Messerschmitt Bf 109 Werke

Started by Erik Gjørup · 305 · 3 months ago · 1/48, 109, 109 werke, airbum, Bf109, Haldværk, halfworks, Messerschmitt, quarterscale
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    Erik Gjørup said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    EXHAUST

    With the kit-exhausts leaving a lot to wish for, AM parts are discussed here

    Tamiya kits are not at all new, and they are not expensive at all. The age is reflected in some parts, the exhausts being no exception.


    They are nowhere near resembling the real thing.

    As seen here on the one in the FliegerFlab museum.

    Now, the most realistic ones are the Rexx metal ones



    They look a lot better – and cost about the same as the kit alone!

    Then there are some resin offerings


    Sadly they are far to short! – I haven’t measured the Hasegawa and Airfix kits, but I suspect it may originally be for one of those?
    When comparing the three, the differences are obvious.



    And with that I shall leave you to it for now

    next up I will be checking up on some AM rudders and such

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    Louis Gardner said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    After reading all of this, I am exhausted 😉 Too bad those Rexx exhaust pipes are so expensive. They do look magnificent... I guess this is a case where you get what you pay for.

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    Spiros Pendedekas said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    Great tutorial, my friend @airbum!
    Realisic exhaust looks add a lot to a model's looks.
    Rudders? Oh, my, how more detailed can you go (per the "how high can you fly?"), my friend 109 man?
    Love it; eagerly waiting for the 109 rudder tutorial.

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    Erik Gjørup said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    Thank you @fiveten and @lgardner.
    It was rather exhausting stuff Louis - and yep, you get what you pay for with the REXx items – I have made a review for some of them in headlines loooong ago, and they are just so cool. They seem to be sold out just as quickly as they re-stock, so get some when you can.
    Spiros, details are what I breathe – hoping to improve each and every time.
    So here we go;

    Moving about

    And with the exhausts for the Tamiya 109 covered, it is time to dig into some moving parts

    I had bought a CMK update kit some time ago, and it does cover all the moving parts (apart from the undercarriage)


    There are replacements for rudder, elevator/tailplane, ailerons and flaps

    The Tailplane and elevators are separate items, enabling you to pose them up or down.




    Ailerons are also there

    As are flaps – with the bulge behind the coolers included


    in the kit you have to assemble this

    And two rudders no less




    One is smoorh, the other with subtle strengthening bands over the stitches

    And regarding the legs, there are metal parts to be found



    They bring absolutely nothing to the kit parts.

    I am sorry to conclude that in my humble opinion it will be a complete waste of money to buy these AM parts. You can make them just as good yourself by some cutting and filling and sanding – AND you do not have to worry about resindust (plus you can probably afford the exhaust by leaving these out of the build)

    I have to admit that I have fallen a bit behind posting, so the next two posts are already photographed – they will cover guns and interior in one, and some progress on more kits in another post

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    Pedro L. Rocha said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    @airbum Erik, I was reading this last update thinking exactly what you wrote in the conclusion- sometimes AM are just extra work and wasted money for little or no gain (heck just read my Do.217 WIP, most is pretty useless or plain headache!)

    The white metal U/C brand is best to use when you broke or lost one of the pieces of the kit, because they are always exact copies of the plastic part, definitely not an upgrade.

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    Spiros Pendedekas said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    Another full of info great posting, my friend @airbum!
    In case of wondering why yours truly scratchbuilding/modifying guy finds AM info "great" and very useful, it is (among others) to take ideas of how the "improved" parts should look like, then modify/scratchbuild! 🙂

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    George R Blair Jr said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    All of the extra work looks great, Erik (@airbum). I was recently struck by the fact that it is very easy to more than double or triple the price of the original kit when you get all of the photoetch, masks, resin, decals, metal landing gear, and other bits available for a kit. And now we have 3D printed parts available for many kits. Sadly I have recently found myself buying the masks and photoetch at the same time I buy a kit without even checking to see if I will need them. As my detail painting skills decline with advancing age, I really do appreciate pre-painted cockpit photoetch. :o)

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    Erik Gjørup said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    Thank you for the support guys.
    Pedro @holzhamer, isn’t is just that now and then. I think with all the stuff you can buy you have to be very selective – and pay attention to the ones who do make an honest try to tell about their experiences. The White Metal legs MAY yet be useful if you have a load of resin in the plane, but generally the kit legs are fine to take some load.
    Spiros @fiveten, it is always useful to check the latest research before you enter a scratchbuild solution.
    George @gblair, they are expensive sometimes, but as I said the exhausts are one of the few cases where I find them useful. Usually resin exhaists will do fine, just not in this case. Regarding the use of photoetch, the recent influx of printed parts on decal paper is likely to be extremely useful. One of our mutual friends here has been using then on a build, and I have to say they are looking great, and are just so easy to use. I may have to look some up for some 109’s 🙂
    Now, I promised some guns before I went into the garden today, so here we go;

    GUNS!

