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Welcome to Neil's online build of the Eduard 1/48th Fokker D VII (OAW)

Added 07/04/2007:

It’s been a while since there’s been an update but I assure you that things have been happening in between work, family, and life in general…

The fuselage went together quite well though the seam needed a little filler top and bottom. I used Mr Surfacer 500 and gap filling super glue also. This was the first time I’ve used the super glue method and I’m very happy with it as it seems to need less sanding than normal putties.

 The underside did need a bit of filler, particularly around the wing roots and forward toward the nose. That was the consequence I think of the internal alignment problems I mentioned in the last update. I’m a little ambivalent about the drop in stitching. Whilst it looks effective, I found there was a slight gap along one side of it, which I needed to run a bead of superglue along to fill it.

 This photo shows the nose painted in green as per the instructions for Buchner’s aircraft. The colour used was a Humbrol No 80 Grass Green. I used this because quite frankly, the Mr Color #138 Russian Tank Green recommended by Eduard does not exist and hasn’t for some time. I emailed Eduard about this and received an indifferent response of ‘oh well, no one knows exactly what colour the green was (like with many World War One aviation colours) so it doesn’t matter’. I found this response poor and not responsive of the needs of modellers who may go through some angst either trying to find this deleted colour or end up mixing their own. Eduard normally has a high standard regarding their kits and I thought they would care more that the colours they are recommending are unavailable. However this seems not to be the case. Nor were they willing to recommend another colour from another paint range either.

Anyway…. Rather than attempting to mix my own (my last resort option), I set about trying to match the green decal strips, which will go on the tail plane (and which should match the nose colour) with about twenty other greens from another paint range. I found that Humbrol 80 Grass Green was the closest, being almost an exact match. As usual with Humbrol it covered well with a couple of light coats.

Oh yes… a little trick I found was that if you don’t secure the engine in the engine bay, you can take it out when painting the nose and forward fuselage. This gets rid of the awkward masking needed to effectively cover the engine when spraying the nose. It is an easy matter to slide it back in, if you don’t permanently attach the radiator (I used Microscale Micro Liquitape for this) at this stage. After removing the engine, I reattached the radiator for painting purposes. The actual radiator detail was painted in Gunze Dark Iron Metaliser. I won’t polish the Metaliser as this would overdo the effect. Instead I will dust it lightly with graphite powder to give it some texture and depth. Currently neither the engine nor the radiator are permanently fixed which is why they look a little off centre in the photo.

The light blue I used for the main fuselage colour was not the Gunze Aqueous colour (H 25 Sky Blue) as I thought it too dark. Instead I used a Tamiya X-14 Sky Blue, which I found a slightly lighter and more appropriate colour. I’ve been experimenting with some weathering effects to texture the blue but haven’t been happy with the results. I tried a range of blue and white lighter tones for filters but couldn’t get them blended with the base colour to my satisfaction. I may try some pastels later in the build however.

I’ve already started on the tail plane assembly and then will be moving on to apply the lozenge to the lower wings…

Added 29/10/2006: Part III The Interior Con't

After a few little touch ups following the last instalment, it was time to assembly
the completed interior.

A fair amount of dry-fitting as you go is necessary here in order to get the fit just right. Dry fitting revealed that my clumsiness earlier with the seat frame came back
to haunt me with the seat showing up as off centre if the back bulkhead was fitted square. A quick attempt at re-assembly of the frame’s components revealed the problem: one of the triangular supports had snapped at one stage and fixing this had lengthened one side of it leading it to be off-true. There was no other course but the fit the back bulkhead on a slight angle in order to fit the seat in its correct position. I’m figuring that this won’t be so noticeable once the fuselage is closed… I’ll find out later, I guess.

On the back bulkhead, dry fitting revealed that, with the positioning tabs in place, it was a little too large, even when fitted into the grooves provided, forcing the
fuselage apart. I trimmed the tabs off and the part fitted perfectly.

Most of the rest of the interior parts fitted well. Be careful that you have the floor fitted tight against the fuselage wall as there is no margin for error in the fit of this component. If its not, the fuselage’s fit will be compromised. Whilst all parts fit very well in this kit, I found that there is no margin for error in the assembly of them – make sure all are fitting well into their allotted places and you’ll have no problems.

