The Last Gustav

[11bee]

I'm usually the first one to voice annoyance about the sheer number of WW2 German models being built, as I mostly prefer to build much more obscure subjects. That being said, I've always had an interest in German aircraft and armor, especially late war subjects when you could see some very unique and unusual paint jobs. So when Revell released their 1/32 Bf-109G-6, I started thinking about taking the plunge and building a late war -109.

First order of business was to find a subject. As noted, I lean towards subjects that are a bit uncommon. Whilst surfing through a very nice website ( http://theprofilepaintshop.blogspot.se/ ) I came upon a profile of "Yellow 5" a very unique looking very late war G-6 that was captured by US troops in Kassel, Germany at the end of the war. The profile in question is a couple of pages in on the above referenced website. For some reason, I can't post a direct link to it.

Yellow 5 is painted in a very unusual (for a G-6) mix of late war colors - brown violet (RLM 81) / dark green (RLM 82) uppers and the yellowish lower color also somewhat incorrectly referred to as RLM 84. What makes the aircraft even more interesting is the mismatched cowling that is painted overall light blue (RLM 76) with some random dark green / brown splotches. After corresponding with the man behind this great website (Anders Hjortsberg, who graciously shared some previously unpublished pictures with me), I discovered that Yellow 5 apparently had a replacement wing added. The starboard wing appears to be painted in standard mid-war colors - green grey (RLM 74) & grey violet (RLM 75) topsides, RLM 76 undersides; while it is believed that the port wing was painted in late war brown violet & dark green topsides with natural metal undersides.

This pretty much adds up to a perfect example of a late war German aircraft. Towards the end, the normally meticulous Germans threw out uniformity. Anything that slowed down production was abandoned and many haphazardly / partially painted aircraft were issued to front line units. Most of these seem to have been older aircraft re-issued by specialized repair / refurbishment facilities as the large manufacturers still managed to achieve some degree of uniformity on newly produced aircraft. These small repair facilities tended to simply replace damaged components with whatever was handy in their spare parts inventory, without much thought to repainting them. At the same time, for whatever reason, it appears that the fuselage was often given a quick (and usually crude) paint job using late war colors and then off to the front they went.

It is almost certain that Yellow 5, being built during the mid-war period, was originally painted in the standard day fighter scheme of RLM 74/75/76. At some point, the aircraft was either damaged or simply needed refurbishment and was rebuilt by one of those many small rehab facilities. At that time, a replacement cowling / port wing were added and the fuselage given a quick overspray in late war colors. It appears that this aircraft was then issued to JG.53 (hence the black band on the aft fuselage).

To illustrate how some of these rebuilt aircraft appeared, here are a couple of pictures of another Bf-109G. Note the late war colors crudely applied and the variations in the paintwork. This aircraft is incredibly unique in that it's the last Bf-109 that remains in it's original paint. All of the others that exist today have been "restored" using often inaccurate colors.

And lastly, here is the subject of my build, sitting forlornly after capture. At this point, it has already been partially dismantled but you can note the late war colors on the fuselage and the lighter mid war colors on the starboard wing. As mentioned above, I have other B&W pics that show the aircraft in better condition but don't feel that it is appropriate to share them at this time.

More to follow....

Edited March 19, 2014 by 11bee

[Cpt_Farrel]

Going to be following this one for sure! :)

One thing though, this aircraft almost certainly left the factory in late war colors. It carries full stencilling in a way that I've never seen on repainted aircraft. The camoulflage pattern also conforms perfectly to the standards of Mtt Regensburg so quite possibly it was part of a batch of aircraft used for testing the new colors. That does certainly not mean that every aircraft built after this one was painted in late war colors. On the contrary, greys were used very late in the war, hence my belief that test batches were delivered in late war colors long before they were standardized.

Cheers! / Anders

[Joel_W]

Will be following along for the ride on this one. Your attention to details surely will make this a way above average build.

Joel

[11bee]

Anders - thanks for the info. Not sure what to think now. To me, it made sense that Yellow 5 was repainted when it went through the rebuild process (which it obvioulsy did since it is sporting a replacement cowling and wing). Do you not think it was possible that full stencils could have been applied at the rebuild facility?

