Hi all!

Having finished several "old" projects lying around, I felt I could allow me to start on a new project.

When I looked in my stash I found this kit I bought not long ago for just under €20.



I have always liked the look of this little chubby aeroplane, and have fond memories building the Airfix kit long ago.

The kit comes from HiPM, a quite unknown company for me.
It´s a short run, multimedia kit and it looks quite good in the box.

The not too big box is quite hefty and contains a lot of plastic, a fret with etched parts and a decalsheet.

The contents;













A closer inspection of the sprues revealed the ugly truth!

Fuselage is very good moulded with fine representation of the fabric surfaces, the wings and floats have nice, recessed details, looking very convincing.

But the small parts sprue was a different matter!
Here´s a lot of flash and detail is generally weak and soft!







Worst part though, was the "clear" parts, beeing thick, almost opaque, filled with bubbles, scratched and almost useless!

Funny, I have lots of Tamiya, Hasegawa and other good well-fitting kits, but I tend to go for these short-runs anyway!
You have to fight the kit every inch on the way, sanding, filling, scratching, and I´m having a ball!
Must be my dark, machoistic side! :-) :-) :-)

Well, let´s see what may come out of this!
It´ll need lots of TLC, that´s for sure!

Cheers!

Stefan E

Hi Stefan

I'm looking forward to seeing your progress on this one - it sounds like a prime candidate for a Feature when it's finished. I remember when the kit was released - I went for the MPM model that appeared at almost exactly the same time. I did a bit of the basic cleaning-up work on that a while ago and it looks an equally challenging build, but it'll be worth it - the '196 has always been a favourite of mine.

All the best

Rowan

Looking forward to see it finished...
Good luck Stefan!

Hi Stefan!

I have the exact same kit in my stash and will follow your build with great interest! I hope you will spot the difficulties and then show us how to overcome them.

Do you plan to do a dio for this one?

Jean-Luc

Hi all!

Now I have started the Arado Ar196-build!

As this is a quite old kit, (1996 according to the box), the plastic Is of the old "eastern-bloc" quality.
That Is hard, brittle and very grainy when sanded.

So I started with the beaching-trolley, just to get a "feel" for the plastic used in this kit!
A form of "learn to know your enemy"!

The trolley´s frame come in one piece and have huge mould-seperation ridges all over it!
I had to sand it to shape, took about 20mins. of hard work.
All other pieces had to be sanded, but that was no major work, and then everything fitted together very nicley.
I found out that the plastic responded very well to my favourite liquid glue, so everything sticks into place as it should.

Here it is without wheels and etched parts, painted in a basic RLM66 Grey.




Now I could start with the aircraft itself, and set out for the wings.

Both wings consists of three larger parts, upper, lower and a end-spar.
After cleaning up the parts i made a dry-fit, and felt my heart sink to my knees!

Large gaps all around, what to do?
I cut off the "locating pins" and sanded all mating surfaces, and now everything fitted very well!

I repeated the procedure for the other wing, with the same results.

Next thing was the cockpit, this consists of two floor pieces and several frames that goes together to form a tub.
I started with the basic tub frames as i thought it would be easier to add the details onto this, opposed to do one side at a time and then joining them at the end.

Here´s my assembled basic tub;



The instructions for this kit is quite good and clear, but there´s no color suggestions whatsoever, except for the camouflage!
I settled for a interior in the RLM66, as this was "standard" for late war Luftwaffe, and used Humbrol #67.

The instrument panel comes with good raised detail, or you can use the etched panel with acetate backing as I did here;



The pilot´s seat and the observer/gunner´s seat pan, assembled with the seatbelts in place;





On the pilot´s right side there´s a switch-panel, a folded etched box that seems to be suspended in thin air!
I glued the box to a piece of 0.25mm plasticard, cut to shape and glued it to the frame.



You can see the installed panel here (on the right side);



And here´s how the cockpit looks now;





It´s still lacking the final finish with dry-brushing and washes, that will be added later!

Until next time!

