Chief Cohiba Posted December 8, 2019 Share Posted December 8, 2019 Being Austrian, the topic of Aviation is something, that you're only involved from a distance, if any. Apart from being famous for the prolongued use of Swedish flying history (we used the Draken until 2005, making it a 50 year old plane in active service) and difficult purchasing processes, there isn't much aviation happening in Austria in the recent years. That wasn't always the case, as in the very early days of aviation, the Royal Austro-Hungarian Aviation Troops (or K.u.K. Luftfahrttruppen) where the seventh-largest airforce in the world, While, to be honest, most of the models where derived from German models, there was a kind of an Aviation industry in Austria. Me definitely not being exposed to patriotic influences in a larger dose, this just being a bit of a historic sideletter to larger chapters in the book of flight. But not too long ago I found out, that one of the larger companies, the Phönix Flugzeugwerke AG, had it's original location close to where I was raised and used to play as a small boy in the 70ies. Even the original factory buildings where partly in use then, in my memory a transport carrier was located there until the early 2000s. So, this has become something a bit personal, and when I discoverd that Special Hobby had a DI in their offering, I had to order one sometimes last year or so. Giving it the usual time to mellow it in the stash, I stated to work on it this summer. Sorry for not involving you in a WIP, it just started as a side project and sort of a late night build, but nevertheless I finished yesterday. About the build; the modell is somekind of basic in some aspects, with only some 30 plastic parts, complemented by some resin- and photoetch parts, Some parts are really beautiful, like the body with nicely molded caps and lids, and some nicely structures for rivets and various structures, and some very parts are so basic, like struts and landing gear, it almost hurts. Also, there is no structure for holding or giving a bit of positioning aid when mounting the upper wings, so from a point in build, about when the lower wings has been mounted, I'd say, you mainly use CA-glue as, plastic cements just doesn't do the job any more. Also, the instructions are somewhat very basic, giving just an rough idea what to do. So there where moments when I sincerely doubted to finish this - but I've went through, but ordered some help in form of a biplane jig from JS models, without I doubt I would have been there. And, yes; I know there are other jigs as well, but this was the only one available late night, when I suffered a moment of deep desparation. For the version I wanted to display; as I didn't like the brown mottle camouflage offered with the decals, I decided to give here a bare livery without any paint, of natural wood and bare linen. I painted the wings in Light Stone Grey from Lifecolor, giving it a quite yellowy linen colour, the body/wood structure with Cold base Wood, also from Livecolor and giving it a cover of Uschi Van Der Rosten wood decals. For the rear struts (after some examination, if these are thin struts, not wires). I used some electric guitar strings. Beware, these are very strong and can easily kill some modelling tools. Caps and hoods were painted with Alclad Semi Matt Aluminium, which maybe turned out a bit to matte, but I think it's okay. Rigging is done with EZ Fine, I decided not to make any turnbuckles, as these are so tiny one would barely see. Maybe I'll change this in future builds of that scale, but I do not miss them overly on this, to be honest. Mayor difficulties where the installation of the upper wing, as stated before, the mounting of the exhaust pipes, which I didn't manage to align properly, due to having installed to upper wing prior, and not having drilled some holes at the very beginning, but according to the manual. While definitely not being perfect and having a lot of flaws, I'm happy so far with the result of this little bit of kind of exotic early aviation. 😉 Here are some impressions, some details look much harsher as on the real model, due to small size: 24 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chief Cohiba Posted December 8, 2019 Author Share Posted December 8, 2019 Also, a few details I would like to present to your hopefully forgiving consideration... 16 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