At this point too, I added an extra gauge/dial/whatever, PE part #5, to the rear machine gun mount next to the rev counter. Eduard would have you add it after the fuselage is closed up but that seemed overly difficult for no good purpose, so I add it with the rest of the interior components. Actually I find this gauge thingy to be a
bit of a mystery. I haven’t been able to find any reference to it in either the Albatros Fokker D VII Datafile Special, or in any of my references apart from a cockpit configuration sketch in the Squadron “In Action” book, and they show it in a different place to Eduard. Hmmm….

To round off the cockpit, I added a few cables: a cable running from the rev counter;
a Bowden cable (one only but there should be two) running from the trigger
mechanism on the joystick to the machine guns, and a throttle cable to the throttle on the port fuselage side.

Next instalment will deal with closing the fuselage, lower wing assembly, and I think beginning the process of masking and painting – when I can figure out which colour scheme to do it in that is!
 

Added 22/10/2006: Part II The Interior

Given the time since the first instalment, anyone following this build will be 109 and quite decrepit by now… ;-) Basically getting a new job, family, general slackness etc. etc. slowed things up somewhat, as did my intention of working on this one very methodically.

First up for the interior is the floor, rudder bar and joy stick. No much to say
about this step, apart from the floor perhaps where I lightened a couple of patches on the floor to simulate wear from the pilots boots. The woodwork is done with my standard Gunze Sail Colour base, a Burnt Umber wash, finished with a Tamiya Clear Yellow Overcoat, method. Rudder control cables were fine fuse wire – possibly overscale but will do the job when the interior is closed up.

 

The second step is construction of the seat and seat belts. The construction of the seat frame consists of three parts and is somewhat fiddly and also fragile. I think it came apart at least four times while attaching the seat belts. The PE seat belts conformed quite well to the seat but weren’t as giving as previous unpainted Eduard
PE seat belts I’ve worked with before. Question – How do you anneal pre-painted PE parts? I didn’t and that may explain the slight lessening of flexibility regarding the belts. The Lozenge fabric screen behind the seat is represented by a decal. This settled well with the Model Master setting solutions I used. More on the interior lozenge in a minute… The seat exterior was painted in Gunze Stainless Steel
Metaliser (unpolished gives a nice mid tone metallic colour that is neither too dark or light to my eye). The cushion was done in a Citadel Snake Bite Leather, whilst the back was Revell’s Leather (84) – one of the few dark leather colours on the market. The Seat belts were given a raw sienna wash to finish off.

The third step concerns the construction of the instrument panel, which is a pre-painted (albeit not altogether convincingly) PE job, provided by Eduard. Various taps had to be attached and these were painted in a Humbrol Brass with a flat coat over them to take down the metallic brightness. The other instrument is a three-way
fold up job, which I had a little trouble getting the folding alignment right. I would have preferred three separate pieces but Eduard now are attaching bezels to the instruments in a fold-over single part. Maybe I just have to work more with these to learn how to get them right.

 

An interesting conundrum presents itself at this point… Eduard in the instructions
seem to show the plastic instrument panel as backing the PE two piece components but this seems to leave the instrument panel too thick. Interestingly some online builders of this kit have gone with that, while others have just used the PE parts.
I’m inclined to using the PE parts only. I think Eduard were just showing the
placement for the two alternative instrument panels in the exploded diagram rather than the idea of backing one with the other. Still, it’s a point where Eduard could be clearer in their instructions.


The ammunition belt feed box needs the fuel pump attached to it. The ammunition
box features quite a defined seam line, which I am still toying with removing.
Pictures of the original do feature some detail on them but whether this seam is Eduard’s attempt to represent this or just a very nasty seam line, I’m not sure. Some online builders have removed it. Others have left it. I’m still thinking about this one and may yet do something about it before I build up the interior and close the fuselage… stay tuned for further developments….