Cheers!

Stefan E

Like Rowan I also have the MPM version. I have done a little scratch building in the cockpit, actually replacing the awful tubular framing between the cockpits. One of the hrdest parts, so far has been finding the exact location for the floor. My build came to a halt when I couldn't determin the correct colour for the fuselage. I had decided on RLM 66 but a nagging doubt kept me from carrying on. I do think that RLM66 is the most likely though and, after Telford, I'll, try, and continue with mine, now that I have been given some inspiration
Mal

Wow that is some really nasty flash!! Well, one has to make the most of it.

I also sometimes pick up these old models - just being sentimental. However, I think I will stick to the new ones as I really ran my head against a wall with Matchbox old Heinkel 115.

Those small parts look typical of the airfix kits I have tried, low quality, low cost kits..but sand..putty...sand..trim..sand again..over and over

Hi Johnny and all!

Yes, this Is reminding me about all those old Airfix kits!

Please, don´t misunderstand me!
I love those new kits we get today from Tamiya/Hasegawa/Revell/Trumpeter etc. with perfect fit that You can assemble with ease.

But, once a while I can feel the crave for something more challenging.
Those new kits are easy to assemble, sure, but do you LEARN something new from them?
Hardly, just follow the instructions and you´ll end up with a beautiful model.

Those limited run multimedia kits are often rough, oh Yes.
You have to fill and sand a lot but that´s a part of the deal when building this type of kits.

But most important, this type of kits FORCES you to think, plan ahead and often come up with your own solutions, sometimes you have to scratchbuild or do some creative thinking.

THIS is why these kits are so rewarding to build, you have to stretch your modelling abilities and learn some new tricks.

Now to Today´s update on the Arado;

This is how the cockpit looks finished;







Now I could glue the cockpit tub to the right fuselage side.
I had to use a 1mm piece of plasticard to get a correct fit.



That wasn´t enough, another 0.25mm shim.



When i testfitted the othe fuselage half, It did´nt fit well at all!
No suprise, the interior tub was a little too wide.
I had to carve away about 1mm of plastic from the left fuselage side.



It was getting really thin around the instrument panel!



Finally, I could glue the fuselage halves together with good aid of these clamps.



Remember this lump of plastic?



I was going to buy a new, better, resin engine, but found it way too expensive, so I stuck with the kit part.

After painting with Alclad steel, humbrol black and dark gull grey and a quite havy black wash, It turned out this way.



Good enough for me!

I´m lucky to have a large spare parts box, sometimes it´s a goldmine;



I have also assembled the floats, wings and the beaching trolley, pics on the way!

This is how far the build have progressed until tonight.

Jean-Luc, a dio would be interesting!
A beaching scene with a Kettenkrad dragging an Arado ashore on the trolley?
Maybe, it´s a good idea anyway!

Cheers!

Stefan E

Hi all!

Here comes a update on a build I bet You all had long forgotten!

This Is a really slow build, but It´s actually coming together, piece by piece.

When I had the fuselage together I sanded, filled and painted.
Then I had to fill again to get a good seam.



The floats went together really well after cleaning up,.
They were sanded, filled, painted and then filled and sanded again!

The cowling was assembled around the engine.
...and was sanded, filled, painted and then filled and sanded again!

Someone who sees a pattern here?





One step I knew would give me trouble was the clear parts, wich were cloudy and a bit scratched.



Ugly, eh?
I took a chance and used the "Future" (or Johnson´s Klar here in Sweden) cure for the very first time (for me).

I could not believe the difference!



Not perfectly clear, but much, much better and really usable!

The wings was glued to the fuselage.
I was somewhat worried here as It was a "butt-joint", but the old Britfix tube glue did really "bite" to the plastic and gave a strong joint!



Then It was sanding, filling.... Oh, well, by now you know the procedure!

After "carving" out the struts from the flash and sanding out the moulding seams, I could assemble the floats with the struts.



With this kit you must create your own fit, by a lot of work!

