Fokker Triplane Build: Part 4 of 4

Well, I can finally put this project to bed. It's been the better part of a month, but the six Fokker Dr.Is are ready to hit the game table this coming Tuesday night.

This build took about twice as long as the last group of SE5as I did, mainly because there was so much paint masking and decal work. As an example, one Jasta 19 triplane fuselage side would get a base coat of white primer, then a mask for the iron cross field, then a spray of desert sand (for the linen color), then the iron cross decal. Next there would be a light overpainting of olive for the cross, then the streak decal, then the serial number and finally the decal for the fuselage personal marking. In other words...it took a while!

Here the build is almost done...just waiting for landing gear, tail skid and propeller.

The builds are done now. Kirschstein's optical illusion plane from Jasta 6 is in the back left. The five Jasta 19 planes from early April, 1918 round out the shot.

Another view, this time from the front quarter. I'm running a Canvas Eagles game at the club on Tuesday, so I'll post some pics on Wednesday.

A final inspirational Jasta 19 painting...here Korner is diving on some English Bristol Fighters (even though at this time, these pilots were mostly fighting French opponents).

I'd like to do a flight of Albatros D.Vs next, but I think I'll take a little break and paint some Space Hulk miniatures heading into the Christmas holidays. 'Til next time...

Fokker Triplane Build: Part 3

For the first time in a few weeks, I'm feeling like there is light at the end of the tunnel.

The five Jasta 19 triplanes, and Kirschstein's Jasta 6 machine are starting to take shape.

This past week has been mayhem...the hobby table has been a jumble of wings, tailplanes and half-painted fuselages. At this stage I was prepping the fuselage cross fields. Jasta 19 overpainted their iron crosses to make these markings blend in with the surrounding camouflage fabric, and create an even background for the individual pilot markings.

Here, I'm just starting to work on Krischstein's fuselage bands.

At the end of this week you can see that all the major decaling work is done...and there was a lot of it! Final assembly over the coming week, and then these six Canvas Eagles miniatures should be ready for the game table.

'Til next time!

Fokker Triplane Build: Part 2

Off to Calgary for the weekend...so here's a quick update on the Jasta 19 Dr.I builds for Canvas Eagles.

As you can see, I finally got the last two required kits in, and I'm in the process of catching them up with the other three. All fuselage assemblies have been closed up, puttied and sanded down in this shot.

Here, the fuselage sets have been primed. You may also notice that there are six planes here...not the five I had planned. Easily explained, but only understood my masochists. I figured that while I was doing these five Eduard kits, I might as well toss in a Revell build as well. I had the kit and a set of nice FCM decals to use, so what the Hell? Like six is going to be that much more work than five!

For the sixth triplane, I'm deviating from my standard practice of modeling low-scoring pilots and am doing a build for one of the most prodigious triplane pilots of the war, Hans Kirschstein. Kirschstein scored 27 victories with Jasta 6 in his three months as a fighter pilot. He was killed in late June, 1918 as a passenger in a flight accident.

His triplane was known as The Optical Illusion, due to the nature of the black & white striping which reputedly threw off the aim of attacking pilots.

Here's a three-view drawing of the aircraft.

And here is the current state of this extra sixth build. The top wing striping is on and the Jasta 6 tail markings are done.

More next week. Until then...go Roughriders!

Fokker Triplane Build: Part 1

And now...onto the Jasta 19 Fokker Dr.I build.


As I've been threatening, I'm now starting into a build of five Fokker Triplanes for our Canvas Eagles games. I'm using Eduard 1/72 scale kits with Gunsight Graphics streak painting decals and the Pheon Models transfer sheet for the individual plane markings.


Why Jasta 19? Well, first of all, their markings in late March/early April 1918 were stark, and quite beautiful. They'll be easy to identify and differentiate on the game table.



Second, this was a work-a-day unit. It wasn't stacked full of celebrated pilots who were tearing up the skies of France. In fact, the unit was struggling in early 1918. I guess I'm a sucker for the also-rans! Be that as it may, as the last big German offensive of the war was getting underway (Operation Michael, March 21, 1918), Jasta 19 was one of four squadrons constituting Jagdgeschwader II, another fighter wing patterned after Manfred von Richthofen's very successful Jagdgeschwader I.


I have three of the required five kits on the hobby table...still waiting on the mail for the last two. However, the major components are prepped and I've started into the painting and wing decaling.



