Max Headroom Posted July 9, 2021 Share Posted July 9, 2021 Just a holding post for now. I will be building the Airfix Fw190 A8 in 1/72 as my entry (entree?). Lots of nice vagueness about colours, so I can be relaxed about the exact shade of green (or maybe grey) for this. Not sure I have the roundels (cocards?) for this yet so I will be rifling through the spares box, otherwise the Big H will be getting my custom shortly. Box and sprue photos to follow this weekend. Allons-y Treveur 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JOCKNEY Posted July 9, 2021 Share Posted July 9, 2021 Great choice and a nice surprise to see an FW190 on here. "Bon chance mon ami" Cheers Pat 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 9, 2021 Author Share Posted July 9, 2021 15 minutes ago, JOCKNEY said: Great choice and a nice surprise to see an FW190 on here. "Bon chance mon ami" Cheers Pat It’s not an Fw190!!!!!!! 😆 Trevor 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete in Lincs Posted July 9, 2021 Share Posted July 9, 2021 44 minutes ago, Max Headroom said: It’s not an Fw190!!!!!! Just Deja vu. (Now that is yer akshul French, y'know). 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JOCKNEY Posted July 9, 2021 Share Posted July 9, 2021 56 minutes ago, Max Headroom said: It’s not an Fw190!!!!!!! 😆 Trevor Really ? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 9, 2021 Author Share Posted July 9, 2021 37 minutes ago, JOCKNEY said: Really ? There may be a family resemblance..... Trevor 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wez Posted July 10, 2021 Share Posted July 10, 2021 "Non monsieur, ce n’est pas un Fw-190, c'est un Société Nationale de Constructions Aéronautiques du Centre NC900. Honnêtement, il est!*" stumps off stage left with a Gallic shrug in search of some Pastis and a Gauloise. Treveur, I like your choice as it is a demonstration of the parlous state of the French aircraft industry post WW2. Welcome to the GB and good luck. *Honestly it is 1 1 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 10, 2021 Author Share Posted July 10, 2021 Given the shocking lack of NC900 kits in any scale, I will be forced to use the Airfix Fw190A-8 kit and take on any changes as will be necessary. Here are the obligatory box and sprue shots of my Hangar Queen, a purchase dating back five years because “I’ll build it one day”. I’m sure that’s a sentiment familiar to many! All looks pretty straightforward. I’ve heard that the cowling can be a bit of a ‘mare and that there’s a spurious access hatch on the starboard tailplane. If anyone knows of any other boo-boos please let me know. Not sure the potlets of paint will be of any use here, but some day maybe another German plane will benefit from them. Not shown are the small tube of Humbrol stringy type glue and the brush. The former will be added to my stash of unused tubes and the Humbrol no.2 brush was hijacked years ago. To the spares box for the French markings. Once again my stash of old FROG transfers came up trumps. The roundels look about the right size and I’m sure I can do something to mark up the tail stripes matching with paint. As far as I can tell and some D-Day stripes apart on at least one example, the NC900 doesn’t look as if it hung around long enough to sport any fancy markings. At the moment I think a generic overall dark green will be the scheme. Take your pick of left over German, or surplus US and British paints. For reasons I’ll explain later, I’ve decided this will have an RLM green (of some sort). As an alternative, I believe some had a grey nose and yet others were overall grey. Next instalment we’ll be talking about chalk caves...... Trevor 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Graham Boak Posted July 10, 2021 Share Posted July 10, 2021 The French AF equivalent of "D-Day stripes" were considerably thinner than the regulation ones. The NC900 was issued to Normandie-Niemen, so I suspect that there may well have been a unit badge added. However, I don't know offhand of any actual photos with any markings of any kind other than the roundels/rudder stripes. For a colour I'd use Olive Drab as that seems to have been close to the ubiquitous post war Khaki seen on many French types, much to my personal disfavour. