Fw 190 Butcher Bird 2013 (extended to June 2014) Group Build

Hey John, I am lovin' on your snake 190. Fantastic work.

Here is a link to Victory Models who carries HGW seat belts amongst alot of other great AM stuff. They are based here in the U.S.:

http://www.victorymodels.com/

Thanks, I'll look around, maybe I can even order them from my LHS.   I am not a fan of the PE ones,  put a set in one of the last 190's I did and really didn't like it,  to much bending to try to get it to fit nicely in the seat.  

Almost done with my 1/72 snake head 190,  so I will be pulling out it's bigger brother snake head this weekend to continue working on it.

Clemen's, I think your a bad influence,  I think I'm going to pick up a Hasegawa combo FW190 set  in 1/72 scale!!

Never can have to many 190's

John

I don't know where exactly in the states, but they have an evilbay shop and I get mine at Hannants (I throw in a set with every kit I order)...

Where can you get HGW seat belts?

John

Thanks a lot guys! There's still 2 more sets of PE belts to install, but then I'm off to the HGW belts

I'm so glad I decided to use extra thin superglue for those belts. It just makes it way easier to "remove" the glue visble on the seat by applying some paint with a fine brush. It doesn't look perfect, but I guess it's good enough...

I'll echo what Joe said on the seat belts there Clemens. That's a really good job on those things. How folks can make them lay naturally is pure talent. I'm looking forward to trying a fabric set from Eduard in my future builds to help out with that.

Clemens: Despite your struggles with the PE belts you did a fine job of making them look quite nice. I agree that PE seatbelts can be unwieldy to install. I find that I have gravitated away from them myself. I now prefer resin seats with the seat harnesses molded on. But, I have a couple of sets of HGW seatbelts in 1/48 that I have yet to use and I am definitely looking forward to putting them to use.

Ok guys, a short update. I started messing around with the PE seatbelts. The seatbelts for only two 190s took me 4 hours (and a lot of swearing), but I think they look OK.

I had to do a lot of touch-up work on the seat after finally getting them to settle down without looking too awkward.

My second attempt looks a bit better, but tested my patience almost as much as the first one:

After that frustrating experience, I decided to try assembling the HGW belts and I'm having a blast so far. Since I know HGW's seatbelts, I'm starting to hate PE belts. Let's compare my thoughts about them (I'm referring to complicated belt designs like those on the 190 here):

HGW:

• They assemble like the real deal, so they look like the real ones
• The material used lays down on the contours of the seat without any problems
• a small dab of superglue on each end is enough to hold the belts in place

Eduard PE:

• They lack a bit of detail in some areas (but still look good nonetheless)
• Getting the belts to lay down on the seat is a royal pain (that's what took me almost 3 hours today)

From now on it's only HGW belts for me. I really like working with PE, but seatbelts are just not compatible with PE if you ask me...

Cheers, Clemens

Props to you Joe! Like has been said, your perseverance on this build has to be commended. That finish looks better and better every time you post new pics! I am not sure whether I would have been able to resist introducing it to Mr. Mayhem had it been mine and that paint lifted like it did.

Allen, I greatly appreciate your kind words. Thank You. There is no doubt that this hobby can test your patience. Trust me, I was close to tossing in the towel, sort of. I had purchased another kit just like this one and was on the verge of gutting the cockpit out of the old one and starting over. But. after I had stepped away and taken a "time out",I simply began to formulate options for repairing it and to just give it a try. After the second go around though my pride came into play as I was not going to be deterred. I was bound and determined to give it my best effort There is an old adage that I often apply to my life, " It's not about the mistake but, rather it's all in the recovery". Although it was very costly time wise I can honestly say that, although not exceptional, I am very proud of the work I put into it and the resulting outcome. In the whole process I came away having learned some new skills and techniques. There is nearly always a solution as long as I apply myself to acting on it.

Time to get this puppy back on page 1.

Joe, that is a beautiful paint job, absolutely beautiful!  That was great perserverance on the repair work.  I can't honestly say I would have stuck with it; I would have most likely tossed the whole thing out of frustration. 

Those are some (of the many) things I really need to work on with my modeling; my patience and persistance.

Allen

Thank You Very Much Gentlemen.

Clemens: I pinwashed my panel lines with Mig Abtielung weathering oils thinned with turpenoid.

Alright Joe!!! Glad to see the progress...great work!

Man that is classy!! Great job Joe.

Awesome finish, mate! I still can't believe it's 1/72... What did you do your panel line weathering with?

Gaaahaleee!!! Wow Joe!! Now THAT is a "bad A" paint job!! Nice job man!! AND in 72nd!!

It's about time I got around to sharing some update pics. It's been slow progress lately but some progress nonetheless. I added a dusting of ISO thinned Tamiya Buff. Then added the exhaust stain using Tamiya weathering pastels. Just down to the last few bits. Weathering the bombs, gluing on the landing gear and adding the antenna. Also, some added effects to the guns.

Even here in America during the war alot of "cottage industries" sprang up. Not so much as in Europe, but for example, There was a small shop a street behind the one I grew up on in Detroit, where my Grandma used to sew parachutes together for the war effort. Shoot... it wasnt much larger then a average sized auto repair garage.  I wasnt around till about 8 yrs after the war ended, but I used to here the stories about both my grand dads working in the war plants, 1 at the Willow Run assy plant where Ford built the B-24s and 1 working at the Kaiser plant making trucks and jeeps and such. A terrible time indeed but still ...

