Richards 1/24 Airfix BF109 Messerchmidt (Build)

[rtfoe]

Hi,
It's about time I post the build on the completed 109 which I promised. For those who would like to see the completed kit, just click on the link here

I've had this kit in the stash when I was still in artschool. So by the time I decided to build it, the decals were absolutely horrible, crumbly and brittle. I coated them with a flexible varnish just in case they would shatter on contact with water.
Please bare with me as I only managed to salvage some of the pictures from the old forum so they might be a bit jumbled up in sequence

I was quite surprised that the instruction sheet was in part colour...quite a big thing in those days. The box art featured Helmut Wicks markings and camo livery. There's another set of markings for an iconic Battle of Britain BF109 with red lion not sure what it is with wings.



I planned to do a simple build and not super detail the engine so I slapped it together and it looked pretty good...if only I had the time and patience to detail it.



Sprayed all interior parts with RLM grey...that's what I thought until I checked the bottle ...it was German grey. No problem, I would spot spray larger surface areas with the right colour to get the weathered look.



I checked the overall fit by dry fitting and good thing I did as the engine top didn't fit and bits had to be sliced off. The gap at the wing root was brought on by the weight of the wing but would disappear when glued together to create the dehydral. Of the two canopy versions supplied I chose the early less squarich one to depict a Battle of Britain version.



Besides the flaps and elevators the kit comes with a few more working parts like the rudder and main undercarriage. It was apity to leave the engine in flate monotone colour so I darkened certain parts with semi-gloss black and dry brushed with steel to bring out the raised detail.



The seat looked rather plain and was crying for an addition of some leather padding made from two part putty. The cellotape was to prevent the putty from sticking and once cured was removed for easy painting.



More next showing how I tackled adding side walls to the wheel well.

Cheers,
Richard

 

[spanner570]

Looking good Richard.
Sorry to read about the decal problem. I hope you managed to save his personal Kingfisher emblem.

I built Helmut Wicks's 109 with his unique camouflage on here in 2011. It is 1/48 scale.
I'm sure there are plenty around, but I've not found another model with this unique camouflage, so I look forward to seeing your 1/24 version.

Watching progress for sure.....

Ron

 

[rtfoe]

Hi Ron, thanks.

Sorry to disappoint you as this build was completed many years ago and am posting it here to show it from start to finish. Didn't do Wicks bird, I salvaged whatever decals and finished it inaccurately including the paintwork so please don't use it as point of reference. You can check it out at the Finished section.

Wicks fuselage finish was different with a stipled brush finish rather than mottled airbrushed. Yes it was unique.

Cheers,
Richard

 

[spanner570]

Richard - as you have already finished the model and didn't do Wicks's aircraft, I hope it is o.k. to show you my attempt at his unique camouflage pattern.

It's 1/48 and brush painted.


Following your detailed build with interest.

Ron

 

[rtfoe]

Richard - as you have already finished the model and didn't do Wicks's aircraft, I hope it is o.k. to show you my attempt at his unique camouflage pattern.

It's 1/48 and brush painted.
View attachment 321130

Following your detailed build with interest.

Ron

Hi Ron, that's a beautifully done BF109E of Wicks mount. The brush work is executed well. Did you paint in the dots individually or stipled with a broad brush?

Great to have you along, I have to retrace the steps I took with the detailing like thinning the prop blade

Cheers,
Richard

 

[spanner570]

Thanks Richard.
I used a cut down 000 brush and stippled.

Keep the updates coming...

Cheers.
Ron

 

[rtfoe]

Next installment of BF109 build...

The Airfix BF109 1/24 scale wheel well side walls...non existant. Now you would think at this scale there would have been some kind of support or wall surrounding the wheel well. At the time I wasn't sure if it really had side walls but I wasn't going to leave it empty so with my archaic method of measuring the height of the surrounding wall, I used plastercene or for some of you known as childrens oil based clay.



I traced the height on paper and cut 0.5mm plastic card and stuck it on. Later ribs and frames were added. Even though I wasn't going to display the guns I still gave them a coat of black and dry brushed steel. The instrument panel dials were picked out in black.



They would later be fitted with clear parts from the back and behid that were the instrument dials.



The next few pictures are a wee bit small...my apologies as thats all I have. The wing mg's are fitted onto a separate wing leading edge panel which didn't quite fit flush. Lots of putty went into it and I had to protect the surrounding detail with cellotape while sanding. You can see the support strips in the wheel well. The undercarriage needed to be assembled with the fuselage to be able to work and then the wing fitted. Prior to this I used copper wire for brake lines. Luckily most of the dimple marks were on the underside and were easily delt with some putty. The slight step to openings were sanded flush. The slight gap at the base wing root was wedged with thin plastic strip and sanded down.



These next pictures show mostly the puttying and sanding of joints and panels. In the next post I will show a close up of the cockpit and Revi gunsight that I detailed.



Cheers,
Richard

 

[Dave Rogers]

At the time I wasn't sure if it really had side walls but I wasn't going to leave it empty so with my archaic method of measuring the height of the surrounding wall, I used plastercene or for some of you known as childrens oil based clay.

