Eduard Bf 109F-4

[CANicoll]

Got an early start to this build (like 4am this morning early!).  Here is the plan for the build:

Eduard's Profipak Bf 109F-4. Comes with its own Eduard PE and masks, but also have the Quinta interior set and for some unknown reason the HGW seatbelts which at this point are going to go unused (anybody need these? - Ditto the Eduard IP color bits - probably will not use 90% of the Eduard cockpit PE).  MRP paints are going to be the base, but the cockpit is already Vallejo as the MRP won't arrive until Tuesday.

Here are the fun bits.  This is kind of typical:  Picking up a kit, then over time adding AM to it.  You should see the last Revell 1/32 P-51D I have.  There is more AM than kit parts in the box!

Already have found an issue with the Quinta set: the instructions have two call outs for the same decal (#12), and I can't figure out where decal #10 (a metal panel) is supposed to go.  But these are nothing compared to what went on with the F-4 Phantom II so already looking like a much easier build.  Too bad Luftwaffe cockpits were so tight.  Hardly any of this will be seen once it is all closed up.

The target subject (if you pardon the pun) is a F-4 originally for North Africa in the desert scheme, that has been modified for the Eastern Front.  The camo scheme is what drew my interest.

In-process pictures coming later tonight...

[Martinnfb]

Excellent choice! 

 

[Peterpools]

Chris

Awesome choice and you're first in with your 109.

Will be following for the entire journey.

 

[JohnB]

Way to go Chris! That's what I call a early start!!! LOL 🙂

[Landlubber Mike]

Fantastic choice Chris!  That camo scheme is really sharp looking!  Looking forward to following along!

[PanzerWomble]

Can't go wrong with an 109 ! Classic airframe . 

[CANicoll]

Thanks guys!!  I was horrible missing the Twins GB deadline so not going to hold everyone up this time!

And apologies for the terrible focusing.  Went back to using a real camera and missed the aperture.  Ok, on with the WIP:

Quinta IP, up close and personal.  Missing a couple of switches which is on purpose as I know I'll just knock them off.  This is actually 3 pieces.

What is cool is that Eduard puts two IPs in the kit - one with all the relief for use with the decal, and this one for use with their PE or AM IPs.  No sanding required.

Sidewall detail with some light weathering/shading using gunmetal instead of a lightened RLM 66.  The gunmetal looks like metal wear and highlights edges nicely.  Worked nicely on the seat.

 

The Quinta instructions say to cut off the mounting buckles, but internet cockpit photos show the buckles in place.  Only the right side bottom seat belt (left in the photo) is glued down.  The others are just placed, but staying.  My preference is to not have the belts symmetric and I may even see about draping one over the side of the seat...

The Eduard PE pedals look pretty rough here, but not sure if that is a photo artifact or what.  The heel-cups on both side broke off when I tried to bend them (PE and I have a tenous relationship...) but these are the PE pedals, on the kit plastic petals, drybrushed with the gun metal.  That is probably why the left pedal looks so rough.  The toe-straps are Quinta, but are not long enough to form a loop but in scale looks ok.

Already used the pedicure brushes which arrived this weekend!  Both on the strap on top of the gun breech (red-brown strap) and on that metal loop on the flap wheel on the left of the seat.  The 7mm brush was fantastic.  Used the side of the brush to weather the floorboard and the edges of the seat (mostly hidden by the belts).  There is still one more dual wire support on the left side of the cockpit that is ready to install.

May still pull some washes out, but like the progress so far.  I do like the Eduard kits.  Sorry for the poor-quality photos!  Will do better.

[CANicoll]

Martin, you are always a wealth of knowledge, experience and information!  I'll be studying these photos.  Thanks!!

[mark31]

Nice and off for a great start.

Good work on the pit.

Mark

[Peterpools]

Chris

Holy smokes, you're off to a flying start and some mighty nice work on the front office. Eduard absolutely gives you your money worth with extra details in their Profi line and details look mighty good, plus the Quita 3D details - awesome combo.

Looking at the rudder pedal, just seems under magnification, the paint pigment might be the culprit. But have no fears as once all is in place and the fuselage closed up, a good deal of the details will be hidden and can no longer be seen. 

On my Sa'ar, I'm trying to add and lightly weather what will be seen but it's so hard to stop, as it's such an enjoyable part of the build. 

Quinta IP and belts look mighty good and will be the stars of the front office.

 

[CANicoll]

6 hours ago, mark31 said:

Nice and off for a great start.

Good work on the pit.

Mark

Thanks Mark!  Nice to get an early start and it is a nice kit.

