Some more tank plastic has left my production line earlier this month ....

.... if you're interested scroll down the page and have a look at my new Kanonenjagdpanzer of the Bundeswehr in the 1970's/1980's. If you like to leave a comment please do it over there.

Happy modelling!
Torsten

An afterburner has left my Assembly Line last week ....

If you like, ckeck out my little jet collection and have a look at an iconic jet fighter ....

My next build will have a prop again, promised!

Happy modelling!
Torsten

It has taken me a long time but as promised here comes my latest prop. It's the well known Bf 109 G-2 from Eduard in 1/48 in an uncommon livery ....



.... I have built "Mersu" MT-230 of the 2./HLeLv 28, Finnish Air Force, based in Värtsilä in summer 1944. The plane was delivered to the Ilmavoimat on the 10. May 1943 and was assigned to various pilots in various units during its wartime career. The pilot during summer 1944 was Kapteeni Jaakko Puolakkainen (1915-1999). With MT-230 2,5 kills were scored during the war. The Ilmavoimat got 48 Bf 109 G-2 (MT-201 - MT-248) and lost 31 of them during the war to various reasons. MT-230 was one of the few survivers and was flown until July 1948 when it was stored. On the 24. March 1953 it was finally taken from the inventory list. Further fate of the aircraft is unknown to me but it was most likely scrapped ....



.... some of you have probably followed me in my build blog. Eduard came out with this limited edition "Mersu Bf 109 G in Finland" in 2018 and it was a must have for me. The kit comes as a Dual Combo Profi Pack with a PE fret and masks. If you have followed my blog you'll know that this kit goes well together, there are no fitting problems at all. I have not used all PE parts, only those which look usefull to me like the seat belts, the IP and some parts inside the cockpit. I have added both MG 151/20 in the underwing gondolas though I later read that Finland got only some G-6 with gondolas but no G-2. Well, my fault, but I take it as the freedom of the artist. For me there are still 2 annoying facts about this kit. First I would like to see clear parts for the position lights. And secondly why is the pitot tube already moulded to the wing? I cut it off and drilled a small hole in the wing. During the build I noticed that Eduard offers a seperate pitot tube in the kit (part I 21) which I have used ....



.... you may wonder what this livery is. Well, MT-230 is one of at least ten G-2 which got the "Sota Maalaus", the so called war paint. The aircraft was delivered in standard german RLM 74/75/76 camouflage but probably during an overhaul it got this new finnish camo which we also know mainly from their Brewsters. For the underside I have used Revell Aqua No. 49 Light Blue, which comes very close to the colour the Finns have used. For the upperside camo I have used Revell No. 361 Olive Green and Vallejo 71251 NATO Black. The camo is sprayed freehand. Yellow for the Eastern Front markings is Revell 310 Lufthansa Yellow. The side rudder looks like a replacement part, so I painted it in RLM 76 (Vallejo 71046) with some RLM 74 (Vallejo 71258) blotches. The prop is again painted with Revell 40 Black Green (RLM 70). Needless to mention that this build is not weathered as usual ....



.... Eduard comes with a huge decal sheet for this kit, made by Cartograph, and the painting instruction offers 10 beautiful different Mersu which makes it hard to decide what to build. There are 8 wartime Mersu and 2 post war machines on the sheet. Most famous versions are MT-222 of Ilmari Juutilainen, MT-225 of Lauri Nissinen and MT-449 of Olavi Puro, all well known aces in Finland. But I decided for MT-230 because of its unusual camo. The stencils on this bird are in finnish language and not it german. As I bought the kit directly at the Eduard Online Shop I've got the full decal sheet with all Hakaristi. Divided for the german market and completed for the rest of the world. So there are some more Mersu coming from my assembly line in the future ....
Again I say "kiitoksia!" for walking around my latest build and hope you have enjoyed it. Comments are welcome.

Happy modelling!
Torsten

I was curious about that. Are the Finnish Hakaristi illegal in Germany?

Torsten,
Always glad to see another 109 coming off the line! Beautiful job!

Gaz

Jessie, yes, if you show them in public. That's the reason why we don't see any finnish wartime model at expos in Germany. Same is valid for the latvian Ugunskrusts (Fire Cross).

Gaz, wait for MT-508 ....

Bloody Nazis always ruin things for everybody.

Torsten,
Another outstanding addition to your model museum. perfectly built, expertly painted, and as usual your decaling looks like they were painted on.

I'm glad that Jessica asked that question about those markings as I didn't have a clue as to why I don't recall seeing them before.

Joel

Jessie, I understand the reasons why we have this law in Germany and support it. It does not differentiate between symbols misused by the Nazis and symbols which look alike, like the Hakaristi. Unfortunatly we scale model builders who show our models on expos are also affected by this law.

Thanks Joel! As always I tried to do my best. I believe, the Finnish Air Force is not very well known in the US opposite to Europe. The blue Hakaristi on a white (later light blue) disc was the national insignia of the Finnish Air Force between March 1918 and April 1945. After that date they changed to the white-blue-white roundel we know today. As I said also to Gary, wait for MT-508. There's a sister ship following in the next days ....

Torsten! I promise, I'll do one myself this year, I love the Finnish 109:s and you certainly did a good job on this one!

Regarding the insignia, it gets even more bizarre: it originally comes from Sweden! The first Finnish aircraft was gifted by Swedish count Eric von Rosen in 1918 and he had the swastika as his personal emblem after having seen it on rune stones earlier in his life, it had nothing to do with the nazis to start with. Since then (I think at least) there is always one aircraft in the Finnish Air Force named "Kreivi von Rosen" meaning "Count von Rosen".

However, it can get even a slight bit more bizarre: Hermann Göring was married to Carin von Kantzow who was the sister of Eric von Rosen's wife. They did however meet a few years after the nazis had taken the swastika as their symbol so it's just an odd coincidence!