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grandboof Posted July 11, 2021 Share Posted July 11, 2021 It will great to see this unfold Martin H 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 11, 2021 Author Share Posted July 11, 2021 What then, is an NC900? To be frank it’s a bitza made up of already existing wings and fuselages, mainly of A5 and A8’s, although I read that A3’s and some G’s were in that mix too. Marry this to new, unused French made BMW801 engines and ‘viola’ that is an NC900. No attempt was made to have sub variants. So an NC900 is an NC900. All were remanufactured in a former chalk quarry at Cravant situated halfway between Tours and Paris. Repurposed as an aircraft factory by the French pre-war, it was captured by the Germans before anything was made there. Only in the latter part of the war was it activated by the Germans as a repair facility for damaged Fw190’s. On liberation over 100 sets of wings and fuselages were found abandoned. Poor (read subtlety sabotaged) engines built by Voisin and a mismatch of parts made these machines very unreliable and dangerous to fly. Unpopular with pilots who flew them, they were withdrawn after about 12 months and sold as spares to keep Turkish examples flying. Only one example remains and is painted up as a 190 in the Musee de’l Aire. Purely because it sounds plausible, I will assume that in addition to the hardware, Germans abandoned pots of paint there too and so I’m intending to paint mine up in some shade of RLM grun. Trevor 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jean Posted July 13, 2021 Share Posted July 13, 2021 (edited) Bonsoir Treeveeur, I do not think that you should worry about any serious discrepancies between the Luftwaffe and Armee de l'Air 190 airframes. Do it OOB, stick the Frog roundels (that reminds me that I do have this P-47 D in my stash since the late 70s.... Need to do something with it! Anyway, have a lot of fun! JR Edited July 13, 2021 by jean 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RidgeRunner Posted July 13, 2021 Share Posted July 13, 2021 I’m tempted to submit a Ju88! 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 13, 2021 Author Share Posted July 13, 2021 1 hour ago, RidgeRunner said: I’m tempted to submit a Ju88! https://tenor.com/urim.gif Trevor Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jean Posted July 13, 2021 Share Posted July 13, 2021 1 hour ago, jean said: Bonsoir Treeveeur, I do not think that you should worry about any serious discrepancies between the Luftwaffe and Armee de l'Air 190 airframes. Do it OOB, stick the Frog roundels (that reminds me that I do have this P-47 D in my stash since the late 70s.... Need to do something with it! Anyway, have a lot of fun! JR Sorry, I forgot something crucial! The instruments will be labelled in French!!!!! Make double sure your IP has no German words!!!!! PHEEEEW! Glad I caught you on time. JR 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 13, 2021 Author Share Posted July 13, 2021 4 minutes ago, jean said: Sorry, I forgot something crucial! The instruments will be labelled in French!!!!! Make double sure your IP has no German words!!!!! PHEEEEW! Glad I caught you on time. JR Wow! Dodged a bullet there. Thanks mate 👍 Trevor 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Biggles87 Posted July 16, 2021 Share Posted July 16, 2021 So how will we be able to tell ( apart from the national markings ) that it’s not a ‘190 then? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grandboof Posted July 17, 2021 Share Posted July 17, 2021 Hi Trevor Print Scale do a set for FW190s in foreign service which includes markings for an NC900 including the fin stripes and thinner D-Day stripes . Should be still available . Martin H Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JOCKNEY Posted July 17, 2021 Share Posted July 17, 2021 20 hours ago, Biggles87 said: So how will we be able to tell ( apart from the national markings ) that it’s not a ‘190 then? Exactly ! I would glue the prop solid for a seized engine to make it more authentic Cheers Pat 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michou Posted July 18, 2021 Share Posted July 18, 2021 A rather poor photograph given to me by a colleague who served in the Armée de l'Air. Mike 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 20, 2021 Author Share Posted July 20, 2021 On 7/16/2021 at 3:13 PM, Biggles87 said: So how will we be able to tell ( apart from the national markings ) that it’s not a ‘190 then? Coz NC.900 is marked on the tail in black crayon! On 7/17/2021 at 10:24 AM, Grandboof said: Hi Trevor Print Scale do a set for FW190s in foreign service which includes markings for an NC900 including the fin stripes and thinner D-Day stripes . Should be still available . Martin H Thanks for that but I’ll use the FROG sheet (the naughty part of me wants to put it in SEAC