Fokker E.V / D.VIII Parasol Mikro Mir 1/32

[Jeff]

Rob, I have to agree with Phil and Kai, this is a stunning build, and I, for one look forward to each update.......

[harv]

1 minute ago, Jeff said:

Rob, I have to agree with Phil and Kai, this is a stunning build, and I, for one look forward to each update.......

I feel the same way Jeff !......harv 

[BlrwestSiR]

Same here, a great build of a challenging kit. 

 

 

[GazzaS]

Beautiful result on that engine deck!  I love the alu blast panels. 

[DocRob]

15 hours ago, Jeff said:

Rob, I have to agree with Phil and Kai, this is a stunning build, and I, for one look forward to each update.......

 

12 hours ago, BlrwestSiR said:

Same here, a great build of a challenging kit. 

 

9 hours ago, GazzaS said:

Beautiful result on that engine deck!  I love the alu blast panels. 

 

15 hours ago, harv said:

I feel the same way Jeff !......harv 

Muchas Gracias Amigos,

it is indeed a challenging kit, but I've seen worse and it's a forgiving kit too, because the plastic is soft and good to work with and beside some abysmal parts, other parts are very good. For instance, the fuselage is not easy to get into the right shape, but the cloth surfaces and the stitching looks perfect out of the box, better than most other kits I have seen. With patience and good planning it's not that hard to get a decent result, where the used AM also helped a lot.

The blast panels should have been painted the same colour than the top of the fuselage, but after I airbrushed them in Aluminum as a base for chipping, I decided to let them that way for better contrast.

Cheers Rob
 

[Peterpools]

Rob

What a fantastic and brilliant build - your problem solving and POA worked perfectly, not to mention your superb building skills. Enjoyed reading every page and post, as I catch up.

Keep 'em comin

Peter

 

[DocRob]

11 hours ago, Peterpools said:

What a fantastic and brilliant build - your problem solving and POA worked perfectly, not to mention your superb building skills. Enjoyed reading every page and post, as I catch up.

Thank you Peter and again, good to have you back here and hopefully full recovered soon. I have to admit, that I don't know what POA means.
Kits like this Fokker keep me alive modelling wise, it's demanding, tempting, fascinating with lots to learn and for sure, never boring. I start a kit out of a fascination for the real thing for different possible reasons. That means, I don''t care about, what the quality of a kit is. In this case, it's about close to perfection in terms of building fun.

Cheers Rob

[Peterpools]

Rob

sorry, I shouldn’t have abbreviated: 

POA-  Plan of Attack

Keep ‘em comin

Peter

[DocRob]

While the glue on the wingstruts cured after everything got aligned, which proved harder than thought, I painted the propeller in my typical way. The propeller itself was taken from a WNW Fokker D.VII, because detail was crisper and it needed less filling.

- First a coat of Buff, followed by masking type which I cut 0,5mm wide on my template.

- Then a coat of red brown and away with the masking tape.

Finally a coat of clear orange diluted with IPA. The hub was spryed later in steel and received some panel liner.

Cheers Rob

[DocRob]

The CA on the wings was cured by then and it starts to look like a razor winged Fokker D.VIII. The alignment of all the struts was not so easy and will need some extra work later. In all there were four straight struts and the two V-shaped ones, which meant adjusting 14 joints with CA at the same time, to have the possibility to wiggle all the angles correct. All of that without breaking delicate parts. It's done now luckily and it is pretty sturdy.
Now everything looks complete, but isn't. The steering horns for rudder and ailerons are next, with the necessary rigging, which is prepared.

Cheers Rob

[Kaireckstadt]

19 minutes ago, DocRob said:

The CA on the wings was cured by then and it starts to look like a razor winged Fokker D.VIII. The alignment of all the struts was not so easy and will need some extra work later. In all there were four straight struts and the two V-shaped ones, which meant adjusting 14 joints with CA at the same time, to have the possibility to wiggle all the angles correct. All of that without breaking delicate parts. It's done now luckily and it is pretty sturdy.
Now everything looks complete, but isn't. The steering horns for rudder and ailerons are next, with the necessary rigging, which is prepared.

Cheers Rob

Congratulations Rob to this exceptional build! The finished Bird looks really awesome! It’s so colorful and has lots of gorgeous details.

 

[HubertB]

Exceptional !

Hubert

[BlrwestSiR]

Stunning looking Razor. 

Thanks for describing how you do the prop too.

Carl

[DocRob]

2 hours ago, Kaireckstadt said:

Congratulations Rob to this exceptional build! The finished Bird looks really awesome! It’s so colorful and has lots of gorgeous details.

 

2 hours ago, HubertB said:

Exceptional !

 

1 hour ago, BlrwestSiR said:

Stunning looking Razor. 

Thanks for describing how you do the prop too.

Thank you Gentlemen, it feels good to have mastered this important step with the Fokker. Rigging will not be overly easy, but compared to other planes of the time it's sparse. 
The prop was made the fast and easy way this time. I made no grain and stain details with artist pencils or further weathering. I felt, that a wooden propeller, where literally your life is depending on, was well maintained or changed rapidly with any damage noticeable.

Cheers Rob

[GazzaS]

Great work, Rob!  Now it looks potent and beautiful!

[Jeff]

TOP Drawer, Rob !

[DocRob]

Thanks guys, it's always a great feeling to close in on the finish line with such a demanding built and I personally like like the result with the  razor edge Fokker. This build gives me a very positive feeling about complicated future projects. It's a true confidence build.

Cheers Rob

[Peterpools]

Rob

Laminated prop work looks wonderful and your build is a work of art

Keep 'em comin

Peter

[DocRob]

Thank you Peter, the prop came out ok, but for the future, I have to give the method some thought, because it looks, - err -, well striped. If you laminate a propeller from wood strips, the form dictates, that the laminated strips would be unequal in surface size. As this would be a big task to mask correctly, I may experiment with the real thing and carv my own props, if I can lay my hands on some proper wood.

Cheers Rob

[DocRob]

I'm freakin' out, the last pic post, before the Fokker will get a RFI post .
Tomorrow, I will have to do some touchups here and there, inspect the whole plane through the magnifier and it will be done.
The little things, I made last, where not so much fun in general. The minimal rigging, especially the rudder and elevator wires gave me headaches and eye strain . I added ignition wires and because my 2mm diameter brass tubes arrived together with my new saw and mitre box, I added the air intakes from blackened brass.

Cheers Rob

 

[Jeff]

It is BEAUTIFUL, Rob, what a sweet build and good looking result..... I am VERY impressed.. take a bow !

[Peterpools]

Rob

Simply a  magnificent build.

Peter

[BlrwestSiR]

Absolutely stunning Rob. A great template for when I get around to mine.

Carl

[DocRob]

10 hours ago, Jeff said:

It is BEAUTIFUL, Rob, what a sweet build and good looking result..... I am VERY impressed.. take a bow !

 

9 hours ago, Peterpools said:

Rob

 

5 hours ago, BlrwestSiR said:

Absolutely stunning Rob. A great template for when I get around to mine.

Muchas gracias Amigos, the end got a bit tricky, but all in all it was a pure pleasure build. Maybe I do a second one in bright yellow with black diamonds all over.
It payed off to build everything really robust, because the Fokker needed more handling than every other plane I built. Nothing broke, except one elevator strut (plastic not brass ). I love the feeling, that in the end there is no rattling sound inside the fuselage, because of loosened parts.

I used two build logs a lot and they were very helpful. One is from our Mike (Sandbagger) and the other is written by Dave Hooper and can be found on the Aviattic website.

Cheers Rob

 

[HubertB]

So purdy

Hubert