On a related note - what are the thoughts on this aircraft being a G-14? I've seen it referred to as such on other sites. The battery cover in the cockpit aft bulkhead is missing in all the pictures and I can't make out whether it has a filler for MW-50.

Anyway, here is the obligatory shot of the kit and aftermarket sets I've got. I also broke down and ordered the Aeries resin cockpit set which should arrive in a week or so.

The Revell kit is a nice one (at an equally nice price), most folks feel it is superior to the older Hasegawa kit. However, Revell made some mistakes. The biggest ones (and hardest to correct) are the undersized mg bulges on the cowling and they have the mg troughs too close together. The Alley Cat sets address these issues (and many more). I'll go into details later.

Edited August 16, 2014 by 11bee

[Cpt_Farrel]

If the aircraft was repainted when the new wing was installed, the new wing would've been painted the same color as the rest of the aircraft. :) On second thought, that's not necessarily true as the AWM 109 proves.

The stencils are not 100% proof of a factory scheme either but not far from it. Especially considering that the application of the pattern and mottle is identical with other messerschmitt built G-6 and G-14's. There's a photo from the messerschmitt assembly lines showing similar aircraft with the main camo being much darker than the 74/75 tailplanes which is another indicator that at least one batch of G-6 or G-14's were painted in late war colors.

[HOLMES]

Nice

[11bee]

Plugging away on the landing gear (needed to start somewhere while I await the Aeries cockpit). Not much to show yet.

In the meantime, here are some of the references I'm using.

Obviously there is tons of info on the Bf-109 out there, both in print and online. The "How To Build Revell's Bf-109G-6" provides great info on the kit itself, it also has a very useful section of color photos of the un-restored Bf-109 that I posted above. To make it even more useful, Yellow 5 is the feature build by the author, Brett Green of Hyperscale fame. He did a fantastic job on his. I don't think I'll be able to paint mine to the high standard he set.

However, there are a few things IMO that he got wrong. First off the pics I've seen appear to show the cowling overall light blue with a brown and green mottle. Brett opted to paint the top of the cowling solid brown / green and only mottle the sides. That would be a good choice since just about every other Bf-109 I've ever seen was painted in this manner. However, it does appear that Yellow 5 was unique in not being painted like that. Also, the pics I have show Yellow 5 with the landing gear covers removed. This was a somewhat standard practice to avoid mud build up and for whatever reason, seems to have been somewhat more common towards the end of the war. He also opted to paint both wings the same. As mentioned, it does appear that this aircraft had mis-matched wings. Lastly, he also pretty much built his Bf "out of the box" while I'm going to be using some aftermarket stuff.

Lastly, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention two valuable modeling references. Both are mandatory reading for anyone thinking about building this kit. The first is the extensive tweak list for this kit posted over on Large Scale Planes.

http://forum.largescaleplanes.com/index.php?showtopic=46590

The second is an outstanding review over on Large Scale Modeler:

http://forum.largescalemodeller.com/topic/1238-132-messerschmitt-bf-109g-6-early-and-late/

Edited March 25, 2014 by 11bee

[11bee]

Just received the Aires resin cockpit set. Cost was ~ $26 at Sprue Brothers (amazing service, had it delivered within three days of placing the order). All in all, it's a definite improvement over the kit parts. One of the aggravations with the kit cockpit was that for some reason, Revell opted to mold in the pilot's harness. It's quite hard to remove, given the shape of the bucket seat. The Aires set comes with a PE harness, instrument panel and some odds and ends. Here are the major components compared to the kits (sorry for the crap lighting):

In all honesty, if I wanted to spend the time, I could probably scratch build additional details onto the Revell cockpit but time is somewhat at a premium these days and compared to other aftermarket sets (Eduard!!!), I thought the Aires price was fair. I was hoping Barracudacals would release a resin Bf-109 cockpit (their cockpit for the Tamiya P-51 is probably the state of the art for resin cockpits) but at the current time, they haven't announced anything.

