Ola Guys and gals

Since I can't continue on my T-20 dio for the postcard challenge on account of my dio being bought by Reality in Scale as a master I decided to start on one of the kits I bought at the SMC 2013 here in the Netherlands. I scored Eduards 1:72 Fokker Dr.1 at a very low price (today I found out it is missing a fuselage half which pretty much explains that but now I have a lot of spare parts which is not that bad). And I already had my eye on it for a while because I liked the Kempf Paintscheme with the taunting text. And the built started yesterday. The PE parts are really nice and just enough for what is visible. But they are also tiny and very fragile.

Here a picture of the box


I have not much in progress shots sadly but I have a shot of the MG with the PE parts on it that I made yesterday. It is the first time I have been succesfull in bending a cooling mantlet and I am pretty pleased how it turned out


And this is the pilots office in it's paint before I closed the fuselage. The PE frame is one of those extremely fragile parts and every time you lightly touch it you have to bend it back in shape again. All was OOTB except for the seat that I changed for a PART PE seat because visually it was nicer.


What surprised me was how small the Dr.I is. In height it is pretty much the same as for instance a Albatros D.III and somehow I assumed it would be around the same length as a Fokker D.VII but as I found out it is way shorter. It even is shorter then it's predecessor the E.III. The things one learns from this hobby.

As usual looking forward to any form of feedback

With friendly greetz

Robert Blokker

Greetings Robert,

The length and over all areas on the airframe were based on the power plant. Rotaries were used in lower altitude ops. Inlines were used in higher altitude ops.

@ Stephen
I guess the Dr.1 was quite an agile fighter. Three wings giving a lot of lift to a relatively small aircraft.

I have another update... After a lot of testing around I went on to do the streaking camo. At first I followed the Eduard instructions. Which resulted in this:


Which was quickly shot down by the knowledgable crowd on Facebook. But since I'm still in the stage where I rely on the builtinstructions rather then actual reference I went online... again with the Help of many knowledgable people... Thanks Stephen. And found/was shown pictures of Kempf's actual plane. So I went back to my test piece again and improved it. Which resulted in this:


Which got the approval of the Knowledgable people on facebook. So I was pleased as a monkey with a banana. Untill One of those knowledgable people mentioned the axle wing was all green on top. Thanks Stephen So I painted the axle wing all green on top.

Then I decided to take the Streaking pattern to the aircraft. And I have to say that I found it deceptively hard to do. But for my first attempt I think it is not bad. Colorwise there can probably be a lot to improve but most of the colors chosen are remnant from when I followed the Eduard instructions. I am going to push on now otherwise the aircraft will never be finished. And it will certainly not be my last Fokker with streaking camo. So I can improve on later attempts



Looking forward to hear your opinions.

With friendly greetz

Robert Blokker

Ok... While talking on Facebook at a WW1 Aviation enthousiasts group I compared my work with period pictures and it did not like my own work anymore. So I went back at the bench and started counter striping with thinned Humbrol Linnen color. And I think it looks more like the real thing now then it did before.

That streaking is very difficult to get right, but when you do it's really satisfying
I'm looking forward to how your Fokker will turn out when it's finished.

Ola Jessica

Thanks for your comment. And you are dead on with your comment on it being quite hard to do. When I started I thought... how hard can adding streaky camo to an aircraft be... And as I soon found out... it is really hard. But as I said.. I am pretty happy with it now. And once the rest of the paintwork and the decals are on I think it will look even better.

Ola people

Got some more done on Kempf's DR.1

First I started with a lot of masking and then spraying the white squares on the wings and fuselage and then did the double colored tail.



A view on the Pilots office. I swapped the Eduard seat with a nice one from Part. I don't know if this was the seat that Kempf had in it's aircraft. Haven't been able to find much about it but I liked this seat more then the standard Eduard seat. I did love the belts that Eduard added to the set.


Some more details and then it is up to the Decals


Ok... as usual something goes wrong... and annoyingly it Always happens during this stage. I dropped my Goerings White D.VII F during decals breaking all the struts, The Dutch MLD D.VII got a decal screwed up and had to wait for a replacement. My E.III got it's own special lacquer problem, The Decals for my Junker's D1 seemed to be made of wood. etc. etc. And with the Eduard kit the decals were very nice. Did go on very well. reacted good to set and sol. The only problem was that they were more shiny then my in future coated aircraft. So I had to apply lacquer. Decided to go to the LHS to invest in new tins of Humbrol Lacquer. I opened the tin of Matt Lacquer and already found it a bit cloudy and it had a different color as well. shaked, stirred and shaked some more. Applied it to an old banger as a test. And it looked pretty good. Dried matt and was happy with it. Till about 15/20 minutes later when it looked like it had been standing in a barn for 80 years. For want of a better word all fogged up. More annoyingly I already had coated the aircraft with it so yeah. Tried to save it with an old tin of Matt lacquer and saved it somewhat but well it was not the smooth finish that I was aiming for. I actually wanted to toss it away but decided to keep it and finish it because there were some techniques I wanted to test. Like doing the laminated prop with a pencil. I don't have pics of the decalling process but that speaks kinda for itself. The last pics are of the Dr.1 after the lacquer disaster. You still see some of the fogging here and there.