This is a flight line shot of Jasta 19 aircraft in April 1918. The first three planes you can see here will be included in this build.



In late March and early April, Jasta 19's leader was Leutnant Walter Gottsch. He was fated to be shot down on April 10th, 1918, just as the Jasta was starting to come into its own. His final victory total was 20 enemy aircraft. He was credited with 3 victories in this build's swastika-marked triplane before he was killed in action.



As I mentioned, Jasta 19 was a somewhat under-performing unit. JG II's new commanding officer, Rudolf Berthold, sent his own man to the squadron in order to give them a kick-start. This pilot was Leutnant Arthur Rahn. Rahn scored twice in his diamond-banded triplane. He was wounded on July 17 and finished the war with a total of 6 victories.



Leutnant Rudolf Rienau spent most of his flying career with Jasta 19. He scored once in his striped-fuselage triplane in early March, and then ran up his tally to 6 (flying a Fokker D.VII) towards the end of the war. He was shot down on September 13th 1918, but was saved by his parachute. He was killed in a flying accident in 1925.



Leutnant Hans Korner scored once in his zig-zag marked Jasta 19 triplane on the last day of March, 1918. He survived the war with a final victory total of 7. He remained in aviation after the war, but was killed in a motorcycle accident on the way to his airfield.



Back to the builds...


So I've tried to simulate Fokker paint streaks on models before. And while I was pretty satisfied with the result, it took f-o-r-e-v-e-r. This time around, I've decided to go with decals for the base paint scheme.



Here are three sets of wings with the decals applied (except for the upper wing ailerons).



Pheon Models supplies a lot of source information for their decal sheet. Here you can see the guidelines for Rahn, Gottsch, Korner and Rienau's machines.



Now, of course, this is a five plane build. So...which is the fifth plane? Well, as you may know, many German records were lost or destroyed at the end of the first and second world wars. As such, our knowledge of all pilots and aircraft is incomplete. Now, what we do know is that there was a Jasta 19 pilot known as Vizefeldwebel Gerdes. He scored a single victory with the squadron on March 16th, 1918. (Sorry, no pilot photo.) We also know the following triplane flew for Jasta 19 at that time, but it's pilot was unknown. Unknown pilot...unknown plane. I dub this Gerdes' triplane! It will be the fifth and final plane of this flight.



Some plan views of this build.



OK, hopefully the last couple of models come in and I can move this build forward.

SE5a Flight Build: Part 3 of 3

My wife has done a fair bit of pottery, and she can spend many, many hours on a piece...kneading the clay, making the form, trimming it, drying it, bisque firing and glazing...only to have it all ruined with the final firing (too hot, running glaze, exploding piece...whatever). I have shared that kind of anguish making models. You go through all the meticulous steps, only to have the finished plane ruined by a spray of the matt clear coat which, wrecks the decals, or mottles the finish or whatever. I thought I was headed into another one of those awful experiences as I was finishing off this flight of SE5as. As I spray coated the undersides, I was getting some staining...and I thought, crap...this Dullcoat is reactly badly with the Future floor wax on the models.

Happily, as it turned out, the mottling was minimal. All's well that ends well.

So, here were the final steps of the build...

I got all the decals on and sealed them with a generous coating of Future floor wax. Then I added the painted exhaust stacks...kind of rusty at the front end and darker metal towards the rear. Here is a shot of the planes just before the upper wings went on the the interplane struts were popped in.


I had previously sprayed the propellers with a deck wood paint color. Then I stained them with a sepia wash and when that dried I painted the tips light grey.


Here the SE5as have their wings on and struts in. At this point, they just need undercarriages, props, Lewis gun mounts and tailplanes. The Roden kit has no guide holes for the attachment of the landing gear, so I drilled these out as best I could.


And the result...five models in under 3 weeks. Much better than my normal build time.


I Dullcoated the models, glued magnets to the undersurface of each plane, and presto...they're ready for a game of Canvas Eagles.


Would I like to do more with these builds? Yes. They deserve a little representational rigging. I game with rigged and unrigged planes. Although there isn't much of a difference on the game table, rigged planes just look better overall. These guys will get some stretched sprue rigging at some point. Also, I have some pilot figures I'd like to paint up and pop them in as well.


Well, now that that build is done, I'd like to move on to a flight of Jasta 19 triplanes from April 1918. Here's a preview!


Happy gaming!