That's brilliant. I wish someone had suggested that to me a long time ago. I'll give that a try next time I need to make anything with a complex shape - I'm thinking internal bulkheads, for example.

Is that a well-known technique, and I'm just the last one to hear about it?

Dave

 

[rtfoe]

Hi Dave, not sure if it's a well-known technique but I remember how certain Chinese biscuits are made using a wooden mold by filling and pressing the thick batter, cutting and smoothening the underside and banging against the table to release the molded biscuit. The batter retained its shape. All I needed was something that would hold its shape and I had some left over plastercene which did the trick.

Cheers,
Richard

 

[rtfoe]

Hi,
In my haste to glue things together I realised I hadn't paid attention to the exhaust. Holes had to be drilled which was not easy with the wings in the way. Moreover the exhausts were square which means after drilling I had to square off the aperture with a blade. The exhausts had very prominent weld beading which I replicated with plastic strip soften with liquid cement and roughened with the back of a blade.



The Revi gunsight provided by the kit was bare soI added some strips and knobs of plastic then made a reflector sight with clear plastic supported two platic strips on either side. At this point the cockpit isn't weathered.



More later on how I made my own seatbelts.

Cheers,
Richard

 

[rtfoe]

Hi,
Sorry that its taken me a while to post this, have been re-working my work space and renovating the roof over the dining area of the house.

Seatbelts...Airfix does not supply them and I wasn't sure at the time if there were any after market belts in 1/24 scale so I decided to make my own. Checked out references on German fighter belts and found they had a perculiar harness for the lap. It had a few layers in different shapes which I prepared. Basically the first picture shows the components, the buckles were copper wire tweezed into shape and then hammered flat. The stranged shaped fuse wire is for a fastening strap and the two bent wires were for the grab handles above the cockpit windscreen. The belts were masking tape taped together and cut into lengths and shapes.



Following references I just folded and tucked the straps around the buckles and fastened them with CA then was clamped across further with thinner strips of tape. The odd fuse wire is now attached to the thin fastening strap.



A first layer of light grey and white paint applied with strong strokes of darker and lighter shading of the colors that would slowly be coated with thin layers of the same paint to soften the shades.



Silver, rust brown and dark brown were used to pick out the individual parts of the belt.



Finally after layering there is just a suble hint of shades between each piece of the belt. One thing I should have done was to use a sharp pencil and drawn the threading along the sides of the belt but eventually didn't do.



Next up will be the priming and painting process...till then.

Cheers,
Richard

 

[dave]

Nice work on the seatbelts.

 

[colin m]

Brilliant belts. The nice thing about larger scales is being able to do this sort of thing.

 

[rtfoe]

Dave and Colin, much obliged with your comments. Glad you both like the belts.

Ya, the big scales do offer the opportunity to create items to a finer detail but normally later offerings provide these in the package. Some AM belts still need work to get them looked used. My belts aren't really that detailed and are a bit better in 1/48 scale as they are smaller enough to get away with less detailing.

Cheers,
Richard

 

[rtfoe]

Hi, here come the boring part of the build when all parts are fitted together and pre-shading begins after a light coat of primer. The bigger the plane the easier the application of the pre-shade as I don't have to constantly do three to four pass over the same lines. I can use slightly thicker paint.



You will notice the extra coating of primer at the joints of the wing root and fuselage halves to smoothen out the hardlines of the filler.



From the base of the wing to the tail wheel the BF 109 had a destinct joint line which I scribed in. After this I misted over the bottom pre shading with primer to lighten it so that it doesn't show too strongly through the light blue to be applied later.

Next, the body and masking for the splinter camo... thanks again for looking in.

Cheers,
Richard

 

[Jakko]

Brilliant belts. The nice thing about larger scales is being able to do this sort of thing.

I was about to say pretty much the same thing

 

[rtfoe]

I was about to say pretty much the same thing

And I was going to say thanks Jakko. The larger it is the more stuff to add...it can be enjoyable or a pain.

Cheers,
Richard

 

[Jim R]

Hi Richard
You are really good at making these silk purses from sows ears. Love the way you sorted the undercarriage bay walls. Seat belts are brilliant. So many useful little tips to be had following your builds.
Jim

 

[rtfoe]

Thank you kindly Jim,
When you sit and think hard enough out of the box and plan, things will fall into place. Some of the ideas are simply everyday stuff we do and take for granted until wait a minute howz about I apply it here suddenly hits me in the head. They are nothing new. The other driving factor is to use as little money as possible and make whats available around the house.
Now who would have thought cumin, caraway or fennel seeds would look like bananas? The first thought was the scale, shape and the color yellow and these were formed...



Cheers,
Richard

 

[rtfoe]

More on the painting...tried out new masking tape I got from Ace Hardware. Wasn't that tacky when touched but to be safe I ran it over my pants before applying. It still lifted some of the paint. The pieces protruding from the canopy are tape that I wedged in spaces for the gaps...



Removing the masking is always quite nerving as you don't know what to expect. This time it looked ok. The clean colors at this stage doesn't seem to look right until weathering and decals go on.



The BF 109 is a small plane, imagine the size of a Mustang or Focke Wulf.

Mottling comes up next...

Cheers,
Richard