Building a Kanonen Vogel: Hasegawa Ju 87-G

[Ferrata]

Welcome to anyone interested in following this. After completing the first in the line, the 1/48 Special Hobby Ju 87-A, I have been itching to build the last of the line. Just for completeness, of course. But this time I thought I would do something a bit different and go for 1/32 scale instead of my normal 1/48. It will give me a chance to try out some detailing and challenge my painting skills to produce something that does not look like a toy!

 

The base for this build will be the Hasegawa kit.

This has been sitting in the stash for some time as it is the one with the figure of Rudel and his dog but I don't think I will be tackling them this time round.

At the moment I can't decide if this will be a G1 or a G2 so I will start on the generic parts of the build while the gears turn and I make my mind up. The difference, for any not aware, was the G1 was based on converted D3 airframes and the G2 were factory remanufactured airframes based on the extended wing D5, about 174 airframes in total. The G1 may be a little more interesting as they retained many of the attributes of the dive bombers they were converted from but...

 

Anyway here is the progress so far.

Test fit looks good but the spinner looks a little odd. Will have to look into that.

Control surfaces separated.

37mm cannon built and detailed. I used wire for the compressed air, and electrical connections.

Replacement barrels are from Master in Poland and are absolutely beautiful!

Cockpit will be next and I have a PE set from Eduard to help a bit with this. Oh, I also opened up the underwing radiators to add a bit more life. Replacement exit flaps were made from the foil from the top of a wine bottle and looks a lot more to scale.

That's it for now before I bore anyone still reading this. Hopefully I can get a bit more work done this week and will post an update.

Thanks for having a look. 

[billn53]

That’s gonna be big and beautiful!

[Ferrata]

Been a busy week but I have managed to make some progress. I started work on the cockpit using the Eduard PE set and some scratch built bits and pieces. When thinking about this build, I had been torn between using PE or getting the Aires resin set, but after looking at a few pictures of the resin decided on the PE route. The resin set looked beautiful but a lot of the detail would not be visible and there were some inaccuracies that would need to be corrected. That, coupled with the inevitable struggles to get it to fit, finally tipped the balance. 

The side walls and floor are now ready to paint.  All that remains is to add in the rear gun and ammo containers. Eduard include replacement items for these and although nicely detailed, they do not look like the ones in period photos, so I will retain the kit parts and add some detail to these.

 

Likewise, the PE seat does not have the curves of the real thing, so I have used the kit part after thinning down the side walls and adding the PE armour. Headrest padding and cushions are next to complete the seat, then it will be ready for painting.

The prominent cable down the front of the control column is missing on the kit part so I added that with stretched sprue, the final bit is still to be trimmed in this photo. 

Rudder pedals and mechanism are attached to the back of an instrument panel blank ready for paint, something the resin set did not represent properly.

 

Speaking of the instrument panel, I thought I would try one of the new 3D printed items, but when it arrived from ebay, it just didn't look right. The printed item seemed to be of all different thicknesses, unrelated to the real thing, and the blind flying panel was the wrong colour; black not RLM 66. The final nail was when I ordered it, I hadn't noticed the part was for the Trumpeter kit and does not fit directly into the Hasegawa one. I could have worked around this if it had been good, but with the problems I mentioned it was not worth the effort. I'll just stick with Eduard's PE part this time. 

I just noticed that the blind flying panel on the PE part in the photo is also black but there is another part to go over this that is the correct colour.

 

Finally, I got a package from Hannants this week.

New prop' blades, exhausts, brass barrels for the MG81z and seat belts. As you can see there is quite a difference between the kit and replacement blades! 

The seat belts look like a lot of fun for someone with shaky hands i.e. me! Fabric belts which have to be cut out and threaded through separate buckles. They should look good assuming I can make the blooming things. 🙂 

 

Anyway, that's enough for now. Hopefully I'll have some paint on things for the next update.

Cheers, 

[phildagreek]

Wow, already very impressed!

[Ferrata]

Thanks phildagreek. Only just getting started so plenty of opportunities to stuff it up to come. 😁

[Holzhamer]

Lots of goodies there, and your work imoroving the sidewalls of the cockpit is very nice indeed.