I'll still add a few bits and pieces to this set. I was originally thinking about going for one of those new photocut fabric harness sets but I think after I anneal the PE harness, I can make it work nicely.

Edited March 26, 2014 by 11bee

[11bee]

Update - while looking at the rear bulkhead of the Aires set, it appears to have a partial cover over the upper part of the pilot's backplate. Hard to describe in text but check out the pictures of the resin compared to the kit piece. The Revell piece is just flat sheetmetal, which seems to be similar to all the pictures I've seen of the real thing (minus the lack of the triangular piece at the top which Revell missed). I've never seen the bulkhead as Aires has represented it. Any Bf-109 experts out there who can weigh in on this?

Edited March 26, 2014 by 11bee

[boom175]

11B Let me look at Lynn Ritgers book on the late model 109's when I get home. If its to be found it will be found in that book!!

[Joel_W]

I'll have to admit that looking at all the resin AM cockpits that so many builds have been using of late, I'm starting to weaken my position of just resin AM seats at best, especially for my 1/48 WW11 builds.

Joel

[11bee]

Update - while looking at the rear bulkhead of the Aires set, it appears to have a partial cover over the upper part of the pilot's backplate. Hard to describe in text but check out the pictures of the resin compared to the kit piece. The Revell piece is just flat sheetmetal, which seems to be similar to all the pictures I've seen of the real thing (minus the lack of the triangular piece at the top which Revell missed). I've never seen the bulkhead as Aires has represented it. Any Bf-109 experts out there who can weigh in on this?

I posted this question on the prop forum and got some great feedback from the experts. The bottom line is that the cover casted onto the Aires rear bulkhead doesn't belong there. Really disappointed in Aires for missing something like this. What I'm trying to do now is to carve away this cover, while leaving that raised inverted triangle and the side rails intact. A second option would be to remove the entire resin bulkead and replace with the Revell piece but the kit piece has cast-in harness straps that would have to be removed and the level of detail isn't as good as what Aires provides.

I was able to remove most of bogus cover last night. Have some sanding and cleanup to do, then I'll hit it with a coat of primer to see how good (or bad) it looks.

[11bee]

It took some time but I was able to remove the resin backplate (or whatever the technical term is for it). I had to cut off the beams on either side, to replace them I carefully cut out the ones on the kit bulkhead and superglued them into place. While at it, I drilled out the two holes in the bucket seat and added a couple of bumps to the bulkhead that are shown in references.

I applied a quick coat of silver to highlight any flaws. There is still a bit of a rough spot on the bulkhead. I'll touch it up a bit but once I apply the dark grey and the harnesses, I think it will look fine. It looks a bit rough in the pics due to the hand painted silver and my crappy photography skills so you will have to trust me on this!

I think I'll backcharge Aires for the time I had to spend cleaning that mess up :)/>

[BGB]

Hello,

Missed your build here will follow with interest.

Cheers

Boris

[11bee]

I've made a bit of progress on the cockpit. I added a chain and pulley to the left of the pilot's seat and connected it to the outer trim wheel. It's a bit crude but from the angle it will be viewed at, it will add a nice bit of clutter. I also added a couple of additional levers to the sidewalls. After that, it was time to start painting.

First off, I painted the seat a dull silver and then, using a trick mentioned in the "Building Revell's Bf-109" publication to simulate chipped and scratched paint, I coated the seat with three layers of hairspray. I then painted the three main interior parts RLM66 (a dark grey). I lighted the Testor's paint with a couple of drops of white for scale effect. I then wet the paint over the seat and using a hard bristle brush and a sharp tooth pick, I scratched and abraded the grey paint to expose the silver beneath. The hairspray, being water soluble, assist with the removal of the top coat of paint. The seat and rear bulkhead would have been heavily scratched by the buckles on the pilot's harness every time he entered or left the cockpit. I'm pretty happy with the overall effect, still need a bit of practice but I think it looks better than my old method of painted silver scratches on top of the base paint. Keep in mind that a good deal of this will be hidden by the harness.