I´m having good hope though, as this kit will soon be ready for the paint booth!

More to follow....


Cheers!

Stefan E

Great to see you are making good progress on this dog of a kit, Stefan It will be very interesting to see what you get from it. I am sure the satisfaction of seeing it finished will be so much greater than just building a perfect kit from the box.

Looking forward to see more

Puhh, only a year since your last update Stefan... That is not slow, that is steady progress...
I have a few kits that have been 'in progress' for a lot longer than that..

You are making good work of what looked like a hopeless collection of assorted plastic parts. The small detail sprue looked like it was cast in loose sand. .

Looking forward to see you finish it. Someday...

Cheers
Henk

Hi all!

I have resurrected the Arado tread, and restored the photos again.

My old photo-host did a total remake of their site so every pic lost the link.

But now I use Photobucket, and everything works perfectly fine.
I have gone trough the entire blog and It should be correct now, but if you find any lost/forgotten link or anything else that not works, just send me a mail!

Oh, yes I´m still in a steady process with my Arado and I WILL paint it soon (some day this year, I promise!)

Cheers!

Stefan E

Hi Steffan.

I really hope this build will be up and running again soon. I've only just come across this thread and it brought me back to my first memory of a model airplane - my Dad making an Ar-196. I'd love to build one again, although I normally do 1/72. Are there any 1/72 offerings of this little seaplane?

..too late for Stefan ..but for everyone else with this kit in their stash waiting for some inspiration, here's a heads up for a new book from Lela Presse due on 30 June - Luftwaffe Seaplanes Vol 1....



Vol 1 describes the history of the Arado 196, Dornier 18, Heinkel 60 and Heinkel 59 over 300 A-4 pages and is replete with photos, colour profiles & technical drawings. The most comprehensive and detailed works yet published on these types in any language (French language text). Detailed English language photo captions, nearly 600 in this first volume alone

http://www.avions-bateaux.com

I've got to say that what you've got to work with you are doing a hell of a job Bob

Hi!

@Niel

Never too late for a good reference book!

I don’t read French, but I can always look at the pics anyway!

@Bob;

This must be the WORST kit I have EVER encountered during my 40+ years of model-building!

But I refuse to give in as I really do like this little sea-plane!

Thanks for your encouraging words, I’ll need them!

@ Mike;

The only 1/72 offering I know of is the old Aifix kit.
I know because I built that when I was a kid, many moons ago.

I have the Arado ready for paint now, so there’s some hope of finishing it this year!

Cheers!

Stefan E

Hi all!

The Arado is progressing, even if It´s in a Glacial tempo!

After joining the wings and fuselage there was a big gap between the rear wing roots and the fuse that you are supposed to fill yourself.

Here I have started to fill the void from below.



And this how it looks from above, not too bad actually.



Then I filled the underside with strips made from 0.5mm plastic card, glued with very thin fluid plastic glue to melt the plastic together.

When dry, i cut down the strips and sanded the surface even with the wings.



Now it was time for LOTS of filler, AGAIN!

Then even more sanding!

Here´s my secret weapon and my best friend when sanding those stubborn kits that fight you all the way, It´s the evil 80-Grit!



It´s very rough, and It´s just as effective as it looks, and you have to take great care not sanding too hard.
Then It´s time to go back and sand and polish (AGAIN!!!) to get a smooth finish.

But eventually, you´re finally there!



Then I was satisfied with the fuselage and decided to get the canopies on.
I masked the canopies the traditional way with Tamiya tape and and a sharp scalpel.

As I want to show the cockpit open, I started with the front section, which fitted almost perfect (for once!)!
An open cockpit means that the (pilots) front part slides over the middle section.
A quick test showed that the middle section was way too high, I had to cut it down about 1.5 -2.0mm (on each side of course!).
Then I had to sqeeze it a bit when I glued It to the fuselage (with CA) so the front hood wouldn´t splay out too far.

We´ll see later If I succeeded!




