Allen D's 1/35 Tristar Fieseler Fi-156 Storch Wing Thingy (AAGB)

[Allen Dewire]

Guten Tag Everyone Around the World,

This will be my project for the Animal Antics GB starting 1 October 2019. I will be attempting to build this Tristar kit into a Storch flown in the European theater of Operations. All the parts to do this are included in the kit except 1 piece (no big deal). As I haven't built a wing thingy for about 100 years, this ought to be very interesting. Please keep the laughter down to a dull roar when I start building this!!! Thank you for your cooperation………...

On to the basics. The kit boxtop,



The decals, and there are a lot of them for different countries. Canopy masks are also included (lucky me!!!),



The destructions are pretty easy to follow and don't begin with building road wheels or tracks,



The shaded out pieces are for the ETO version and I will be using them and not the L sprue,



Masking diagram, sticking and painting (got a headache already) and paint schemes. Russia '42 for me, now on to the sprues,



Little pieces to the right and two identical clear sprues. One for practice screwing up on, I guess,



A motor, struts and tiny stuff. Rubber tires and metal landing gear pieces. You have the choice of it sitting on the ground or in flight,



The fuselage and interior stuff. One piece is missing to the left of the seat. No biggie as you have one to the left with the 4 MG-34 drums,



The European version wings that I will be using,



The tropical wings, exhaust headers and top engine cowling that won't be used...……..

I am not sure when this insanity build will begin as I have other things on my plate too. Sorry for the plastic bag glare, but we aren't allowed to cut or do anything before the start date......…......……...…...…...…..

Prost
Allen

 

[Steve Jones]

I know iit's a wingy, flying, up and down thing but I will watch on in admiration of your fine modelling skills. Good luck mate

 

[yak face]

Great subject allen , looking forward to the build , cheers tony

 

[JR]

Guten Tag Everyone Around the World,

This will be my project for the Animal Antics GB starting 1 October 2019. I will be attempting to build this Tristar kit into a Storch flown in the European theater of Operations. All the parts to do this are included in the kit except 1 piece (no big deal). As I haven't built a wing thingy for about 100 years, this ought to be very interesting. Please keep the laughter down to a dull roar when I start building this!!! Thank you for your cooperation………...

On to the basics. The kit boxtop,

View attachment 357736

The decals, and there are a lot of them for different countries. Canopy masks are also included (lucky me!!!),

View attachment 357737

The destructions are pretty easy to follow and don't begin with building road wheels or tracks,

View attachment 357738

The shaded out pieces are for the ETO version and I will be using them and not the L sprue,

View attachment 357739

Masking diagram, sticking and painting (got a headache already) and paint schemes. Russia '42 for me, now on to the sprues,

View attachment 357740

Little pieces to the right and two identical clear sprues. One for practice screwing up on, I guess,

View attachment 357741

A motor, struts and tiny stuff. Rubber tires and metal landing gear pieces. You have the choice of it sitting on the ground or in flight,

View attachment 357743

The fuselage and interior stuff. On piece is missing to the left of the seat. No biggie as you have one to the left with the 4 MG-34 drums,

View attachment 357744

The European version wings that I will be using,

View attachment 357745

The tropical wings, exhaust headers and top engine cowling that won't be used...……..

I am not sure when this insanity build will begin as I have other things on my plate too. Sorry for the plastic bag glare, but we aren't allowed to cut or do anything before the start date......…......……...…...…...…..

Prost
Allen

This us what happens when you sit in long lines of stationary traffic on the autobann and your mind wonders to flights of fancy.

Get it ? Flights
TAXI

 

[Si Benson]

Afternoon Mr D,

Just been reading review for this and seems to be a reasonable kit....I’m sure you’ll ace it! Think I just made a flying based pun?
Anywho....good luck, I’ll see you on the starting grid

 

[Jakko]

I’ve been wanting to build one of these in 1:72, either like this:



or this:

 

[Fernando N]

Great looking kit Allen, neat to have so many marking options and masks too.
Good luck mate .

 

[BattleshipBob]

Good choice sir!

 

[Allen Dewire]

I wasn't sure if I could answer you all until the GB started. The rules you know...…..

As of today, I Thank You all for the interest in my attempt to fly (legally). I still don't know when I can start, but it will probably be around the 22nd of October when I get back from Holland. Please stay tuned……………...……….

 

[Jim R]

Hi Allen
Great idea. Just realised it is 1/35 - unusual for a plane.
Jim

 

[Ian M]

Hi Allen
Great idea. Just realised it is 1/35 - unusual for a plane.
Jim

But great for a diorama with tank/truck/figures....
I have one in 1/32 in the stash. Having seen the RAF marked version I could be tempted to find more about it...
Look forward to seeing your build.

 

[AlanG]

I wasn't sure if I could answer you all until the GB started. The rules you know...…..

As of today, I Thank You all for the interest in my attempt to fly (legally). I still don't know when I can start, but it will probably be around the 22nd of October when I get back from Holland. Please stay tuned……………...……….

Good luck Allen. I've got my glider pilot licence and love the freedom flying gives you. One day i'll move up to engined aircraft. Would seriously love to own a microlite.

 

[Allen Dewire]

Good Evening GBer's, Readers and Children Around The World,

Jim - Yes, there aren't a lot of wing thingys in 1/35 as 1/32 is the norm. My V1 kit from Bronco is also in 1/35.

Ian - Break it out and build it. I couldn't find AM for this at the show so I got the seatbelt kit for the 1/32 Hasegawa kit to use. If you need seatbelts for yours, let me know.

Alan - I have always wanted to fly a plane, but could never afford it. I have a small airport about 800 meters from the house and gliders are flying around all the time. We have good thermals here in Bamberg. You are a lucky man!