After that, I began the detail painting. It seems there was a great deal of variation on these cockpits. Using pictures of the cockpit of the Bf-109 featured in my initial post (completely unrestored), I decided to take a slightly minimalist approach to colors. Some modelers go heavy on the various bright colors but since my subject is a hard-worked veteran, I wanted to show the cockpit in a bit of disrepair with a good portion of the original fittings replaced by whatever the mechanics could get their hands on.

I painted the oxygen regulator blue (the Germans used color coded fittings - blue for oxygen, yellow for fuel, etc). While some modelers opted to paint the rat's nest of oxygen tubing blue, I decided to keep the tubing bare steel. I also painted all electrical wiring a dinghy shade of yellow. I added a dark wash to selected features for a bit of depth. Here are some pictures, keep in mind that I still have a long way to go. My final weathering will tone down all of the colors.

The starbord sidewall. The section at the bottom is just extra resin and will get trimmed off. Makes for a handy palette as well!

[Macbain]

Looking good. I should get this kit, and ditch the Hasegawa's in the stash.

Every cabinet needs a 109.

[Joel_W]

the cockpit is starting to come together nicely. Must have been a real bear to remove and reshape that "back plate" area. The end result certainly was worth the effort. For a company like Aires whose been making AM cockpits & interiors for some time, one has to wonder if their resources actually had a back plate or could it have been some type of covering?

Joel

[TaiidanTomcat]

Looking great John, Thanks for all the links as well

[BGB]

Hello,

Very nice cockpit!

Cheers

Boris

[11bee]

Done with 90% of the cockpit painting. Still need to tweak the weathering. After that, I'll try those PE seatbelts and then move on to the instrument panel. I've heard that Aires is notorious for poor fitting parts. After all this work, I'll be extremely bummed if none of this fits.

[Joel_W]

11bee,

The cockpit detail painting & weathering really looks good. As far as the Aires AM parts fit issues, unfortunately, that seems to be the general rule more then the exception. My brother builds mostly 1/32 scale props and jets, and has had issues with every single Aires cockpit. The good news is that he's gotten them eventually to fit. Even better news is when he's struggling with those fit issues, we're each in our own homes, so I only see pics with his emails. :cheers:/>

Joel

[Leo Etgen]

Hi guys

Somewhat belatedly as I did not notice this thread until now here is an image of the seat of the Bf 109 G-series included in The Messerschmitt Bf 109 Part 2 by Ritger. It seems it was a good idea to get rid of that odd cover on the Aires cockpit set. The cockpit is looking very nice and especially since you are using toned downed colors for the wiring and piping.

Horrido!

Leo

[.linus]

Wow really great color work in the cockpit!!

[11bee]

Thanks for the compliments guys. The -109 cockpit is tough to paint realistically. It's small and mostly RLM66 black grey so you have to work at it in order to have it come to life. I just hope the darned thing fits!!

BTW, another helpful ARC'er posted this on a thread I had over in the prop forum. It's a great 3D view of a Gustav 'pit. Especially since this one appears to be un-restored and shows some nice authentic weathering effects. Quite a useful reference for anyone interested in the subject.

http://virtuaalikuvat.com/jamiflyin/?p=0&t=2

One other thing I noted was the size of the harness belts. Most aftermarket sets appear to be much wider than the real thing. Notice how relatively narrow the belts actually are. I also like the well-worn color of them. Beats just painting them white.

Regards,

John

Edited April 11, 2014 by 11bee

[11bee]

IP is pretty much done. I didn't go heavy on the colored gauges, just a couple of yellow (fuel) on the right hand side. The Aires panel is pretty decent, resin with a smaller PE cover and a piece of printed film in between. I learned a trick from the "Building the Revel 109" magazine and used Future to fix the film and the PE sections. It dries extremely clear and gloss so it looks like glass over each gauge and you can tweak the pieces into place (unlike superglue) since it takes 5 minutes or so to set up.

Still have a bit of work to do on detail painting and cleaning up some paint errors (also need to add the gunsight but I save that for later since it is much too easy to break) but this is how the panel looks so far:

Notice how the future looks like glass over the instruments:

Just a couple shots of the dry fitted cockpit:

Edited April 13, 2014 by 11bee