Funny seeing that the kit pilot seat is as bad as it’s 1/48 brother. Following with interest

[Ferrata]

18 hours ago, Holzhamer said:

Lots of goodies there, and your work imoroving the sidewalls of the cockpit is very nice indeed.

Funny seeing that the kit pilot seat is as bad as it’s 1/48 brother. Following with interest

Agreed, the seat is a bit poor but it has a good basic shape so is a reasonable base to work from. I suppose the kit is starting to show its age now.

[mick]

great start ,will be following your build

[Ferrata]

Quick update. I got some paint on the cockpit interior and put on some more of the PE. Going to have to stop now as my eyes are going crossed with all the small parts!

I'll post some better pictures later.

Bye for now.

I

[Zack]

Hello Ferrata, 

Looking very good from were I am seated! 

I have one Hasegawa an a second Italeri 1/48 residing on the SOD, your post has already triggerd me to pull them out again 👍 

Just out of curiosity, are you going to leave the aft of the sidewalls in alu? 

 

Thank you for sharing and happy modelling! 

 

Zack

 

 

[Ferrata]

Hi Zack,

Glad to hear of another two models getting a chance to come off the SOD. I have a few there myself. I’ve not tried the Italeri Stuka yet but have a couple in the stash, what do you think of it?

 

I am going to leave the sidewalls bare alu for this one. According to the Hikoki book Luftwaffe Colours 1935-1945 the RLM issued started simplifying painting interiors from 1942 resulting in many alu surfaces being unpainted. This matches up with the Ju87-G at Hendon. The cockpit on this example has not been restored and photos show much of the sidewalls are unpainted. I had a visit to see this aircraft with the museum’s curator a few years ago and he told me the reddish tinge seen on the bare alu areas is from a coat of Waxoil that was splashed about in the 60’s as a preservative measure. I plan on weathering the cockpit down a bit so that will get rid of the metallic shine.

Cheers,

[Ferrata]

 Hello again,

 

Things are progressing nicely with the cockpit. The main parts are now painted and next step will be to give them a coat of Tamiya gloss ready for a wash and some dry brushing. 

I made new seat cushions and headrest from milliput which definitely looks better, still working up the enthusiasm to tackle the seatbelts though!

The PE instrument panel from the Eduard set was pre-coloured and just drops in but the kit gunsight was a bit disappointing. the reflector glass was moulded on in grey plastic so I cut this off with the intention of replacing it with clear sheet later in the build.

To get a break from the cockpit I started work on the undercarriage, To cater for other versions Hasegawa have moulded the spats with the siren mounts in place. Fine if you want a D-1 or a D-3 but no good for a G so these have to be removed, like the one on the left.

I also got the wing centre section built and started some dry fitting to look for any problems. The good news is that, so far, the fit is great with only some minor touching up looking likely. 

Anyway, have a good weekend and happy building.

[Sturmovik]

Take care when trying to fit part J4 into the fuselage, it won't fit properly. Though that may have been my own mistake.

[Ferrata]

I see what you mean Sturmovik, I’ve just tried it and it does look Iike it will take a bit of work. Thanks for the warning.

[Sturmovik]

1 hour ago, Ferrata said:

I see what you mean Sturmovik, I’ve just tried it and it does look Iike it will take a bit of work. Thanks for the warning.

It could be that the cockpit walls are too far aft, and that makes J4 don't fit properly. I jad to use brute force in order to make it fit. Luckily, nothing broke, but I suggest you try being more patient than me.

[2lefthands]

It looks terrific already!

The eduard pre-colored pe parts look alot nicer to me, when matte coated lightly. Masking the glossy instruments of course

[Ferrata]

Sorry it's been a little while since the last update but there has been some progress. After a coat of Tamiya clear I got started on weathering the cockpit. Reasoning that these aircraft would have a fairly short operational life I decided to keep it fairly light and gave it a couple of washes with black and dark brown before dry brushing with a couple of different shades. I finished off by adding a few areas of light chipping using the old sponge technique. I still find that, done lightly, this gives a result that looks pretty realistic. The mental sticking point for me though was how to add the ammo feeds to the rear gun without the constant worry of knocking the blooming gun off during the rest of the build! I needn't have worried, after checking a few photo's I realised that the feeds go from the Ammo containers to the bottom of the exit chutes which Hasegawa have helpfully moulded as part of the gun mount not the gun. The feeds were made from PE and not my best work as they are a bit creased but they will do for me. The whole thing was finished off with a blast of Tamiya flat (not forgetting the IP where the dials got a touch of gloss, thanks 2lefthands) ready to be closed up in the fuselage.

