Buchon Scale Models (buchonscalemodels.com) brought out 1/32 conversion sets for the HA-1112-K1L "Tripala" and HA-1112-M1L "Buchon" last year, finally getting the brass parts to arm them this year. The kits are available from buchonscalemodels.com - I am doing reviews of both conversions for my friend Espen Tjetland, who developed the kits.

The conversion is made to fit the Hasegawa 1/32 Bf-109G-2/4 and Bf-109G-6 kits. I am using two ProModeler kits I found cheap at the LHS estate sale.

The resin comes from SBS, so quality is excellent. For the K1L, decals are provided for three aircraft: one fully-armed airplane and two unarmed K1Ls, one of which is marked as a "Marseille Yellow 14" when it starred in the movie "Der Stern von Afrika" back in 1958.

The conversion involves cutting the donor kit along panel lines. Fit is excellent and presents no problems so long as you take care in making the attachments.

The overall color seems to be something close to RLM63, which makes sense since the 109s supplied during the Civil War came in that color.

In addition to model shots, I am attaching three color shots of the Tripala in the Spanish Air Force Museum.

8 attached images. Click to enlarge.

That's a great conversion, Tom!
Waiting for your progress!

Looking forward to the conversion, Tom (@tcinla). Isn't this the plane they used to film the Battle of Britain?

More progress. It’s now been painted. Espen sent me a good daylight color photo of a Tripala in service. The color is not otherwise identifiable, but I think it comes closest to Tamiya’s XF-51 Khaki Drab, to which I added a bit of Tamiya RLM02, since the other color photo of a Tripala at the end of its service shows more "green-grey". The model was painted overall with X-18 Semi-Gloss Black, after painting the rudder white and masking it, then painted with the Khaki Drab. I added some light grey to the paint and went back over the model, then a third time after adding in some flat white. Other photos I have in B&W don’t give the color, but they’re sufficiently ligtly “dappled” to show that the airplane was faded under the hot Spanish sun, just like the 109s supplied during the Civil War.

So, the model painted and some research photos.

5 attached images. Click to enlarge.

Great progress, Tom. @tcinla
Do you know what the function is of those verticles plates beside the canons.
Is it just for stabalization?

And here it is painted and decaled and finished, with the @#$#@! rockets done and attached.

The way around a boring monochromatic finish is to consider what the airplane looked like after two years in the Spanish sun. The result, I think, speaks for itself.

Not a difficult conversion, in fact simple enough to be someone's first conversion project. And now an obscure version of the 109 series is in the collection.

A review at Modeling Madness on Thursday, after which I will post the project to headlines here.

3 attached images. Click to enlarge.

Great job, Tom!
Waiting for your article!

The beauty of simplicity ! And one nice model off course . Well done Tom !