[CANicoll]

2 hours ago, Peterpools said:

Chris

Holy smokes, you're off to a flying start and some mighty nice work on the front office. Eduard absolutely gives you your money worth with extra details in their Profi line and details look mighty good, plus the Quita 3D details - awesome combo.

Looking at the rudder pedal, just seems under magnification, the paint pigment might be the culprit. But have no fears as once all is in place and the fuselage closed up, a good deal of the details will be hidden and can no longer be seen. 

On my Sa'ar, I'm trying to add and lightly weather what will be seen but it's so hard to stop, as it's such an enjoyable part of the build. 

Quinta IP and belts look mighty good and will be the stars of the front office.

 

Peter - you nailed it.  I will probably clean off some of that pigment, but as you pointed out - it is not going to be seen anyway.  But WE know it's there, right!  The Quinta belts are nice - but also a bit brittle.  I have to watch that....  I'll do some adjusting on them along the way...  Looking forward to your Sa'ar.

[Peterpools]

Chris

What I like to do on the Quinta belts is just reinforce the back where the bend will be with Tamiya tape and no issues or worries. Works great and I wish they would stop using the ultra thin paper belts as they just don't look that good. Your belts are old school and look great.

 

[CANicoll]

25 minutes ago, Peterpools said:

Chris

What I like to do on the Quinta belts is just reinforce the back where the bend will be with Tamiya tape and no issues or worries. Works great and I wish they would stop using the ultra thin paper belts as they just don't look that good. Your belts are old school and look great.

 

OHHHH.. Excellent idea!.....

[CANicoll]

Had the first casualty of the build.  The bottom panel of the IP went missing.  For some reason, Eduard didn't include the flap on the IP without the raised detail.  I had the Quinta panel CA'd to the bottom of the panel, and noticed today it is AWOL.  Probably out looking for a camel...

Fortunately, I have two options:  I can raid the Eduard Color PE kit for that panel, or I can go the kit IP/decal angle, which is probably what I'm going to do since I don't want to mess up the Eduard Color PE stuff.  This panel is at the bottom of the IP anyway. 

However, here is what I was working on - attaching three knobs to the IP: one red, one white and one yellow.  Quinta, to their credit, give you two of each as they are TINY.  A dab of CA gel is currently holding them in place.

A test fit of the cockpit shows how tight the fit really is.  I close up the fuselage (no pic) and wow, German pilots were SKINNY.  Oh, and I had seen this in a YouTube review of the Bf 109 kit: no alignment pins on the fuselage.  In effect, the cockpit becomes how the fuselage halves get properly aligned.  I have built another Eduard Bf 109G-10 but forgot about this.

And have completed the cockpit itself now.  Still doing a bit of detailing and weathering, but this is probably about as fussy as I'm going to be with it.  It really is something how small the opening is in the fuselage.

And if I had thought ahead a bit, I would have pre-painted the fuselage openings around the exhausts to make masking so much easier later, but completely punted on that.  Oh well.  It's only tape, right?  Exhausts are Model Master Burnt Iron Metalizer which sprays beautifully.  Left side exhaust will have a PE cover added later in the build.  Interestingly, the nose gun openings drop in from the outside.  And are definitely handed.  They fit really well, but only on the side intended.  (Ask me how I know...).

Too nice a day to have been inside this long.  Time to get out and celebrate Labor Day!  

 

[Peterpools]

Chris

Just always seems to happen when you least expect it .. just part of the fun! gas line and fuel gauge look mighty good - nice progress on the 109. Yup, they surely looked small and tight - not for us chubby's these day.

. . 

[HubertB]

That is actually what made the 109 the exceptional aircraft it was: design an airframe as small and light as possible around the biggest engine you have. 
The Japanese did the same with the Zero, but saved weight by very-thin gauge aluminium (the first versions had a 0.2 mm thick skin) and no protection for the pilot. ( The skin thickness increased by 70 % by the time they produced the -5 version).

You’re in a roll, Chris 

Hubert

[CANicoll]

Getting very close to closing up the fuselage on the 109.  Still looking at the IP conundrum: Eduard offers two different IPs for the F-4: One with a drop panel in the middle (via the PE option) and one without (kit IP).  Then Quinta comes in with their version which can go both ways.  The panel is VERY visible, and the cockpit canopy will be displayed open. Hmmm

Otherwise, the fit is tight and nice.  Tailwheel strut has to go in now before closing the fuselage, but it is very thin and fragile.

[Peterpools]

Chris

Nice progress and you're on a roll. Just a shame, so much the front office details will be lost once the fuselage halves are closed up.

