Hi all, I've been following Iwatajim's posts on his Tamiya E-3 with interest and thought I would put up some pics of my progress to date on the same kit. Not really that different to Jim's - I'm still at the cockpit stage (hopefully finish that soon, it's been dragging on a bit). I'm using the full Eduard etch set - although there's a few bits I'll probably pass on - and a lovely Ultracast seat.



















That's it for now. I'll probably tweak a few more bits in the cockpit, but not much - I want to get construction out of the way so I can start painting - I'm doing a captured machine in its more-or-less original 70/71/65 scheme, but with high-viz (big yellow outline) RAF roundels in all six positions.

Comments welcome, cheers Brad

Hi Brad

Excellent cockpit! Like it a lot and I am looking forward to your progress!

all the best

Steffen

Hi Brad,

Very nice. Great work with all that photo-etch and the painting and weathering. I look forward to comparing notes as we progress. Thanks for sharing.

Cheers,

Jim.

Steffen and Jim, thanks for your nice comments. Assembling the cockpit has been an entertaining but fiddly process - I'm just putting in the final bits and bobs before I close up the fuselage. Before I do, though, I have a couple of questions for those out there with more knowledge of 109s than myself (and I think that's most of you!)

First, the flap and elevator control wheels on the rear port sidewall next to the seat. I was going to paint these RLM 02 like the rest of the cockpit, but I have seen a few walkaround pictures where the rims of these wheels are in a different colour (brown or black). Does anyone know if this is accurate for 1939, or a more modern interpretation?

Secondly, in another walkaround picture I have (of the Emil at Hendon) the tail wheel well is filled with a liner. Again, is this authentic for WW2, or a more recent addition? I like the idea of stuffing something in the tail wheel well, because in the Tamiya kit it's an empty hole...

Finally, a couple of questions about the overall paint scheme of the aircraft I am modelling. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures I can post - my reference photos are on pp.10-13 of the excellent Jackiewicz and Wawrzynski book "Captured Me 109s" if anyone has it. The plane is an E-3 of I/JG 76 which was captured intact by the French after the pilot accidentally landed on the wrong side of the lines in November 1939. It's in a standard 70/71/65 scheme - nothing exciting here so far, but then the French painted out the German markings and replaced them with some nice French roundels on the wings as well as a tricolour rudder (no roundels on the fuselage sides). These French markings were subsequently painted over by the RAF when they took possession of the airframe.

My questions relate to the colours, and available model paint equivalents, which the French used to paint out the German markings - my reference indicates a "khaki" colour was used to overpaint the upper wing, fuselage and tail markings, and a "dark grey" to overpaint the underwing crosses. I know very little about French WW2 camouflage colours, and would be grateful if anyone can point me in the right direction of colours I might use (I normally use Tamiya or Gunze acrylics).

Thanks, Brad

Hi all, making slow but steady progress on the build - nothing photo-worthy yet - but I do have a question I hope someone can answer. I dipped the clear parts in Future last night, and carefully left them to dry out on paper towel and under a protective cover to stop bits of dust etc sticking to the canopy. Despite these precautions, however, two of the three clear pieces have little hairs or bits of fluff stuck in the now-dry Future. What is the best way to get rid of the Future so I can try again? I've heard that dipping/washing the clear parts in Windex will do the trick - grateful if anyone can confirm this, or point to other possible solutions. Thanks in advance, Brad

Hi there, latest update after some very slow progress. I need to wrap this up in a few weeks if I'm to meet the deadline for a local comp I want to enter, so I had better get a move on. Anyway, here goes...

Upper fuselage and canopy, ready for priming. Note the ICM and Airfix 109F canopy parts that I am using as a mask for painting - fit is actually quite good, but they are too thick and/or too inaccurate to use on their own kits, hence their sacrifice here. It's difficult to see clearly in this pic, but the fit of the upper wing halves to the fuselage was outstanding. I tacked them on first (as per Lynn Ritger's suggestion in his 109 Datafile from SAM Publications) before adding the one-piece lower wing.



Lower fuselage ready for painting. Wheel wells are pre-painted, Futured and washed and will need to be masked. Lower and upper engine cowls are only tacked on with white glue for now - will be removed once painting is complete to install oil cooler equipment and cowl machine guns respectively.



Sink marks filled in upper port wing. These sink marks are one of the few, but well-known, deficiencies of the Tamiya 1/48 Emil series. There are similar marks to fill on the starboard upper wing and both lower wings.



Horizontal stabs added and filled. This is another area where Tamiya falls down a little - the support struts for the stabs are slightly too short, so that if the stabs are installed to accommodate the fit of the struts, they will display anhedral - yuck! After a bit of head scratching, I've installed the stabs without the struts and with about 1-2 degrees of dihedral (I've learned that if stabs are installed dead-level, they also look like they have anhedral). I'll then install the struts after painting is complete, and hope I can winkle them into place satisfactorily. I've done a few test runs and think it will work out OK, but it's still a bit of a worry, not least because the struts are (a) fragile (I've already broken one once) and (b) of a shape that is difficult to replicate.