 

The observant will notice something missing - seats. The seatbelts have taken a couple of nights work, Cutting out the printed fabric belts, threading into buckles and gluing together. No mean feat for my shaky hands! My issue now is how to get them to hang realistically once in position - any tips?

 

 

 

After all that fiddly stuff I needed something simple so I got started on the wheels. I'm planning on using the kit ones so I cleaned up the seams and gave them a coat of rubber black. Next I will paint the hubs black and give them a bit of weathering.

That's all for now. Until the next instalment, happy modelling . 

[Marklo]

Lovely build so far. Just being a bit pedantic on the tyres. Not having access to actual rubber like the allies German industry relied on synthetic rubber and afaik this was a dark grey rather than black.

[Ferrata]

Hi Marklo,

Thanks for the comment. You probably know Tamiya's rubber black is not black but more like a black grey. I think it make a good base colour for tyres but what would you recommend for Luftwaffe?

[Pete in Lincs]

Lovely build so far. Impressive looking I.P. too. Marklo is right about the tyres. I've seen models done with a sort of dark sea grey used.

The only reason tyres are black is because they add Carbon Black to the mixture.

 

BTW, if you see a Luftwaffe tyre with white walls, that means it's earthed for refuelling purposes. I only found this out myself a couple of years ago!

 

Here's a cannon vogel on take off

https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WiU427cPp6I/XzBFQs1RDcI/AAAAAAAAg5M/svjvfywkdfEd-CPsPbJEgWpiIx7tIxVmACLcBGAsYHQ/s640/Ju87GECPAD.jpg

[Sturmovik]

26 minutes ago, Ferrata said:

but what would you recommend for Luftwaffe?

I use Revell 78 Panzer Grey for all my tyres.

[Ferrata]

Actually, it looks like a repaint of the tyres is on the cards regardless. The D series onwards all seem to have have smooth tyres in period photo's and the kit ones have grooves running across the tyre so looks like I will have to fill and smooth these ones off. Unless I can fine any pictures showing a tread. 

[Ferrata]

Thanks Gent's, a dark grey it is.

 

 

[Ferrata]

On 9/25/2021 at 9:43 PM, Pete in Lincs said:

Lovely build so far. Impressive looking I.P. too. Marklo is right about the tyres. I've seen models done with a sort of dark sea grey used.

The only reason tyres are black is because they add Carbon Black to the mixture.

 

BTW, if you see a Luftwaffe tyre with white walls, that means it's earthed for refuelling purposes. I only found this out myself a couple of years ago!

 

Here's a cannon vogel on take off

https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WiU427cPp6I/XzBFQs1RDcI/AAAAAAAAg5M/svjvfywkdfEd-CPsPbJEgWpiIx7tIxVmACLcBGAsYHQ/s640/Ju87GECPAD.jpg

 

Good picture, I don't think I've seen that one before. I had read that it was common practice to paint the side walls white to protect against UV in strong sunlight regions. The earthing explanation is new to me. Was it a temporary thing i.e. stuck on for refuelling?

[Pete in Lincs]

I'm still not sure how it worked. You need to have an open path for static electricity to flow down.

Normal practice when I worked on Aircraft was to have separate earthing leads. One from the Aircraft to the ground, and one from the Aircraft to the bowser.

I think I've only seen the Luftwaffe tailwheel with the whitewalls. So I imagine that maybe a metal strip was moulded into the rubber somehow?

Yet with grease in the bearings, continuous metal to metal contact to earth would be sketchy. It all sounds a bit dodgy to me.

Maybe I'm missing something. I'll ask in the WW2 questions.