So folks, the time has come for me to step into the Twilight Zone and build this thing. Upon opening the first plastic bag and looking at the parts close up, the molding of the parts is very good. The plastic for this kit is kind of soft and forgiving. There is some flash here and there, but easy to clean up. So far the downside is the large sprue attachment points on smaller parts. Care is needed to remove them, but armed with 3 cutters and the JLC saw, they posed no probs. My sausage fingers have so far only broken one piece and that was easy to fix.....

A little history is in order for those who are not familiar with the Storch or don't build wing thingys,

The Storch was developed and first flown in 1936. It was built by the Gerhard Fieseler Werke GmbH which was located in Kassel. The Storch as it was affectionately known was an STOL (Short Take Off and Landing) plane. With it's long fixed landing gear, wide wingspan and it's skinny appearance, the pilots thought it looked like a Stork or Storch, hence the name. With a weight of 930 kilos, it was light and that allowed the Storch to take off in about 75 meters. Into a moderate headwind, It could do it in 50 meters...

Landing was the same and it only needed about 25 meters. Into a moderate headwind, about 15 - 20 meters to land. Into a strong headwind, It could do a pinpoint landing in about 2 meters!!! It could fly as slow as just under 50 KPH and it's top speed was 175 KPH. This enabled the Storch to be used to lay commo cables at slow speed. It was also used for arty spotting, recon, liaison, ambulance, high ranking officer transport and even Rommel had one to fly around in....

It had a wingspan of 14.25 meters, could fly 350 kms on a full tank, was powered by an air cooled V-8 Argus As 10C motor that developed 241 horses. It was unarmed, but many had an aircraft version of the MG 34 mounted in the rear of the canopy. From 1936 till 1945, there were a total of 2500 of these birds built....................

I started nipping parts off the sprues, cleaned them up and in about an hour I had a nice V-8 motor. Usually I have a bunch of road wheels or tracks done,



Some mold seams to clean up and I drilled out the exhaust pipes. But there was one prob though,



It's an inverted V-8 and works up side down!!! What do I know...With the motor done, I moved on to the cockpit. It really doesn't have that many parts for a 1/35 scale kit,



The rear seat is folded down with a round stool to sit on when firing the MG out the back window. You can turn around and sit forwards too. I don't think the roll cage would make it in NASCAR or the F1. The engine firewall and gas tank are on the left. Next up, I removed the fuselage from the sprue, carefully cleaned it up and did a test fit. I threw the motor in it's mount to see how it looked,



It looks funny being up side down, but it is correct. You can see some flash on the top of where the firewall mounts. The fit of the 2 halves of the fuselage is pretty good and might not even need filler if I'm careful gluing it together. I love the same size gas and brake pedal on the floor!!! Ok, so they aren't for gas and brake...........................................Next I started fixing up the butt with the rudder and the little wings,



I need to do a little more whittling on a few points as they are all movable which is kinda cool. Just above the little wheel thing is a crank. I guess this is to roll down the cockpit window when it gets hot in the summer...........

So that's it for now good people. I want to paint the interior tomorrow and according to the destructions, it is light grey. They say use IJN grey for it. I don't know what the Japanese navy has to do with a Storch. I'll use my AK German Grey Uniform Light #3146. it looks right in my eyes......…

More to follow and hope I don't crash and burn on this. Thanks for looking in. All comments, good or bad are cheerfully accepted............

Prost
Allen (building a wing thingy)

PS, I haven't stopped work on my V2 project. I have been amassing more info and scratching more stuff for it. It will continue!!!

 

[adt70hk]

Hi Allen

Good luck! Will be following this one.

ATB
Andrew

 

[colin m]

Great start Allen. Upside down engines are a bit odd, but the 109 was the same, and that turned out alright !

 

[JR]

Dude1.
Looks a nice kit, but those thin sections but you've managed well.
Off to find a photo of this plane, the take off and landing distances are some thing else.
Keep saying " I will finish this" repeat as needed .

 

[Jakko]

I have one in 1/32 in the stash. Having seen the RAF marked version I could be tempted to find more about it...

Several Fi 156s were used by the Allies, in North Africa as well as Europe (North-West and Italy), mainly as VIP transports. According to Wikipedia, the British captured 145, but it’s not clear if this means “captured and used” or just “captured”.

I don't think the roll cage would make it in NASCAR or the F1.

They’re struts to make sure the fuselage doesn’t fall off the wing

Great start Allen. Upside down engines are a bit odd, but the 109 was the same, and that turned out alright !

Don’t forget the H-engines that the British fitted to planes like the Hawker Typhoon. Half the cylinders in those pointed straight down.

 

[JR]

Just found one for sale !
Seems they have ended up all over the world , and still considered the best STOL ever built .
According to the article they were favoured by top ranking officers because being so slow and flying so low they were not an easy target. As a liaison and observation platform it was second to none out performing every allied counterpart with both its rugged construction, reliability and performance.

It simply flew too low and slow for allied pilots to shoot it down!.No wonder then that a captured ones was used by Field Marshall Montgomery.

A number of Fieseler Fi 156s still exist, including some in Germany, South Africa, Switzerland, and the United States. The aircraft served with armed forces of postwar Poland, Czechoslovakia, Spain, and France, as well as with those in Thailand. The Japanese even flew a modified version as late as 1997.
A really interesting plane, even for me as a none wingy

 

[papa 695]

Nice start Allen.

 

[Jakko]

Seems they have ended up all over the world

They kept being built for quite a while after the war, including in France (because the Germans had set up a factory for them there) as the Morane-Saulnier 500-series, nicknamed Criquet, and in Czechoslovakia as the K-65 Čáp. Production only ended in 1965 in France.