Hasegawa Fw 190D-9 "Blue 12" WNr. 500570

[Jamme]

Hello.

Really nice job that you did till now!

and Welcome to THE Forum!

Cheers,

Jamme

[BradG]

Copyrighting I'm sure. I was going to scan the pictures in the EagleCals booklet, but decided against it as the images are copyrighted! As I'm new to this forum, I'm wondering if people post copyrighted images on the regular or if that's taboo? I suspect the latter to be the case.

 

Review, research or study fall under the amendment of fair use under the Copyright Act. You also can't copyright someone elses images, not to mention even if someone tried to sue another for reproducing a few pictures, anything you would hope to get back would be many times outweighted by the cost of sueing that person, making the whole process useless.

[LSP_Kevin]

The respectful consideration of copyright issues is a requirement for posting here on LSP, so the OP is right to tread carefully. A few select images, with the appropriate attributions and disclaimers, is fine. Anything beyond that is inviting trouble.

 

Kev

[Thunderbolt]

Right on.

[Thunderbolt]

Have not done much work lately as I've been waiting on and reading reference material before proceeding with various sub-assemblies.

 

However, I took a little break and modified the windscreen. I used thin sheet acetate to create the thicker and angled upper portions of the windscreen frame. Far too many beautiful replicas lack this detail feature; it's a real shame because it is very easy to create and adds to the realism of the cockpit pretty significantly.

 

Here is a picture of what I wanted to create:

 

Here is a picture of my Hasegawa "High-Grade" Fw 190D-9, note how the windscreen inaccurately exhibits a perfect trapezoid:

 

To create the proper effect shown above, I sanded the edge of the windscreen with 200 grit sandpaper and attached it to thin (0.1 mm?) sheet acetate using superglue gel.

 

Then, I trimmed off the excess:

 

I then used scotch tape and a sharpie, simply judging by eye, to mask off the portions of the acetate I wanted to save. The sharpie made the tape easier to see; once I had sharpied over the tape it was clear I had initially made the port side angle too steep.

 

I then laid the assembly flat on my cutting mat and used the tip of a fresh #11 x-acto knife to cut away the excess. I then painted over it with "Blue Angel Blue" to clearly show if any trimming was necessary. Here's the finished product:

 

Hope you like this technique.

 

C

Edited January 28, 2012 by thunderbolt1988

[krow113]

Great work on one of my favourite planes.I did this in 1/24 here are some links:

http://www.militarymodelling.com/forums/postings.asp?th=48494

http://forum.largescaleplanes.com/index.php?showtopic=36621

And on this forum in the ready for inspection category.

I would not get into too much discussion regarding the markings and color scheme for this aircraft ,you'll make yourself silly and there is no definitive pix or description. The best reference I found for this a/c is Jerry Crandalls book vol 2 where a computer scan analysis was done of the color pic shown in this thread . The in depth analysis is questionable as well from my experience. The best thing I can say is the plane was filthy , it was marked up all over the fuse and has a ton of character.i used dark sea blue for my markings. If you try to get it perfect it cant be done.Search this site as well,mine is there as well as a very well done kit by a guy named Matrixone.

http://www.swannysmodels.com/yabb2/YaBB.pl?catselect=general

Good luck and I'll be watching. As far as copyright goes ,it isnt relevant unless you are trying to sell someone elses image as your own ,sharing here is hardly criminal or immoral.

Edited February 1, 2012 by krow113

[Thunderbolt]

Krow,

 

 

Have you had a chance to read the JaPo Fw 190D part II book? I agree that while it is impossible to get the camouflage exactly right, the book does a great job of combining the historical facts concerning how particular production blocks were painted,with particular photos of aircraft that came from those blocks. I recommend it highly, and have not read your book yet. I would pick JaPo over Eagle for one reason - the marking on the front left cowl was not a highly unusual 'E9' - rather, it was a stencil. So, as I paint my model, I will be updating you with info from the book that justifies each particular painting decision. Fabulous work on your Dora, btw. One question in particular - what references did you use to plumb the engine?

 

Anyway, updates from the production line:

 

I took some time to pre-align the engine bearers so that the top of the engine block was perfectly parallel with the canopy deck. The four supports have been glued to the bearers. I'll add the bearers to the engine right before installing it.

 

With the alignment set, I did most of the gunbay work and finally completed the airframe:

Edited February 4, 2012 by thunderbolt1988

[krow113]

Cool The Japo book is relevant , however it is still not the final word. I used dry transfers for the stencil you refer to ,it is an octane rating stencil ,I changed the 'E9' to the decal when I did my work.

My references for the engine were mainly from several sources the most used was a search on wikipedia that led to other links.This profile was helpful as well:

From this book:

And for fun here are the colors I used to mix the light green:

Good Luck man ,I hope you do well with it.

[Thunderbolt]

Fore sure, there are things in the JaPo book I don't agree with and I will cover those aspects as I paint. What are your reasons for rejecting 81/76 for the upper surfaces, if I may ask? The top drawings book is quite good - I used it for riveting and the profile is good. I wouldn't use the provided decals of the blue 12 that are provided however, as the shape and color of the blue 12 are both incorrect. Good catch on the stencil - I need to find one; I don't think it's included on the EC sheet.

