1/48 Do 217E-5

[Old Dog]

This is another one from my shelf of ignore and was started almost ten years ago. Why so long for such an easy peasy kit ? Well, this was one of the first kits I started when I decided to get back in the hobby and I doomed it by making it the first kit that I used both PE and resin parts on. Needless to say the frustration level had it on and off the shelf numerous times and it seemed like every time I got past one barrier I hit another. It eventually ended up in a plastic storage box that got buried by other things and sat idle for a long time. Earlier this year I was determined to finish it and managed to get it painted only to run into frustrations with decal issues. I ended up cutting stencils for everything but the nose numbers and the bottom wing crosses and sourced the swastikas from a generic sheet, everything else was painted on. That hurdle overcome I thought I had it made until I installed the main gear and discovered that they splayed outward. During it's time in the storage box the wing had developed a dihedral :frantic Fixing this required clamping a straight bar across the top of the wing with spacers at each end forcing the wing in the opposite direction. After a month of this with no apparent change I applied some heat to the underneath side and finally got the results I wanted without doing any easily visible damage and was finally able to complete the kit. :yipee Given my skills at the outset and the amount of time it sat around it is not one of my better efforts but it looks OK in the cabinet. Hopefully the other two variants of this I still want to build will not take this long to finish. For anyone wishing to see the entire build log it is here. I did go into a lot of detail on installing the dropped flaps. I spent a long time searching for a photo of one with them down as most photos have them up.

Dropped flaps prior to installation

Thanks for looking !

 

[moon puppy]

Now that's perseverance!

 

[razordws]

Turned out great Gary. Glad you stuck with it.

 

[Heavens Eagle]

Looks great Gary! I am a bit the same way, build till I get tired to fixing things and then set it aside for a while.
Better to do that than trash it or force yourself to work on something super frustrating.

 

[sharkman]

I have a bunch sitting around like that. I do get to them eventually, just need to get in the right mood and for the interest to come back!

I have one of these in the stash too. Looks great and I really like the dropped flaps. Were they a PE set that you can buy? What was the resin you used??


Glad to see you finished it! Is it just me or is the Hs 293 a bit off??

 

[Old Dog]

Thanks guys ! Warren, you made me go look, it's just lens distortion the missile is lined up correctly. Resin came from two places, the props,fans,spinners and forward cowl rings were from Cutting Edge, so unobtainium now unless you have deep pockets. The flaps and the balance of the resin parts I used which included replacement pilot and radio operators seats came from Verlinden which are also probably becoming scarce as well.

 

[ij001]

Now that's perseverance!

Yes it is, and a great model at the end of the process, Gary.


Ian.

 

[Paulw]

Always nice to see one of those. Very nice indeed.

 

[MichelC]

Excellent work and well done for the perseverance!

Finishing one’s first kit is no small achievement. I should know: after 11 years since I came back to the hobby my first 4 kits are still there, in some boxes under the pile...

 

[phantom II]

Very nice Gary . Congrats . Definitely one to be proud of .


Cheers, Christian B)

 

[lupanzer]

Beautiful job!

Luiz

 

[jknaus]

Very very nice. I love it
James