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Dewoitine 338, Free French, Africa 1941, Broplan 1/72 (vacu),


JWM

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Hi,

Dewoitne 338 was a luxury long range French passenger airplane from late thirties. 31 of them were build. You can read  more on this type here:

https://www.passionair1940.fr/Armee de l'Air/Appareils/Transport/Dewoitine-D338/EN-Dewoitine-D338.htm and here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dewoitine_D.338.

Few of them were captured by Britts in summer 1941 in Syria & Lebanon campaign  and them they were transferred to Free French forces. Together with other civil airplanes they went into LAM (Lignes Aériennes Militaires ) - the FFAF transport service  which was flying between Bayreuth and Brazzaville in Congo with base in Bangui (today Central African Republic). 

Each machine posses individual name. Mine has name "Belfort" (FL-AQB) and was renamed from "Ville de Beyrouth" (F-AQBD).    

The kit is by Broplan, vacu with small parts done as injection. The building thread within Mediterranean Theater of Operation GB  is here:

Here she is:

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(on above photos the khaki hue is reproduced closest to what I see by bare eye, below it goes too much to fresh green for some reasons...)

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The left engine just started! ;) :

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An some shots in African sun:

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So it is already fourth militarized civil French type in my collection, other are Potez 29, Potez 651 and Bloch MB 220:

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 Dewoitine is the largest of them !

 

This is mine No 19th in this year

 

 

comments welcome

Regards

Jerzy-Wojtek

 

 

 

 

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What? Number 19 of the year?  This is a great build, wonderful paint job and with vacuform!  An amazing accomplishment indeed.  You put my production goals to shame as I have always shot for 1 a month and am no where near that goal.  But should pick up once it starts to snow (which should be this week).

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On 11/8/2020 at 3:54 PM, swralph said:

Very nice.😀

 

On 11/8/2020 at 8:44 PM, dogsbody said:

Well done!

 

 

19 hours ago, spiton said:

Fantastic. Very rare !!

Thank you gents! :)

On 11/8/2020 at 11:31 PM, Harold55 said:

What? Number 19 of the year?  This is a great build, wonderful paint job and with vacuform!  An amazing accomplishment indeed.  You put my production goals to shame as I have always shot for 1 a month and am no where near that goal.  But should pick up once it starts to snow (which should be this week).

One per month was my last year rate, well - roughly. I did 13 during 2019. But in 2018 it was maximum number of my builds ever - 29.

I keep record of my builds since 1991, and average is perhaps close to 10 per year. Two or three years ago I realized, that still having above 250 kits in stash and my age one should to speed a bit up...- otherwise you cannot buy new kits ;). The secret of speeding up is in parallel constructions - a kind of Henry Ford method to some point.

 

On 11/9/2020 at 12:07 PM, Spitfire31 said:

I wouldn't have guessed that this elegant model started life as a number of vacformed sheets of styrene, if you hadn't revealed the origin in the header!

 

Excellent modelling.

 

Kind regards,

 

Joachim

 

Joachim, thank you. I appreciate. The vacu models are now phased a bit out for rare types in favor of resin ones of course, but this is very nice technique. I am not that expert as @Moa in it, but I do like it. This is I think No 14 or 15 vacu kit ever for me, so my experience is still very limited.... 

 

On 11/9/2020 at 5:49 PM, tonyot said:

Lovely job as usual mate,..... another type that I have never heard of,..... but have now!

Cheers

           Tony 

Tony, many thanks. This is indeed rare machine. I've learnt on it maybe some 10 years ago when I studied production list of small Polish company Broplan  looking what they offer in WW2 machines range (plus Spanish Civil War, Italian invasion in Abissynia and China-Japan war, in general 1935-45). There are some rarities which I want to build  (I hope soon) like for example Russian Shcherbakov ShCh2,  Italian Savoias SM 74  & SM 75 or a series of minor Polish types.... But not now, the end of this year belongs to French airplanes on my desk.

 

Best regards

Jerzy-Wojtek

 

 

 

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19 minutes ago, Buzby061 said:

Another rare bird & nicely done.

 

Pete

Many thanks! :)

8 minutes ago, Pin said:

Your work is inspirational, sir. Having this kit in stash my hands are itching to get it stated! Very well done! 

Great o hear, sir, thank you :) Advises - make more reinforcements in fuselage (in general - in all parts, the plastic is very thin). Use a caliper to adjust width of fuselage to match the width of canopy (I did that - it shown that i should not cut the thickness of card, as usually one have to do in vacu)

Have a fun of build!

Regards

J-W

 

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On 11/10/2020 at 11:09 PM, djos said:

Rare model and showing your great craftsmanship.

All collection looks great

Regards Djordje

Thank you. The next (and last) French transport machine in stash is Caudron Goeland, I am not decided yout for which livery...

 

On 11/10/2020 at 11:32 PM, TheyJammedKenny! said:

Impressive work on this, undoubtedly difficult kit, and great collection!  19 models in one year?  You have me beaten by a factor of...19.  Great job!

 

Alex

Many thanks! Still o month ahead, so you can try your best... :)

Regards

J-W

 

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3 hours ago, Pedro1 said:

Nice work on the Dewoitine Jerzy! I have one in the stash as well, but that one will be build in civilian Air France colours 🙂

 

Peter

Peter, thank you. I wanted to do her in this military livery, just being a bit afraid how the vacu formed surface will look in all silver, but when I sprayed bottom I was strongly tempted to do the all silver finish - even the same FL-AQB from end of war time  or earlier Vichy communication plane with yellow tail. But I decided to do finally the original my concept of chosen scheme... You should be careful with softness of thin plastic sheets - some construction should be added.

3 hours ago, Vesa Jussila said:

Nice work, I have have totally missed this vacuformed kit. Learning every day.

Thank you. Broplan has some really rare types in offert,, Dewoitine 338 is not the only one!

Regards

J-W

 

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16 hours ago, Wulfman said:

Excellent build and a lovely and different collection, first class modelling !

Many thanks! For some reasons the civil machines in military liveries are currently my favorite kind of subject do do. Likely because they are unarmed (what is not the case of Potez 651) or just because they are not obvious. 

10 hours ago, Vinnie said:

Lovely work again, Jerzy. Another unusual subject which sent me off to Wicki to find out more.

Thank you. I still have some surprising items in stash, so be prepared for next ;) !

 

10 hours ago, Ed Russell said:

That 338 is brilliant. Lots of work but great result.

 

I like the LAPE Goelands - there are several liveries but this is the nicest.

Ed, thank you. The LAPE livery is a good choice, one more to think about.... And the German Afrika Korps is good as well. 

BTW - nice your double build of also vacu Goelands. Now, with RS kit it should be much easier.

Regards

 

Jerzy-Wojtek

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by JWM
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I am writing this post just to check, of my answer will bring back the thread to first page, because my previous post did not and was not displayed as last post in whole RFI current list.

Regards

J-W

 

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