Finally: I have flown with Eric von Rosen's grandson, he is one of the pilots of the Swedish veteran DC-3 "Daisy" and he is also named Eric von Rosen !

That's about it about the von Rosens, the swastika and the nazis !

Edit: Corrected the surname of Carin.



Magnus

Thanks for the little history lesson, Magnus. I guess, not many of our friends here on Aeroscale are familiar with the finnish history.
Good to hear, that my build gives you the needed push to build an Ilmavoimat 109 also ....


Right, and I did it a few years ago with this Saab J35 Draken (Hasegawa 1/48). The name "Kreivi von Rosen" is written on the tailplane fin. DK-223 can still be seen at the Tikkakoski Museum. There are so many Drakens around Finland as gate guards and in museums that I guess they didn't even scrapped one of them ....


I took photos of MT-508 today. Will take a few days until I can show them here. Stay tuned!

Happy modelling!
Torsten

They're so petty they wouldn't dare scrap them.

An amazing collection Torsten!

Indeed they are, Jessie !

Welcome to my thread, Russell! It's great to hear that you like what you see!

As I mentioned before, here comes Part 2 of my FiAF Mersu Dual Combo, this time it's the Bf 109 G-6, again from Eduard ....



.... on the 23. June 1950 the FiAF Air Base in Utti in the southeast of Finland held a Midsummernight Festival. They also arranged a "Reno Style" air race in which 4 special marked Bf 109 took part, marked as planes A to D. I have build MT-508 of HLeLV 31, which flew the race as plane B. At the controls on this occasion was Luutnantti Arvo Arima, a reconnaissance pilot from war times. The usual german camouflage of RLM 74/75/76 on MT-508 was painted over on the left fuselage with white and blue squares forming checkers plus the letter B in the middle and on the left wing. It's accompanied by further white symbols. It is believed that these checkers were only painted on the left side as the aircraft flew in circles around the pylons. This is the only known photo of MT-508 as plane B. I further found also a photo of MT-402 as plane D somewhere in the internet ....





.... like the G-2 this kit comes from the limited edition "Mersu - Bf 109 G in Finland" and offers the same high quality, though during the build I noticed here and there a slightly worse fitting compared to MT-230 from above. So I had to do a bit more sanding than on MT-230 (which was probably my own fault) but I also needed some putty at the connection of the right wing to the fuselage. But everything else went smooth. Eduard has for sure one of the best Bf 109 kits in 1/48 out at the moment. If you have missed my build blog or just want to go through it again you still can check out my Utti Air Racer with 126 w.i.p. pics, incl. some historical photos ....



.... the painting of this Mersu was mainly done with Vallejo paints 71046 (RLM 76), 71258 (RLM 74) and 71259 (RLM 75). The propeller was painted again in RLM 70 (Revell No. 40), though the blades could also be black. I find it interesting to see that post war Mersu had yellow propeller tips (but only on the front side), while during the war they had not, like on all german aircraft. For painting the spinner spiral I have used the Eduard mask EX500, which makes it easier than the decal. Final coating was again made with Flat Clear Varnish from Marabu. Like MT-230 also MT-508 is build out of box and not weathered ....



.... all decals come again from this great sheet Eduard provides with the kit. It's no problem at all to apply these colourful big decals. It just needs some time and patience. The stencils here are again in finnish language. MT-508 is one of two post war options this kit offers. You can see it by the new white-blue-white roundels as the FiAF national insignia after 1945. Unfortunatly Eduard doesn't offer this limited edition in their online shop anymore. So if you like to build this aircraft also you have to try your luck somewhere else, I'm sorry.
So, again I say "kiitos" for walking around my first racer and I hope you've enjoyed it as I have enjoyed building it.

Happy modelling and take care!
Torsten

Finally a little family photo of my latest Mersu builds. Here you can see the difference in size and appearance of the two national insignias of Finland before and after 1945.
I also found a 1 Markka coin, the old finnish currency before the Euro. It has the same size as a 1 Euro coin ....

Torsten,
Now that's one impressive pair for sure.

joel

Thanks Joel! I'm glad to hear that you like my latest builds.
I'm really pleased how both Mersu came out in the end and happy how smooth the big decals of MT-508 went on. It would have become a catastrophy if they would have flipped over or torn. But they are great Cartograph quality.

Torsten! Two beautiful builds and thanks for telling the story about the odd paintjob. And I really love the way they made an ananas out of the roundel !



Magnus

Ananas .... Yummy! My favourite fruit!
Never thought of it but there is some resemblance indeed ....

Life is colourful and so is my new Leopard 2A4GR from Revell Germany in 1/35. Have a look if you like ....


Happy modelling!
Torsten

Torsten,
Your Greek brethren to your German Leopard 2A4GR really turned out fantastic. I just love the Camo scheme as it compliments the German camo as being almost totally the opposite. Weathering on both tanks is certainly not over done, yet really add that little bit of extra realism.

Well done my friend, very well done.

joel

Thanks, Joel! Yes, the camo on the 2A4GR was very time consuming. Everything is painted free-hand and I had some great reference photos in my Leopard 2 book. Though it was not easy to find the correct or close correct colours. But I think I did quite well. So far the Greek were the only ones to have their Leos in a non NATO Standard 4-tone-camo. Meanwhile Hungary, which got their first Leo 2A4 just a few weeks ago also have a very interesting 4-tone-camouflage, completely different to Greece. I'm trying to get decals for a 2A4HU in the next days. Now, should I build ..... ? No, not now, not this year!

There's another earth crawler leaving my assembly line in the next days but afterwards it's time for some more flying plastic. Have already started the dual build with white and red stars. Read my signature.

Cheers!
Torsten