Valiant Wings Airframe & Miniature 5 Early Series (to E-9 including T) and 11 Bf.109 Late Series (F-K & Z) Second Editions

[Mike]

Airframe & Miniature 5 Early Series (to E-9 including T) and 11 Bf.109 Late Series (F-K & Z) Second Editions

A Complete Guide To The Luftwaffe's Famous Fighter

Valiant Wings Publishing

 

 

There can't be many folks with an interest in WWII aviation that wouldn’t know what a Bf.109 looked like, although some still refer to it technically incorrectly as an Me.109.  A great many of us have a liking for this aircraft, despite the despotic regime that it represented at the time.  They are just pieces of metal, paint and rubber, afterall.  The Bf.109, a product of the Messerschmitt works was a pre-war design that went on to serve valiantly to the end of the war, and went through many variants, including a Zwilling twin prototype, and a long-winged T variant that was originally intended to serve on the on-again-off-again aircraft carrier DKM Graf Zeppelin.  Even though it was supposed to be replaced by supposedly better aircraft such as the Fw.190, it soldiered on alongside them to the very end, and as a ‘license built’ Spanish Buchon, and in other foreign service post-war.  A few original airframes still survive, but if you see a 109 in the sky at an airshow, it's most likely the previously mention Buchon that sports a Merlin engine, with exhausts high on the modified cowling, rather than low down on the original inverted-V Daimler Benz engines.

 

This is the second edition of this pair of books, the first of which covered the early 109s and was released in 2015, later joined by its sibling that covered the later marks up until the end of production.  They also cover the oddities mentioned above, which will be of significance to anyone that is interested in the almost or what-if possibilities of this versatile airframe.  After a few years away, the duo has now been republished due to resurgent demand, packed with even more information, model builds and photos.

 

Both books are perfect bound in a card jacket and printed on glossy paper with spot colour throughout.  The author for each one is the prolific Richard A Franks, with Richard J Caruana providing the colour profiles as usual with this interesting series.  Attached to the rear inner cover of each volume are a set of plans that will be of great use to any modeller that likes to compare and contrast their plastic replicas with profiles and plans.

 

 

Airframe & Miniature 5, Bf.109 V1 to E-9 including T-series – ISBN: 9781912932252

 

 

Expanded from 208 to 232 pages, it details the development of the 109 from early design work, prototypes, initial production and the early marks that saw service during the expansion of the Reich, and the Nazi's "dry-run" of their Blitzkreig warfare during the Spanish Civil War, and finally in the early part of WWII when it was tested against the British Spitfire and found to be a reasonable match in some modes of flight, but in need of improvement if it was to keep up with the steady development of the fabulous Merlin engine and the Supermarine engineers constantly improving on the original design.  There are new builds in the pages of the 1:72 Special Hobby and the 1:48 Wingsy Models kits.

 

 

 

 

The pages are broken down as follows:

 

Airframe Chapters

• Evolution 10
• Bf.109B series 14
• Bf.109C & D series 26
• Bf.109E prototypes 33
• Bf.109E production 41
• Bf.109 T-series, projects and one-off conversions 55
• Camouflage & markings 61
• Colour Profiles 81

 

Miniature Chapters

• Bf.109V1 to E-9 and T-series kits 92
• Building a selection 116
• Building a collection 144
• In detail: The Bf.109 166

 

Appendices

• Bf.109V1 to E-9 (including T-series) kit list 209
• Bf.109V1 to E-9 (including T-series) accessories list 214
• Bf.109V1 to E-9 (including T-series) decal list 220
• Bibliography 230

 

Fold-Outs – Equivalent to 8 sides of A4

• Scale plans – V1, B-0 Fold Out A
• Scale plans – D-1, E-1, E7 Trop, T-2 Fold Out B

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Airframe & Miniature Volume 11 – Bf.109 Late Series (F to K including the Z-series) ISBN: 9781912932269

 

 

With a further expanded page count up to 256 pages, this volume documents the struggle to develop the 109 past the point that it probably would have seen if it weren't for the changing tides of war and the whirlwind that Nazi Germany reaped after its failure to conquer Britain, and the declaration of war by the American after Pearl Harbour shook them from their isolationist reverie.  The changes involved many dead-ends, including V-tail, retractable oil cooler, skis, wide-track undercarriage and just about any kind of aerodynamic of mechanical updates that the engineers thought could give them advantage over the Spitfire and eventually the Mustang, Thunderbolt and many other late war heavy fighters.  This edition has builds of the recent 1:35 Border Models G-6, and a two-set conversion of the Revell/Hasegawa 1:32 kit from a G-4 to a G-12 trainer, using an Alley Cat conversion set.

 

 

 

 

The page breakdown is as follows:

 

Airframe Chapters

• Evolution – Bf.109F Series 24
• Evolution – Bf.109G Series 41
• Evolution – Bf.109H, K and Z series 62
• Camouflage and Markings and Colour Profiles 69

 

Miniature Chapters

• Bf.109F to G series Kits 110
• Building a Selection 124
• Building a Collection 149
• In Detail: The Bf.109F to K 180
  • Cockpit & Canopy 181
  • Fuselage 191
  • Engine, Radiator, Cowls & Propeller 193
  • Supercharger Intake 196
  • Cowl Types 201
  • Oil, Fuel, Coolant, Oxygen, Hydraulic & GM-1 and/or MW50 Systems 204
  • Wings & Flight Controls 206
  • Tail 213
  • Undercarriage 217
  • Armament, Ordnance & Drop Tanks 220
  • Camera, Radio & Radar Systems 230
  • Miscellaneous 235

 

Appendices

• Bf.109F to K Series Kit List 236
• Bf.109F to K Series Accessory List 239
• Bf.109F to K Series Decal List 246
• Bibliography 255

 

1:48 Scale Plans Fold-Out – Equivalent to 8 sides of A4

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Conclusion

As we have come to expect from this series, indeed any of the Valiant Wings publications, the text is interesting, the photos of high quality, and the drawings are crisp with lots of informative captions.  The colour profiles are of high quality, and the isometrics that show the differences between marks are my personal favourites.  There is plenty to interest the aviation enthusiast as well as the modeller, but the modelling section is great for us plastic fiends, with models of the highest quality being showcased with tips and tricks to obtain similar results, with all major scales represented from many manufacturers.

 

This series has become a great source of knowledge for those of us that don't know everything already, and with them in hand, you are poised to do a better job of your latest 109 project, especially if you're looking at detail.

 

Very highly recommended.

 

Review sample courtesy of