Edited February 4, 2012 by thunderbolt1988

[krow113]

Fore sure, there are things in the JaPo book I don't agree with and I will cover those aspects as I paint. What are your reasons for rejecting 81/76 for the upper surfaces, if I may ask? The top drawings book is quite good - I used it for riveting and the profile is good. I wouldn't use the provided decals of the blue 12 that are provided however, as the shape and color of the blue 12 are both incorrect. Good catch on the stencil - I need to find one; I don't think it's included on the EC sheet.

Tbolt Yer gettin' it! I see Blue 12 all over ,a popular subject . There is a pic of a model by Mick Pitts in "Luftwaffe Modelling" by Osprey ,I used that for the wing camo along with other sources . No decals I have seen match the blue properly ,I used Dark Sea Blue and cut masks for for all the markings on my sign cutter,designing them in Corel. There is a decal set with the octane decal in it from Aeromaster,Too little ,Too late #4 I think.I can send some pix of engine wiring plumbing if ya like, it wont be right away though.

I just remembered the decals came in the book I put up prior,they have the one you want. If not I wont build a 1/32 Dora ,so you can have em if ya want. Or I can scan it and send you the file for your own custom decals.

Edited February 5, 2012 by krow113

[DougN]

On thing I've noticed on the EC decal sheet, the "1" and the "2" that make up the "12" are of noticeably different heights. Not sure why they did that, as it appears from all photos that they should be the same.

 

Doug

[Loic]

, I like what you are doing here !

[Daywalker]

Just went through and read all of this thread, and am once again amazed by the amount of skill and dedication some people put into a build. This is master quality stuff, thanks for sharing your WIP with us!

[krow113]

...actually this is the book with the decal sheet ,my mistake.It has the elusive octane rating decals in 1/24 , 1/32 , 1/48 . There is a close up artwork of the decal in Vol 2 of Crandalls work as well.

 

As for the 1-2 being different sizes ,I cut my masks at different sizes ,my lifetime of signwork afforded me the "eye" ,I saw the m as different heights.

Edited February 6, 2012 by krow113

[David E Brown]

Gents,

 

I thought that I might add a few thoughts to the colour discussion of this aircraft.

 

By way of introduction, Dave Wadman and I did a detailed analysis of this aircraft (amongst others) for our first Experten Decals book (1993). This was based on a number of available photographs from Jim Crow and Tom Hitchcock's collections, and others, and of course, our knowledge of Luftwaffe camouflage and markings at the time. Since then, we have learned more about the subject and we shared our knowledge with fellow researchers Larger, Deboeck, and Poruba for their JaPo series.

 

With respect to "Blue 12", Werknummer 500570, of 8./II./JG 6 there are numerous photos of this aircraft, and most importantly, one in colour ( a Kodachrome slide from which I received a copy from the original). These 500000-series aircraft appear in a number of "hodgepodge" camouflage schemes, likely reflecting their manufacturing process of assembling various components built by widely dispersed subcontractors. The aircraft generally follows the Braunviolett 81 / Hellgrün 82 scheme.

 

On the fuselage, following a coat of green-blue (grünblau) shade of RLM 76 on the sides, Braunviolett 81 was along the fuselage spine up to and including the gun cowling cover. This was followed by Hellgrün 82 over-sprayed on the gun cowling on top of the 81, and forward of the rear fuselage insert up to the canopy. RLM 82 was applied to the spine over the RLM 81 from the base of the fine forward to the jacking point.

 

The Jumo engine "power-egg" was delivered as a complete component to the final assembly facility that completed this aircraft. It was most likely given a single coat of RLM 76. When attached to the aircraft, it too was given a coat of RLM 81 on its uppersurface, followed by a second coat of RLM 82, which appears darker given the darker underlying colour. In addition, a new photo of the port side of the cowling shows that the making "(E3)" is incorrect and is actually (and more appropriately) "(213)".

 

Our original interpretation was that Blue 12's upperwing colours were Grauviolett 75 and one of the primer grey colours, or Hellgrau 77. Re-interpretation of extant and new photos of Blue 12 and other aircraft permit a re-assessment. This is particularly based on photos of an Fw 190 D-9, White 16, WNr.500636 of 1./JG 6, that clearly reveals its upperwing camouflage scheme as a combination of Braunviolett 81 and the fuselage side and undersurface colour: the green-blue (grünblau) shade of RLM 76. Again, the best references for this are the photos of White 6.

 

The aircraft's underside colour is a combination of RLM on the forward half, and the remainer left in natural metal. The control surfaces were completed by a subcontractor and finished in RLM 76.The fuselage underside is in natural metal only from the wheel wells back to the tail. The rudder was another subcontracted part and was painted in RLM 75 with a mottle of RLM 76 applied. The fin was another subcontracted component given an overall coat of RLM 76 upon which was applied a dense fogging of RLM 81.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Cheers,

 

David