russ c Posted December 8, 2019 Share Posted December 8, 2019 Very nicely done, great job 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chief Cohiba Posted December 8, 2019 Author Share Posted December 8, 2019 And, as promised, here are one or two pictures of her being still in the rig, here in the final stage with the upper beams removed. Being a mayor help on this, and I would say on biplane modelling in general... 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mig88 Posted December 8, 2019 Share Posted December 8, 2019 Wow!! Regardless of everything you did a lovely job with it. It looks great! Miguel 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brandy Posted December 8, 2019 Share Posted December 8, 2019 Very nicely done! The Austro-Hungarian manufacturers produced some very unorthodox aircraft during the Great War, and many are available as kits. The sea planes in particular are very pleasing to the eye! Ian 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chief Cohiba Posted December 8, 2019 Author Share Posted December 8, 2019 Just now, limeypilot said: Very nicely done! The Austro-Hungarian manufacturers produced some very unorthodox aircraft during the Great War, and many are available as kits. The sea planes in particular are very pleasing to the eye! Ian Ian, many thanks! It was a nice lesson in making a model out of quite simple kit - definitely nothing to compare with one of these WNW masterpieces. Also in the result. But it was fun. Well, most of the time, that is... 😉 I have noticed a raised interest in the Austro-Hungarian Planes as well, and also I plan to do more. Still in the stash I have Eduards "Viribus Unitis" Package of the two Oeffag Albatrosses, the Naval (Seeflieger) Version of the Phoenix, and a Lloyd, both from Special Hobby. Any other I should have a look on? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brandy Posted December 8, 2019 Share Posted December 8, 2019 I'm not au fait with 1:48 I'm afraid as I build in 1:72, but I have a Lloyd, a few Lohners and Hansa-Brandenburgs ( both sea and land planes), a couple of Phoenix as well as the OEFFAG Albatrosses. I also built an Austro-Hungarian Donnet-Leveque a couple of years ago, which won a gold at this years SMW in Telford! Ian 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chief Cohiba Posted December 8, 2019 Author Share Posted December 8, 2019 3 hours ago, limeypilot said: I also built an Austro-Hungarian Donnet-Leveque a couple of years ago, which won a gold at this years SMW in Telford! I've just scrolled through the build log and you see me very impressed - to be honest I'm shying away still from the madness of a vacuform build. But it's great to see someone mastering this level. I could've guessed that there's more i 1/72 than in Quarterscale, but I found this being my preferred scale with this small biplanes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bughunter Posted December 8, 2019 Share Posted December 8, 2019 Very nice so far! You invited me to shown my Phönix too, now in the neighbor thread The inner struts was made from steel, so painted balck instead of wood. But how to hell you managed to use the kit struts? I replaced the outer ones with wood and the inner with brass. Cheers, Frank Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chief Cohiba Posted December 8, 2019 Author Share Posted December 8, 2019 1 hour ago, Bughunter said: Very nice so far! You invited me to shown my Phönix too, now in the neighbor thread The inner struts was made from steel, so painted balck instead of wood. But how to hell you managed to use the kit struts? I replaced the outer ones with wood and the inner with brass. Already left a note, very fine one must admit! 🧐 Thanks for the hint with the inner struts, obviously to late for this one, but will do so on my Marineflieger. The struts - well, these were quite a bit of a struggle, wouldn*t have been possble without the jig. Started with the inner struts, glued them on the upper wing, slightly narrower than needed. Holding it in position with blue tac, glueing it with gap filling medium slow, chilled CA glue. That gives you about 5 seconds to position, then a drop of accelerator. Then positioned it with the jig, having slight tension as these were narrower than the body, it kept position almost on its own. Again gap filling glue. Then the outer struts, bending the wings in position. Again, the right CA glue is you friend on this. Yes, this was a bit of a fiddle... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMCS Posted December 8, 2019 Share Posted December 8, 2019 Superb 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reini78 Posted December 9, 2019 Share Posted December 9, 2019 I like the paintjob Good to see some Austrian stuff 😉 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chief Cohiba Posted December 10, 2019 Author Share Posted December 10, 2019 On 12/9/2019 at 8:38 AM, Reini78 said: I like the paintjob Good to see some Austrian stuff 😉 Many thanks, I just didnÄt like the "original" livery. There have been some additions in 1/48 recently with Austro-Hungarian origins, and, as stated, I have some of them in my stash. So stay tuned... 😉 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now