 

[Landlubber Mike]

Wow Chris, moving right along!  Love the cockpit and IP.  The exhausts came out really nicely too - I might have to look into the Model Master paint.  I'm trying not to delve into too many paint lines, as it gets hard to keep them all straight with air pressures, thinners, clean ups, etc.

[CANicoll]

1 hour ago, Landlubber Mike said:

Wow Chris, moving right along!  Love the cockpit and IP.  The exhausts came out really nicely too - I might have to look into the Model Master paint.  I'm trying not to delve into too many paint lines, as it gets hard to keep them all straight with air pressures, thinners, clean ups, etc.

Mike -  Thanks!!  This is the benefit of a 1/48 kit.  If this was a 1/32 Bf 109 I think I'd still be on the cockpit.  On my bench right now I have all of the radiators ready to get a coat of the Burnt Iron Metalizer, have the elevators ready for paint - since their camo doesn't extend to the fuselage it makes it easier to paint them separately, and finish the tail with its camo, then assemble - and have laid out all of the flaps, ailerons, wheel well parts, etc for their painting.  Moving so much faster than the Phantom!!

I hear you on the different paints.  I think I'd like to try the AK Interactive paints but mostly I watch what Peter is using to see how he likes it.  👍.  I'm kind of stuck on Vallejo acrylics (but am less and less happy with them in general), The Vallejo Metal Color paints (which I think are terrific) and then the lacquers which is mostly MRP and Alclad.  I do have maybe 50 bottles of Model Master Acryl still, too.

The Model Master Metalizers are a lacquer and spray wonderfully, but I think are OOP.  Shoot me a PM and I'll send back the list of what I have (about a dozen different bottles I think?) and if you need something I can run a bottle over to you.  I have some of their buffing metalizers, meaning after you spray, you can polish them with a cloth. Kinda cool.  They are a lot like MRP - they spray incredibly thin so a little goes a long way and I spray them at about 10psi.  They clean up easily with lacquer thinner.

[CANicoll]

Progress, but nothing really interesting to show other than the radiators.  Primed a lot of the pieces with MRP white primer, and then some RLM 02 on various bits and undersurfaces.  Tomorrow the radiators and wheel wells will come together and then the wing can come together.  Thinking carefully about weathering - and looking at the pictures Martin sent over as well.

Here are the Profipack PE radiator grills on the kit's styrene parts, before and after the Model Master Burnt Iron Metalizer paint. 

BTW, Notice how parts 33 and 34 are not rectangular. On both pieces the side with the sprue attachment has an extra couple of horizontal grills which fits the shape of the Bf 109 wing, of course.  But it seems like the challenges German industry had with manufacturing that they wouldn't just go for an easier-to-manufacture rectangular radiator?

On the 109-F-4 there are SIX different sized radiators (parts 35 and 36 actually have an angle on the right sides in the photo below) - again I wonder about manufacturing efficiency...

The instruction call-out is for Burnt Iron, but I don't think of that color when I think of radiators.  Will probably do a very light dry brush with Aluminum or Steel or maybe even GunMetal.

[Landlubber Mike]

Looking good Chris!  Those radiators look sweet!  Interesting about how they aren't perfect rectangles.  

[Peterpools]

Chris

Nice progress on the PE radiators and completely agree about the color callout being wrong. All those slightly different size and shape radiators need careful attention. Knowing me, I have a good tendency of getting the parts mixed and going on wrong. These days I use a marking system both on the part and in the instructions to help keep me on the path.

Eduard did a nice job of detailing the radiators - a nice plus for the 109. 

[CANicoll]

Really like the look of the PE radiators and grills, especially after the Metalizer Burn Iron, followed up with a dry brush of Vallejo Metal Color GunMetal and topped that off with a drybrush of some Vallejo Metal Color Rust to give it a bit more color.  The gunmetal highlighted the framing and grills, and the Rust added some nice depth.

And I am SO DELIGHTED I went through all of that, for this:

That is one small opening.  Oh well, WE know it is there, right?

Ran into another very unusual problem. adding the tunnel for the landing gear, I found that I could not close up the wing:

I adjusted and moved and fitted and sanded.  No matter how I adjusted the piece, the wing would not close up on that side.  After a fair amount of sanding, was able to close the wing, but this should NOT have happened.  The other side fit much better, but trimmed it down just a bit anyway.  Really not sure why this didn't fit better. There is not a lot of variability as to where it fits onto the wing...

On the "how long do you think these will stay in place", added the two counterweights to the ailerons.  For now, going to keep the pieces on the sprue while I paint the bottom color.  Since the topside has a camo pattern, will add these to the wing when I'm the top of the wing.