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Ta183 Bat Plane!

The AM Tech Kit

The AM Tech kit in 1/48 scale is a little out of my league. I usually build 1/72 scale, but the thought of flawless fitting Luft 46 kit was too good to pass up. I ordered the kit from Squadron and within a week of its release date, it was on my workbench. The parts were a molded in a very dark grey coloured plastic. The parts had a very nice smooth finish and were free from flash. This wasn’t the usual limited run kit of a limited interest item. Cool.


I started by putting the cockpit together. It was painted the expected RLM 66 Black Grey colour and highlighted with silver pencil and washes of black paint. The seat had the cushions painted red, just to add a little colour to such a drab cockpit. I added a drop of Microscale Gloss Clear to the instrument faces to simulate glass-covered instruments. The main wheel well bays were added next along with the tailpipe blanking plates. While these set up, the holes for the wing pylons were opened up in the wings. The wing halves were glued together and set aside to set. I inserted the cockpit through the nose opening, glued it in place and added the intake. I sanded all the seams and did a little too much sanding on the nose in front of the canopy. This created a step between the fuselage and the windscreen that would have to be filled in later. Drats!

With all the seams sanded, I attached the wings and tailplanes. Now it started to look like a Bat Plane. I test fitted the bomb bay door and promptly got it stuck in place. The fuselage was sealed and I hadn’t installed any nose weight! Drats, drats and triple drats! Oh well. I added the landing gear and tested the balance of the model. It was just on the edge of tail sitting. I figured when I add the drop tanks and missiles, it’ll tip forward. Time for paint!

Copyright ©2002 - Text and Photos by Val Bueno. All Rights Reserved.