Fokker D.VII OAW - 1:48 Eduard

[KSaarni]

Finally the mailman brought the Fokker, with a bunch of appropriate colors for the build.




The subject of this project:



Decals come from Galdecal:



The color references differs between what is written in the reference book "The colors of the Finnish Air Force" and what Galdecal is using. In this build I trust more the information taken from the reference book than what Galdecals is telling, especially when you know the task force behind the book.

The project itself will not be a straight out of the box build, as there are a number of differencies that needs to be taken into consideration, among others;

• No armament installed, needs some scratch-building

• Mercedes D III engine, need to figure out what the differencies are with a BMW engine, at least the exhaust is different

• The fuselage of the Eduard kit I have is not 100% correct, so some kit bashing is needed.

• And on top of it all, inspired by my Fokker C.X build, this Fokker will be fitted with skis!

There are probably a few other adjustments as well, will see which precisely while the build proceeds.

The biggest issue is that there are hardly any reference pictures available for the I.D.357 (formally I.C.357)
The measurements for the ski's I will pick from instructions for a 1/72 aftermarket ski kit. And using reference pictures from other builds that I find online. There are a few good ones!

So will be an interesting journey, that's for sure!

Let's see what next!

- Kari

[BlackSheep214]

[Stikpusher]

Oh a little Fokker!

[BlackSheep214]

What he said?!?!

[KSaarni]

Oh a little Fokker!

- Kari

[Stuart]

[speedgraflex]

My friend Gary whom I know through various WWI and large scale forums scratchbuilt the skids in 1/32

[KSaarni]

Thanks Bruce! Yeah, I have seen this gorgeous build.

But I'm a bit unsure where he picked up some of the colors for the camouflage scheme, for example, the dark green ( ~FS24092 or FS24098) seems to be missing completely. Still, a really beautiful build!


- Kari

[KSaarni]

Sooner or later I need to make skis from scratch, so I thought to do some tryouts, test examples..

The greatest challenge with the skis is to be able to bend the tips slightly upwards. I read somewhere regarding "lamination method", in other words using a few thin styrenes (0.2-0.3 mm thick), using Tamiyas extra thin cement in between the layers and immediately, before the glue sets, bend them upwards with the help of a pen or something similar with the same curve.

I made some rough measuring, used the styrene piece what I had (0.25 mm) and cut 3 pieces





Then some careful bending of the tip


Cut into the shape


And here we have a test ski


The other tip did not succeed so well, but this was after all "just a test"


Continued to try to make it more wooden


All in all, I think this part will work out well, there are more parts in the ski construction that needs to be made as well.
But, that is for a later moment...

(I did all in all 4 skis, but 3 of them were unsuccessful, only this above became something )

- Kari

[cbaltrin]

Nice work. Your rigging looks fantastic.