I might go with that.  I will post a pic once finished. Looks like the forecast for this week is rain so perhaps I will not have to start on the wall my wife wants in the garden.

 

See you around.

 

Subsequently test red decal worked fine and I have managed to clean the "C's" up a bit and reprint them so they are ready to go, along with the ZG26 Horst Wessel badge.

Edited June 10, 2019 by PeterB

[PeterB]

Prior to starting mottling, I have stuck on the decals for the JG26 badge as I "painted" them with a grey background. The picture below had to be adjusted due to low light levels so it is not quite true colour, but you can see that the "background" is not as close as it could be but should be easy enough to blend in with a little RLM76 paint. If it were a small serial number I could get away with just painting round the outside and any grey patches inside the numbers would be close enough to pass muster - that is why I use this odd technique, but I am open to suggestions if anybody knows a better way.

 

 

You can probably also see why it is not a good idea to cut too close to the actual design as the grey has run a bit round the edges. Once the microsol has dried I will varnish and paint it. Hopefully I will mottle the tail and the fuselage spine in a day or so and see how it looks.

 

More as and when -thanks for your interest.

Edited June 11, 2019 by PeterB