Note also the broken radio line attachment point - will have to replace with wire and superglue...



Flaps assembled, painted and waiting for weathering and installation.



I'm using Ultracast's 109E main wheels - these are beautifully cast and will look even better once I've given them a drybrush and some weathering.

The tailwheel is a spare from Hasegawa's 109G-10 - again as per Lynn Ritger's suggestion - to replace Tamiya's undersized item. I've checked the Hasegawa wheel against 109E wheels in my references, and it looks the business.



I'm using Quickboost exhausts - I had bought some Ultracast items to use, but - uncharacteristically - these were quite poorly moulded, with soft detail and a few air bubbles, which in an item like this are very hard to get rid off. The Quickboost exhausts look much better.



I've decided to replace the kit's machine gun and cannon barrels with these little turned brass gems from Master Model's Air Master series - here they are before painting and installation.



Because the kit I'm using came without a prop and spinner (a friend bought it for me at a ridiculous markdown when his local toyshop was getting rid of its kits), I'm using Ultracast's lovely spinner and blades. They make three versions of 109E spinner - I'm using the standard version. Here they are on my newly acquired PropMaster jig prior to final cementing - it all looks good but I'm a bit nervous to commit - point of no return and all that. Gotta take the plunge...



And finally, some details of the scheme I'll be doing - it's from this fabulous book published by Kecay entitled "Captured Me 109s". There is truly a lifetime of modelling inspiration in this book. My only complaint about it is production, and particularly binding, quality - as you can see if you look closely, about one third of the pages in my copy have come adrift from the spine, and I've only had the book for six months. Not great for something that costs between $70-100 Aussie dollars.



Here is the scheme I'm doing - an E-3 which a pilot from 1/JG 76 embarrassingly (for him) landed at a French airfield in November 1939. The airframe had a long subsequent history in French, British and US hands, but I'm portraying it shortly after capture, with its German markings roughly painted out and replaced with French colours.



For the French markings, I'm using an Iliad sheet designed for the D.520 - the roundels are the right size, and I've already applied the rudder stripes which have gone on very nicely. I'll source the 1/JG 76 badge from the Tamiya kit's decal sheet, and I can make up the work number on the vertical fin from spares in Eduard's Bf 110E. The only marking I'm still really searching for, funnily enough, is the "1" on the fuselage sides - I can use one from an EagleCal's Fw190 sheet I have, at a pinch, but it's not exactly the right size, so I'm still hunting.



Thanks for looking, and comments welcome! cheers Brad

G'day Brad, your Emil is looking great so far. I have never built a 109, but I have a 1/32 Hasegawa G-10 coming up for a campaign build this year, so I will be looking back over yours and a few others for inspiration.

Cheers, and keep posting pics for me.

Damian

Nice work Brad. Did you sort out your French colours? The French used a colour called Kaki which was a sort of dark olive drab. For the underside overpainting I guess Gris Fonce (dark grey blue) is most likely but they may have used Gris Bleu Clair (Sky grey). The only manufacturer I know of who matches French colours is WEM. That is enamel paint though.
Steve

Thanks for the nice comments Damian and Steve. To answer your question Steve - yes I have sorted the colours, sort of. I'm pretty happy with the underwing French grey, less so with the khaki. The latter was spot-on the money when applied over grey primer on the rudder, but went a much darker greeny-grey colour when applied over the RLM 70/71 camouflage, so unfortunately the contrast isn't as great as I was hoping. Nonetheless, I'm still pretty happy with what I've got so far.
Here are some pics of the kit as currently painted, futured, and decaled - I'm just finishing the wash and doing some touch-ups before I spray on some matt varnish, add the sticky-outy bits and call it a day...Comments/suggestions welcome! cheers Brad

Hi Brad,

Very nice work so far, the colors look spot on to me!

I hope you will submit this build for a feature once finished. We already had many Bf109s but not in French markings...

Jean-Luc

Thanks Jean-Luc, I'd be very happy to submit this as a feature. It's been a bit of a frustrating build - for the first time I've had some niggles with the Eduard products I've used (even though as usual they lift the model to a higher standard) - so I'm glad it's nearly finished! cheers Brad

Hi again

Long time between posts, but I've finally finished the beast. It sat on the shelf mocking me for the past few months, only needing a few dangly bits to finish the job - I finally bit the bullet and did so.

Here are a few pics - apologies for the quality, they're more garish and flashlit than I'd like, but my daytime photo skills seem to have deserted me for the moment.

I've used a Mark 58 base as a prop - a fabulous product and really excellent service from Marc as well. It won't be the last of these bases that I buy!

Anyway, comments welcome and thanks for looking, Brad