Steve's Models

[Sailor Steve]

Basic assembly complete. I had hoped to have the landing gear on as well, but I had some other things going on as well. I'm only a month away from the 100th anniversary of the first naval (non)engagement of the war, and I wanted to play out the possible scenarios with my own naval game, but I haven't really even started on the ships and models for that fight. I'm trying to make time to get all that done.

[Sailor Steve]

Landing gear and paint applied. This is one of the first examples of the use of Protective Coloring #10, commonly just called PC-10. As the name implies, it was partly for camoflage but mostly to protect the fabric from the sun and help it last longer.

[Fish40]

Nice!

[Sailor Steve]

I didn't do anything with the model on Monday, being too busy working on a couple of other things plus getting ready to go play music. Yesterday I was busy recovering from the playing and the trip to the gym that morning. Today I got the pilots painted and the fuselage details that will be unaccessible once the upper wing is on. I then cut four cabanes out of brass rod and got the wing on straight. I then thought about the struts. It's hot here in the summer and the thin plastic struts are susceptible to the heat. It turns out resin is even worse, so I have to fix a couple of my recent models and be more careful about leaving them in the car at the hobby shop. Brass rod is great, but many struts of the era had an aerofoil shape, wide from the side but narrow from the front, and pointy at the ends, and I don't have the equipment to shape brass that way. I would use plastic but I've run out of the spare stock I bought so many years ago and no one makes it anymore.

So I did a little online research and came up with pretty much nothing. Then I got to thinking (always a dangerous pastime) and it suddenly hit me - There was one material I hadn't tried for various reasons, but I had a supply of it right here in my home, and it may be enough to last me a lifetime; if not, I can get plenty more for an insanely cheap price at the local supermarket. It's called "wood". A long time ago I though about balsa, but it's fairly expensive and while it's great for flying models, for something the size I need it's not very strong. I needed a hardwood, something that won't bend, won't break and is still easily workable. But where to find such a wood in a size that's measured in millimeters? Then it hit me: TOOTHPICKS! I had some in the cupboard, and another little bottle is somewhere between $1 and $3, and the bottle contains at least a hundred of them.

So I got out the toothpicks, measured and cut one. I cut off the pointy ends because they're too pointy, put the handy-dandy sanding wheel on the Dremel tool and ground the square toothpick down until it had the proper aerofoil shape, then used a sanding stick to shape the ends and smooth the rest. One of the problems with brass is that if you cut it just a tiny bit too long the only way to shorten it is to cut it again, and then your run the risk of making it just a tiny bit too short, and there's no fix for that. With the toothpick if it's just a tiny bit too long you start gently sanding the end, just a little, then check it again.

Eureka! Voila! Presto! Perfection!

I only got the two struts for one side done when the Dremel started slowing down. I took off the battery pack and put it on the charger, and used some brown paint and a lot of thinner to make a stain. Now I not only have good solid struts, but they have real wood grain! I only did one, so the picture shows one stained and one not.

[Jimbuna]

Nice work...you've learned well

[Sailor Steve]

All done but the rigging. The kit didn't come with a gravity tank, and every single photograph shows one. I fabricated one out of a World War 2 drop tank. A little cutting, a little gluing, a little grinding, a little sanding...

[Sailor Steve]

Shortening the lower wing and having only one set of struts meant that they added an extraordinary amount of rigging to give the plane strength. All that extra rigging has taken three days to install, but today it's finally done.

The BE.2e. I can see why they called it 'The Quirk'.

This picture also shows off the new set of British propeller logos I recently puchased. Markings are by Tibbenham Aviation Company.

This aircraft represents one that was forced down and captured by the Germans. The only photographs I know of were taken after the capture, and show iron crosses on the wheel covers, something I left off the model. The other markings represent squadron and personal markings, and they had three different pairs of those. The 'A' on the tail was a squadron marking, as was the stripe on the sides.


The BE.2e still had the observer in the front cockpit, giving him a limited range of fire. They did try different mountings, the most popular being a swiveling pintel which allowed the gun to move a little more freely and the gunner to look down the sights, a luxury not available on a regular pintel mount. In this case I chose to represent the "goalpost" mount, which allowed the gun to slide back and forth, which did help some.