Fuselage, wings and stabilizator mated, cockpit glazing on, all seams filled, sanded and polished smooth.
Now It looks like the paint booth are in reach soon!



Looks like the glacier is melting fast now!

Cheers!

Stefan E

Hi all!

After spending so much time and effort on the seams, and sanding all parts to an acceptable finish, I finally reached the point when enough is ENOUGH!

Now it was off to the paint-shop!

I decided it would be easier to paint the fuselage, floats and engine assemblies separate.

Oh what a feeling when the RLM65 Light blue paint covered all the filler and blemishes on the underside, revealing a smooth surface!

I also painted the complete float and engine assembly light blue.

I masked the underside with tape and painted the first, lighter, green RLM72, with as good result as the light blue!



Next step was masking for RLM73, a slightly darker green shade.



Then painting the color and the de-masking.



De-masking the very delicate float assembly showed to be very hard, and of course I managed to snap one of the braces.
Luckily it was fixed with a little superglue.

While rigging the floats I managed to break BOTH of the cross-braces and was sooo near to do a "test-flight" in the nearest wall!

After much foul words colorIng the air over my work-bench a deeper shade of purple, during the fiddly repair-job, I finally ended up with a rigged set of floats.
Phew!

Now the floats were so fragile I hardly could handle them, but somehow I got them in place on the underside of the fuselage.

To get a really strong join I used the good ole´ Britfix tube glue, works everytime!

It worked very well, and the assembly became very solid (a great surprise to me!) when fully cured!





Then I gave the model a good coat of Humbrol #35 Gloss clear to prepare the surface for decals.



After curing for a few days It was time to use the decals.
As the subject is somewhat esoteric, there´s no after market decals whatsoever for the Arado.
So I had to use the kit´s supplied decals.

But, as opposed to so much in this kit, they showed to be excellent!

I used Micro-set, and that was about the strongest sovent I had to use!

But, as always there´s a hitch!

Those decals took a very long time to soak before releasing from the backing paper, even thogh I used VERY hot water!
The decals showed to be extremley thin, teared very easily and stuck "ZAP", about 2-3 seconds was all I had to get them in position!
The best liquid you can use is saliva, yes, spit on it! :-)
Then I got some more (much needed!) seconds!
But they were opaque, no bleed trough on the white decals, not even over the dark greens and when dry, they got that painted-on look we all search for!
I used a swastika from a Aeromaster generic sheet as I did not want to use the two-part ones in the kit.


Final assembly was a snap and the final matt-coats went on, leaving a slightly satin finish.

When I peeled the masking from the windscreen and the canopies I had some bleeding trough, but that was easily scraped off with a wooden coctail-stick.

I had a set of metal exhausts from Moskit, the prop was pushed in it´s place and my Arado Ar196 is FINISHED!


























Despite all troubles and all the hard work, I´m really satisfiyed with my Arado, and I feel It was worth the effort!

I can only recommend this kit to very experienced builders who are used to short run kits!

Hope you will like my little Arado!

Cheers!

Stefan E

Looks great! You really got this difficult-looking kit to shine.
Was it really just a dip in Future what you did to those clear parts?
Seems you had this one in progress for almost two years; time well spent I'd say.

Personally, I like to accent panel lines and add some weathering, but that's personaly preference, nothing wrong with a factory-fresh finish.

80-grit sandpaper, that's almost scary!
But I guess sometimes you just need to bring out the heavy artillery.
Isn't that about the coarsest grade there is?

There was also one from Revell, but its probably just as hard to find as the Airfix kit these days.

Just goes to show...a great modeler can overcome the deficiencies of a kit, and end up with a great build.

Turned out fantastic in the end, well done Stefan

Stefan,

Your's turned out bigger and better than my lil' 1/72 196, but I beat you on build time--1989-2005!

Excellent job. When I look at all that flash, I think, "I want a Ar 196 in 1/48 but...no thanks!" You did a superb job!

Hi Stefan

Wonderful and inspiring stuff! This would would make a great subject for a Feature.

All the best

Rowan