Doug

Regarding the "cottage industry":

Many aircraft produced in the last years of the war were assembled out of parts coming from a lot of those garage/basement workshops. The fuselages for the He 162 were built in a closed mine here in Austria for example...

Thanks for all your help, guys! I think I'll go with the following:

• painted-over White "58>"
• striped mottling on the tail (it looks like it is striped in that photo)
• "blown" canopy
• bare metal fuselage extension

FlyItLikeYouStoleIt

By the way guys, I'll be going to the "Hope it Don't Snow" model show in Rochester Minnesota on Feb 1st. I plan to show everything that I've finished in the past year: my Spitfire Mk IIb, Fw190A5, Speeder Bike, STAP (with droid if I finish him in time), and Dual .50 cal AA.

I was kind of surprised that the Rochester show isn't in the list of "Events" in our forums here. It is sponsored by an IPMS club after all

  I'm planning on being there too.  I've gone the last 2 years.  I've got a S-3A viking, Albatros DIII, a couple for FW190's.  I had bigger plans for more stuff to bring but I didn't finish all if it.

I'll see ya there.

John

jugjunkie

Quite correct Red 4 was originally White >58 (happens to be the one i'm doing). As >58 the tail extension was in fact BM and it may or may not have still been BM for awhile as Red 4, my opinion though is that when they converted it to Red 4 they would have converted her totally it woudn't make sense to leave that piece BM.

If you look at the pic of red 4's tail I posted, it still looks to be bare metal. It is for sure a different hue than the rest of the fuselage. Its hard to be 100% certain though.

FlyItLikeYouStoleIt

Rigidrider

Bill, to maybe help with your NMF question, From what I've read, As was with the most of the war (but more so towards the bitter end) the aircraft were never built nor assyembled at one point exclusively, and as the war turned against the Reich, a "Cottage Industry" mentality was relied on even moreso then ever in the past. Many of the components were mfg and shipped to an assy point by numerous points in germany. There are instances where Folks would assy instrument panels and related wireing in sheds and garages out side their homes.

Many of the underside NMF panels and wing sections were sent from their assy points in that way, because they just flat had no paint to put on them, and the upper surfaces were more important to be painted to try to conceal from the now marauding P-47s and P-51s, that had free orders to attack anything they felt was a target. In a nutshell I think thats why you see more NMF undersides. Not that it was desired, just a consaquence of the circumstance.

Doug

Thank you very much, Doug! That was the sort of thing I suspected. I love how a simple question can lead to some real education in here. Model building can be such a history lesson. It's one of the points I make when justifying my love of the hobby to "others". 

Clemens:  Thank you for posting those pics of that mostly NMF 190. That is a sweet looking bird and yes, it would be a great build.

Quite correct Red 4 was originally White >58 (happens to be the one i'm doing). As >58 the tail extension was in fact BM and it may or may not have still been BM for awhile as Red 4, my opinion though is that when they converted it to Red 4 they would have converted her totally it woudn't make sense to leave that piece BM.

Rigidrider

Bill, to maybe help with your NMF question, From what I've read, As was with the most of the war (but more so towards the bitter end) the aircraft were never built nor assyembled at one point exclusively, and as the war turned against the Reich, a "Cottage Industry" mentality was relied on even moreso then ever in the past. Many of the components were mfg and shipped to an assy point by numerous points in germany. There are instances where Folks would assy instrument panels and related wireing in sheds and garages out side their homes.

Many of the underside NMF panels and wing sections were sent from their assy points in that way, because they just flat had no paint to put on them, and the upper surfaces were more important to be painted to try to conceal from the now marauding P-47s and P-51s, that had free orders to attack anything they felt was a target. In a nutshell I think thats why you see more NMF undersides. Not that it was desired, just a consaquence of the circumstance.

Doug

Thank you very much, Doug! That was the sort of thing I suspected. I love how a simple question can lead to some real education in here. Model building can be such a history lesson. It's one of the points I make when justifying my love of the hobby to "others". 

Clemens:  Thank you for posting those pics of that mostly NMF 190. That is a sweet looking bird and yes, it would be a great build.

+1 on that.  

Nathan T

What I'm not sure about is how Jerry Crandall knows what type of canopy it had??

 On a serious note though, this guy has put out two monster bibles/ volumes on the Dora. That kind of research to pull that off is pretty strong evidence that he knows what he's talkin' about.

I don't know about Jerry Crandall, but the 2nd pic in my post shows her with the headrest from the blown canopy. The author of my 190 "bible" is Peter Rodeike (it's a German book) and the color profiles are either his own work or drawn by Claes Sundin.

SchattenSpartan

Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. It's very visible in the color profile I posted earlier.

I'm sure its safe to assume the port side tail camo looks identical to the starboard side I posted, as there are no pics of the port side tail and rudder. What I'm not sure about is how Jerry Crandall knows what type of canopy it had?? I suppose its just assumption it had the blown type as thats what most late war A/C sported??

LOL!!! I was worried we wouldnt be able to be bros no more! LOL

Doug