This close-up shows the "star and crescent" marking on the engine cover, which I'm pretty sure was a personal marking, and the barely-visible clover, probably also a personal emblem.


One of the oddities that made me want to do this version was the fact that the photos clearly show that the upper wing was bare linen rather than PC-10 paint, which indicates that the upper wing was damaged at some point and replaced with an older wing from when the entire plane was still CDL. Even more odd is that half the starboard aileron was apparently replaced again with one that was painted PC-10. This also indicates that the aileron came in two sections, something not mentioned in any of the sources I've seen.


I need to work on the rules for Thursday's game, so I probably won't be starting my next project until Friday.

[Aktungbby]

Great rigging job! Any chance the Turks got hold of a British Captured aircraft which would explain the star and crescent for use in the Mesopotamia campaign?
Wikipedia- "By the end of 1915, two offices were established to govern Ottoman military aviation. The 13th Branch was part of the Ottoman General Staff; the 9th Branch was part of the Minister of War's office.
By 1916, the growing air force had 81 pilots and observers and about 90 airplanes. Eventually, Germany would transfer 460 airplanes to the Ottoman Empire; some 260 went to the Ottoman units and the rest remained in German units. Some 400 German aviation personnel served in Ottoman forces.
By the war's end, the Ottoman aviation squadrons had become a potpourri of about 200 supplied, purchased, and captured aircraft from Germany, France, Russia, and Britain. Even a general enumeration was overwhelming: seven types of Albatros; four types of Fokkers; three types of Gotha bombers; two types each of Rumpler and Caudron; plus LVG B series, Halberstadts, Pfalzes, Voisins, DeHavillands, Nieuports, a Bristol Bullet, a Farman, a Morane-Saulnier L Parasol, and a Grigorovich G.5." I suspect your rehabbed BE2e might be a Turkish loaner. this BE2e for example was used by New Zealand forces in Palestine in 1917;

And this BE2e was used in Gaza night bombing by Australians- all sides used each other's aircraft and the 'Quirk' was certainly in the Middle East. It was definitely not the aircraft of choice!

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Aktungbby

Any chance the Turks got hold of a British Captured aircraft which would explain the star and crescent for use in the Mesopotamia campaign?

Probably not in this case. The first test conversion of a BE.2c to the new configuration was completed on February 14, 1916. 'C' and 'D' models were being converted prior to delivery in late May. This aircraft, 5836, was assigned to the RFC in France on June 26 and remained there until brought down in Germany on August 29.

It was definitely not the aircraft of choice!

Not there, not on the Western Front, not anywhere.

[Buddahaid]

Nice model Steve. I've always like that general colour scheme and what a mess to rig!

[Sailor Steve]

Next project: Another Albatros C.III. I originally bid on one on eBay, then saw a different kit for a better 'Buy It Now' price. I bought the second one, expecting someone to outbid me for the first, at which point I would let it go. No one did, and I ended up with two. I built the first one as an early version, without the synchronized forward gun. This one will be a later version, with the pilot's gun and with very cool personal markings.

[Aktungbby]

Sailor Steve: with very cool personal markings

The last war WITH very cool personal markings, IMHO very cool! for some of us really old warbirds Although he never flew the Albatross, #4 on the WWI list-tied with Voss- Josef Jacob, commander Jasta 7, certainly had 'interesting markings'...for anyone with Udo von D: 666 fallen angel proclivities DRI#450/17 Whatever HIS religious affiliation insignia-wise, Jacobs was the last Pour Le Merite (BlueMax) winner to die in 1978-age 84> Strangely, religion was a wide-open issue as Erhard Milch, Knight's Cross, of mixed Jewish ancestry, also commanded Jasta 7 and in WWII was a Generalfieldmarshall under Goering and Speer. One of the very few high ranking officers to serve with Jewish ancestry, He did time for war crimes.

[Sailor Steve]

Interior finished. This kit, from Meikraft, is very poorly designed. The dimensions all seem to be right, and the details look good, but everything is tied to the sprue with very thick connectors that have to be carefully trimmed and sanded to get rid of the huge lumps. Not fun at all.

[Sailor Steve]

Fuselage, tail assembly and lower wings in place.

[DragonRider]

Hi Steve You Might find this interesting.

http://news.uk.msn.com/airworthy-ww1-planes-unveiled