So yeah... Few steps away from finishing it. On the pictures it doesn't look all that bad... But I see it... And it annoys me. WOuld be nice to finally have a project with wings where nothing goes wrong.

Hallo robert,

Nice job on the Fokker. Like the tekst on the wings.
The very personal touch pilots gave their planes is so cool.
Very interesting...

Dit ga ik dus ook maar weer doen. Ben helemaal om, na 30 jaar geen vliegtuig gebouwd te hebben.

Greetz,

Robert Jan

Thanks Robert Jan

A fellow Dutchie... nice to meet you. Yes that is why I like WWI aircraft and WWI aircraft from the Flying Circus in special so much... Bold colors and taunting texts... It simply doesn't get much better then that

Ik ben pas een jaar aan het vliegtuigbouwen naast mijn gebruikelijke armor maar het bevalt me zeer. Ben benieuwd naar je eerste vliegtuig in 30 jaar.

Met een vriendelijke groet

Robert

Hallo Robert,

In modeling I'm coming back from big adventures in planes trains and automobiles. I've given up on trains, back to automoiles in 1/16. With all the new stuff on the market(PE) it's real cool.
Internet does the rest, great forums and a wide range of subjects to build.

Ik ga denk ik voor een WNW kit. Heb daar al heel wat uren naar zitten kijken. Gaat sowieso een Fokker worden.

Greetz,

Robert Jan

If you ever encounter this mythical beast do please let me know. The best part of modelling is triumphing over our disasters, whether they're self inflicted, or a property of the kit and making a darned nice model despite them. That's what I see when I look at your models

@ Robert Jan
Yeah there is a lot of nice stuff on the market. I find new stuff every day that I'd love to try out.

Ben erg benieuwd naar jouw werk en zeker met een WNW kit. Ik heb ze al een tijdje zitten kijken maar ik wil eerst even oefenen in het klein. Ik heb voor mijn gevoel nog zoveel te leren op het vliegtuigen gebied dat ik de aankoop van zo'n grote kist nog even uitstel.

@ Jessica
Thanks for the compliments. That really means a lot to me.
You might speak of a mythical beast but I can't remember I had this long a string of screw ups in my armor and diorama stuff in 1:35. But maybe that is me.

In the meantime I had a bit of a think and I thought up a way to fix the fogging that was still visible here and there. I restreaked the top wing with the same color mix I used earlier and the thinned linnen color. I painted the crosses with diluted black oilpaint. The black tailsection got the same treatment. And slowly but surely I get the idea that most of the visible problems are solved. Pics of it follow later.

Ola Peepz

I promised some pictures sadly in the meantime I had my grandmothers wake and cremation which wasn't the happiest of moments. However it is odd how therapeutic scalemodelling can work because it gave me a lot of rest in my head during those days.

Well as I said I restreaked the surfaces where the fogging was most visible. I coated the black crosses on the top wing with diluted black oilpaint. Did the same for the black part of the tail. Gave other parts a light sanding. Added the last parts and decals. Did the last detail painting and did some pinwashes. Added controlwires and rigging and this is the result.









I'm glad I decided to push on instead of tossing it away or scrapping it for spares. Mostly because of it allowing me to test a few ideas I had like doing the prop laminating with a pencil and oils among other things and in the end I think the aircraft turned out quite decent.
Now I have to scratchbuilt a hangar.

Hallo Robert,

Nice paintjob. As I'm going back to where it started some 30 years aog, I ordered the same plane in 1/48 scale at Eduard last weekend. See how it works out before I go to higher levels in 1/32.
This thread will be a reminder on painting tricks I think.

Groeten,

Robert Jan

Hi Robert ,

i have already told you what i think about your beautiful model.

But you are a lot more ambitious than i thought and that's no joke !

I have one thing to say about making that hangar , just fantastic ! And now i'm very curious of course......

Looking forward to see more !

Kurt

@ Robert Jan
Looking forward to that. If the 1:48 scale kit is just as good as the 1:72 kit you should have a really enjoyable built.

@ Kurt
Thanks for the kind words. And as for the hangar it will only be the front bit and a few CM inside... Not going to scratchbuilt a full hangar. I only need a facade. Have been collection enough info to get started on it... Should not take too long.

Ola Peepz

The idea was to have this aircraft displayed on a small base with a section of Hangar but we had a group meeting this saturday and I wanted to show my Dr.1 there. But I had not started on scratchbuilding the hangar. Therefor I decided to create a small temporary base to put the aircraft on so it would not get damaged.