Revell 1/72nd Fokker Dr.1

The Revell 1/72nd scale Fokker Dr.1 triplane. What's a collection of Great War aeroplanes without at least one Manfred-mobile? I'm occasionally known to claim that Fokker Dr.1s and Pzkw-V Panthers are grossly over-represented in the modeling world, and I think they are, but that doesn't mean I won't build the occasional example.

It's a lovely kit, featuring a pretty nice interior, nice fit, and nice surface detail. The decals are nice too. It's just nice, all the way around. Even the Spandau machine guns are recognizable, though you couldn't tell that from my ham-fisted photography.

Tamiya 1/48th V1

Tamiya's 1/48th scale V1, shown here in postwar US markings when the US Air Force and US Navy launched a number of captured examples to gain experience with jet-powered cruise missiles (and yes, the V1 was a cruise missile, just a fairly primitive one). The kit is very easy to build and features good fit. Building and painting the V1 are about as easy as falling off a log, so long as you leave the pulsejet off until everything has been painted. I painted the V1 itself hardware store orange paint, which turned out to be pleasingly glossy, and sprayed the pulsejet with Testors burnt metal and the innards of the pulsejet with Testors steel. The ground-handling cart got a coat of Luftwaffe schwartzgrau and some fairly sustained silver drybrushing to recreate wear and tear, especially on the steel wheels.

I don't remember if the markings came from the Tamiya kit or not, to be perfectly honest, but if they didn't, then I have no idea where I came up with the checkboard rudder marking.

Condor 1/72nd V-2

Here is my stab at building Condor's 1/72nd scale V2. The problem with photographing rockets is that their height requires me to stand quite a ways back, which means that no detail is visible. But I guess that's okay.

This actually is a fun to kit to build, within certain limits. The V2 itself only consumes a handful of parts, and the fit is pretty much what you'd expect from a limited-run kit - if you check, sand, fiddle and fuss, the fit is excellent. If you don't, well, be sure to have some putty on hand. The main corrective work involves butt-splicing two of the fins so they don't leave gaps, and doing something about the rather substantial offset between the two halves in the region of the nozzle. The nozzle insert and the steering vanes hide a lot of sins in this area, but some work is still called for.

The launch table is much harder to build. I didn't think the instructions exactly suffered from an excess of clarity, and there are a decided lack of positive locating features. I spent a lot of time eyeballing things and adjusting the alignment. It's fiddlesome work and there were some small parts I just couldn't figure out at all, but in the end you're rewarded with a pretty detailed launch table (if you build carefully, it'll even revolve, but I wasn't that careful).

The kit instructions include a four-view drawing of a V2 in splinter camouflage, but I used a scheme I found on the Internet. Is it accurate? I don't know, but it looks the part, and I half-suspect that no two V2s were quite identical anyway. I used Model Master panzer buff and panzer yellow, and Krylon olive drab, and lots and lots of sliced-up blue 3M tape. Have I ever mentioned what a drag masking a hard-edge splinter is?

I painted the launch table basic dark grey and oversprayed it with Burnt Metal metalizer, concentrating on the flame deflector in the bottom of the table.

To show some idea of scale, I threw in an old Hasegawa Schwimmwagen and a couple of figures on a base made out of Sculptamold and MDF.