    - and a seat and other stuff

    The kit parts are flat, but COULD be useable by some careful drilling (I have tried that once)


    Resin parts are a lot nicer with cooling jacket details, though a lot will be hidden

    Another option ar those nice Brass turned items that are available for many things


    Here you have the three options. If you build anything with the guns sticking out it is worth considering wich to use.

    The glass is another item that has been more or less neglected by modelers



    The kit parts are often nive to use, but in order to make the cockpit more scalelike, vac formed can make it look a lot better – and they can save the day if the kit part gets damaged. The vac-formed here from Squadron are for the E-4, but I have some for an E-3 in a Falcon kit that actually has a lot og different versions of 109 glass. The squadron items are actually made by Falcon, but have now been discontinued. Quinto Studio is getting a move on vac-formed glass too.

    Now, in danger of making this post too long, I shall show you a cockpit that really stands out


    It is from SBS model, and combines resin and photoetch, and looks like it has been very well researched.

    The sidewalls are very accurate



    All that detail! And with an open hood (or a vacformed) it will all be visible

    The floor and back wall has some very nice details too



    And the seat is a lot more correct than any kit offering (it is available as a separate item too)

    Just for fun, here you have a few different seats


    Lots of different looks.

    And finally a look at the photoetch parts. There are parts to fit Tamiya and parts for Hasegawa too!


    It does not get any better that this! (that is, a prepainted IP may be better that making one yourself, but if you bought this AM kit why buy an extra IP?)

    And with that I have cought up with the pictures for the 109 werke. Next up will be a send off of some of these kits to their own topics

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    Pedro L. Rocha said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    Erik @airbum, SBS falls in the category of “Damm good AM stuff”, I have several sets and they are a real improvement over the plastic parts. I have that same set stashed away for one of my old Hasegawa Emils, and I can corroborate your opinion on that. They also produce very good seats (both with and without harness straps) for the Fw.190 and the Zero, quality top tier.

    I may save an Eduard 109 F from the SoD using the Quinta Studios set I purchased recently 😉

    Nice seat comparison BTW. Looking forward for the resin instalment

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    John vd Biggelaar said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    What a huge amount of additional parts available for the 109.
    Thanks for sharing these details with us, Erik @airbum
    Since I'm still looking to start with a 'nearly' perfect 109 build, I put every comment in my notebook.
    Some of those parts are incredibly detailed.

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    Spiros Pendedekas said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    Those are some REALLY nice AM, my friend @airbum!
    Thse gun barrels are second to none!

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    George R Blair Jr said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    Some great, well-documented info on your current 109 build, Erik (@airbum). Great lineup of seats and other parts. It is helpful to be able to compare the parts.

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    Erik Gjørup said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    Thank you for following the pre-builds of a bunch of Emils @gblair, @holzhamer, @johnb, @mvtb, @gkittinger, @fiveten and @lgardner. Today I will be giving two of them new homes on iModeler

    The big sendoff

    It is time to get into details on the Tamiya 109E’s, and therefore they will be leaving the kindergarden to have their own homes

    It is no secret that I have a soft spot for the early birds (ok, anything 109, but that is a lot for one post), and I have been researching the V13 and the V14. As some may know, there were a conversion for the V14 some moons ago, but sadly that one is no longer available. The V13 may have had a limited edition conversion in its record-setting form, at least there is a canopy available from VAC-expert Falcon in New Zealand.

    And what do we have? Actually with two airframes there are three possibilities;




    First is V13 in its late guise as the recordholder (Very wrongly announced as V14 in this caption), then in its original form, and finally the V14 in all its dark red splendor. The last two have decals available from Draw Decals.

    Well, to send them off, I have one last WIP on them here. I have 4 Tamiya 109E-3 builds in progress, but the details were at a stage where they had to get more specific.



    Two will have the engraved lines filled as in real life, something that happened quite often, even later on with operational planes in WWII.

    The early birds did not have the MG FF bulges under the wings, and they have to be removed. (It may be easier to take an Eduard E-1 to convert?)





    And with that done it is off to new homes as a 109V13 and 109V14 topic here in WIP.

    next up I guess one or two more might be sent off – I have an idea for one of them, but not entirely sure what is going to happen to the last one of the foursome

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    John vd Biggelaar said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    That is some serious surgery, Erik.
    Not sure about your heartrate when starting to cut of these large pieces, but mine would definitely be tremendous.

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    Colin Gomez said 3 years, 1 month ago:

    You are incredibly prolific with your 109 production line, Erik. What an interesting and challenging way to hone your skills by working on the same airframe several times over with subtle variations and additions for each. It is a recipe for accelerated learning. From one of your pics, I think I would be seeing 109 Emils in my sleep. Good thing you love the aircraft. I t is fun to see the comparisons between metal and resin parts whiel viewing plastic and the real thing alongside. I seem to have been working through a lot of resin lately and sometimes feel it is a bit overrated. Then again, metal can be really prohibitively expensive in details like exhausts. I think I mentioned that I have a Gustav and an Emil in 1/32 to do in the near future. I will certainly follow your builds for ongoing insights on the airframe. Just got to get through my Buffalo, Tempest, Vulcan, Sea Harrier, A-4 and SAAB Draken first (ha ha).