Internal lozenge decals need to be applied to the fuselage sidewalls. These decals
are quite workable and settle well with setting solutions. Once these were applied
and ready, I gave them a couple of coats of Humbrol Matt Clear to take down the brightness of the decals and when this was dry, I brushed them with yellow-buff
pastel dust to fade them out somewhat as I think they are too defined as they are (remember these are meant to be lozenge print seen from the reverse side so maybe they shouldn’t be too bright or defined). Once this was done I proceeded to make a mess of the sidewall detail, picking it out with first Gunze Medium Grey, and when
that provided little contrast, my favourite Dark Iron Metaliser. Unfortunately clumsiness set in and as a result my sidewall detail is a bit thick. I also went over it with a lead pencil as well. Oh well, I’m hoping it wont be too visible when the
fuselage is closed up. A burnt umber wash was applied for not much value and then a further brushing with the buff pastel dust. Somehow I think I overworked this section maybe… ;-)

Once all that was done, the PE throttle was attached to the right sidewall. Eduard
say not to paint this apart for the wooden handle but did I listen to that advice? No! Apart from the handle done in wood, the upper parts were done in steel and the throttle lever down in Dark Iron, with a wash over the top to pick out the detail.

Looking at the photos I took to accompany this instalment I see a couple of points
for a bit of touch up with the old paint brush to be done. Its amazing what the old digital camera reveals sometimes…

All hairs present in the photos courtesy of Preston The Perpetually Shedding Cat. These will be of course removed prior to assembly….
 

Added 05/09/2006: Ever since I purchased this kit when it came out, its been beckoning me to build it. Since I was looking for a nice build after a couple of older
kits the Eduard Fokker D VII almost automatically suggested itself.

Once Ross heard I was building this kit, he began to twist my arm for an online build of sorts. After a bit of thought, I agreed. My take on it is that rather than present an ‘uber-modeller’ build article, where the author is more intent on impressing the reader with his/her ‘expert’ knowledge on the subject, it might be more interesting for everyone to see what an average modeller makes of this much written about kit.

To start, I’m not going into the history of the Fokker D VII at all. That’s been much covered elsewhere. Suffice to say, it was a finely engineered aircraft with few vices, which set the benchmark for technology at the time in mid-1918.

First impressions is that this is a very high quality piece of engineering. All parts are very crisp and pouring gates are minimal. So far I’ve seen no sink marks or ejection plugs anywhere (something I’m all too familiar with on older kits). The computer generated instructions are something to behold and I believe establish Eduard as a market leader in this area. Also included is a nice PE set for extra detailing, some express masks to help with the painting, and a decal sheet covering four options.

Step One covers the assembly of the engine. Two versions are possible here – either
a Mercedes D.IIIa or a BMW IIIa engine. Which you choose will define largely which version of the aircraft you choose to depict (There are two marking options for each variant). I chose the BMW for my model, which will be either the Von Wedel Jasta 23s or Buchner Jasta 13 versions (I’m not entirely sure which it will be at this stage). The engine goes together very well indeed with excellent fit on all parts. All it needed was a light buff with a medium grade nail file to remove what little seam was extant after assembly. The only parts that gave me any trouble were the PE engine data plates which bent very easily and as a result don’t sit as well as they might on my engine. Still since they won’t be seen, I’m not too worried about that.

I departed a little in the painting of the engine, rather than Eduard’s recommended “Superfine Silver” for the engine body, I preferred to use an Extracolour “Oily Steel” (x503). The cylinders etc were done in Gunze Dark Iron Metalizer (unbuffed) with the base of the cylinders and pipes in Gunze Steel Metaliser (also unbuffed). The intake pipes were also very lightly dry brushed with brass for a bit of weathering. The entire engine was given a Lamp Black watercolour wash, and once this had dried a slightly thicker Burnt Umber watercolour wash was applied to the engine body only. Once
these had dried, a few passes with a cotton wool bud took off the excess, and also buffed slightly the Dark Iron, providing a few highlights to the detail of the engine. I prefer this method to dry brushing on engines as I find the highlights the buffing provides are more natural looking than dry-brushing. If you do use this method, be sure to buff lightly and only when you are removing the excess of the washes. Too much or too heavy buffing will lead to an overly shiny engine that just doesn’t look right. Also I did not buff the sides of the cylinders at all, preferring a dull flat look to this part of the engine. Next instalment will deal with the cockpit interior….