Dornier Do J Wal 'N25'- Update

[kkarlsen]

The finished build of Amundsen & Ellsworth Dornier Do J 'Wal' N25

 

 

 

In 1925 Roald Amundsen attempted to fly to the North Pole with five others in two aircrafts, the N24 and the N25. They started from Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard, on 21 May 1925 and flew side by side to 87°43' N, where they landed on leads in the drift ice after more than eight hours in the air. N24 had been damaged on take-off and it was now obvious that the plane could not be flown again. The six men struggled for 3½ weeks to create a take-off strip on the drift ice. On 15 June Hjalmar Riiser-Larsen managed to get N25 into the air with all six men on board. They landed off the north coast of Svalbard and were able to hitch a ride back to Ny-Ålesund with a small ship which was in the area by chance. There were huge celebrations when the men returned to Oslo.

 

 

The 'Wal' is one of the aircraft witch has always been a special plane for me. In 2015 I bought a book by M. Michiel van der Mey 'Dornier Wal "a light coming over The Sea" with plans of the aircraft. And right away I started working on the basis for the fuselage. But as it always is with these kind of projects, it came to a stand still. Over the years I have never abandoned  the thought of the build and years later I managed to get the wings done, because I didn't want to proceed if the wings didn't work out. I was very lucky when in 2021 the Dornier Museum in Friedrichshafen completed a 1:1 Replica of 'N25'. I do not think that I would have been able to finish the model if it wasn't for the photos of the Replica in the Museum. The last 3-4 months of 2023 I've been working continuously because of the deadline I had made for myself, the 100 year anniversary of the Polar flight by Amundsen & Ellsworth in May-June 1925.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All of the parts are made by hand exempt from the Wingnut Wing Rolls-Royce Eagle engines left over from the Aeromarine build. But it has been a 'tour de force' of different methods of making parts for 'N25' - Styrene sheets and profiles, vacuum forming, making masters and casting copy's in resin, working with aluminium sheets, reinforcing parts with brass rods etc... The Dornier Do Wal wasn't a small plane, the model has a wingspan of nearly 69 cm's and a length of 54 cm's.

 

Cheers: Kent

Edited Tuesday at 02:47 PM by kkarlsen

[RBrown]

Incredible replica.

[Rod Bettencourt]

Nice!!! Very cool build sir. Thanks for sharing.

 

Rod

[s00ntir]

Holy.... wow... Impressive!

[jimvit]

A crazy challenge but what a great success.....bravos 

[Jan_G]

awesome build Kent! and very inspiring! wow 

Jan

[dutik]

A piece of modelling art!

 

Regards

- dutik

[Kagemusha]

That's as good a model as I've seen, love the subject too.

[Jaro]

Outstanding! Congratulations!

 

Just out of curiosity—do the propellers combine two two-bladed designs? Was that a field modification or a factory standard?

 

Again congratulations!

[LSP_Kevin]

A magnificent achievement, Kent! And now the subject of this week's banner image on our Facebook page:

 

https://www.facebook.com/largescaleplanes

 

Kev

[Christa]

Applause, applause; N25 is informative, interesting, inspiring. Thank you for sharing.

[Palm-tree]

Kent, once again you have pulled "a rabbit out of the magician's hat".

 

Very impressive build, and very convincing finish.

Will watch with great interest to see what you build for exploration by air at the South of the Planet.

 

best wishes.

[kkarlsen]

6 minutes ago, Jaro said:

Just out of curiosity—do the propellers combine two two-bladed designs? Was that a field modification or a factory standard?

 

They are two single propellers and I think they are made by Dornier, they have Dornier logo's.

 

Thank you very much  RBrown, Rod, Jan, Kagemusha, dutik, Bogdan, Jaro..

[kkarlsen]

3 hours ago, LSP_Kevin said:

A magnificent achievement, Kent! And now the subject of this week's banner image on our Facebook page:

 

https://www.facebook.com/largescaleplanes

 

Kev

Holy... what an honor Kevin, thank you 

 

Kent

[kkarlsen]

33 minutes ago, Palm-tree said:

Kent, once again you have pulled "a rabbit out of the magician's hat".

 

Very impressive build, and very convincing finish.

Will watch with great interest to see what you build for exploration by air at the South of the Planet.

 

best wishes.

 

Thank you Dave? - As Anthony in NZ mentioned, it may be time for me to pull the 'Que sera sera' project out of the "hat"...

I have learned so much from the 'N25' project in the 'Scratch building department' so I think I'm ready to have a go at this...

 

Kent