markings!) On 7/17/2021 at 11:28 AM, JOCKNEY said: Exactly ! I would glue the prop solid for a seized engine to make it more authentic Cheers Pat I’ll be using stringy Britfix just to make sure 🤓 On 7/18/2021 at 8:54 PM, Michou said: A rather poor photograph given to me by a colleague who served in the Armée de l'Air. Mike I like that ⬆️ The third one seems to have a darker nose - doesn’t look like a cover. Maybe black??? Looks to be the same shade as the spinner. This is giving me a wide palette of colours in which maybe to be wrong, or within the bounds of ‘licence artistique’ or something. No butchering of plastic yet folks as it’s too darned hot (sounds like a film title) and my spare time is being utilised either doing summery things, or standing in a cold shower. Trevor typing in 31*c......... 3 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 25, 2021 Author Share Posted July 25, 2021 And I’m off! Temperature has cooled a bit and so I thought I’d start whittling the plastic. First off though, I had a look at a few photos and a couple of things were apparent. Firstly, the wing cannon were not fitted. Looking at the wing leading edges the hole for the muzzles were covered over, not in a temporary, taped over kind of way, but not fitted in the first place. Secondly the the starboard wing-tip pitot was set much further in. For the first thing, I shaved of the ejector shute moulding from the underside panel inserts. So eschewing the norm of cockpit first, I thought I’d rebel (slightly). The inner shute hole also needed fairing over Strangely it seems the upper panel cover for the inner gun at the wing root remained in place, so no need to touch that. As for the pitot tip, I’ll leave that alone for now, unless of course it falls off due to ‘an accident’. Cockpit was next, not much to report as there was only a seat, a control column and an instrument panel. I’m guessing that the recommended Humbrol 145 is RLM66? As I’m not well stocked (at all!) on Luftwaffe paints so I had a rummage and found a Games Workshop Mechanicous Medium Grey. So I thought ‘near enough for me’. The instructions quote 145 for the wheel well and fuselage too. A coat was given to all. Good stuff this Gameshop Workshop paint and all of the generic colours I have give good single coat covering. DetaIling was confined to rubbing a HB pencil over to highlight some of the raised detail and a thin black wash for the holes in the wheel well roof. Overall I thought it gives a pleasing effect. I’d have a few more photos, but I'm coming to the limit on my free storage with Flickr and have been busy shedding old pix to make room. I’m going to have to bite the bullet and pay for storage 😡 More soon! Trevor 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 25, 2021 Author Share Posted July 25, 2021 I heard that the nose area is a bit of a nightmare and sure enough it is somewhat tricky. My first problem was to fix the exhausts to the fuselage sides. Try as I might, although I could get one side to fit, would the other? Of course not. Life is too short to sweat the little things in life, so snip, snip and I separated the two sides and glued them in individually. Result!🥳 Trevor 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted July 25, 2021 Author Share Posted July 25, 2021 A bit more work on the front The two part nose insert isn’t exactly a seamless fit. My reasoning is that it wasn’t snug in the first place! And this is where I’m up to Blimey, this is coming together quickly. Trevor 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jean Posted July 29, 2021 Share Posted July 29, 2021 Hi Treveur, the build is going really well so far. Well done. A lot of people have complained that the fit on the Airfix 190 was atrocious and more than one have been sent to the local landfill. I hope this won't be the fate of yours! As an anecdote, here is a photo I found in a magazine dating back from 1988: It is a bas relief sculpted in a wall of an underground chalk mine in the Yonne valley, near Auxerre. During the war the Luftwaffe had set up a an underground factory inside the tunnels, where FW 190 were repaired. After the war the SNCAC took over the facility for the reconditioning of the FW 190s left behind by the Germans. The above is likely to have been carved during the war by one member of the French forced labour. It won't help diddly-squat with your build, but it may give you some ideas, if you happen to have a chalk mine in your garden! Have fun! JR 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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