COMPLETE WnW Albatross D.Va

[JimD]

The Corsair has entered the watch paint dry stage, so it's time to bust into something new.



This will be my first WnW kit and first biplane as well. There are only a couple of kits WNW makes that I'd ever actually be interested in doing (at this point)...this one and the Fokker D. VIIs...so naturally I went with the one with the more complicated rigging...but I wanted the challenge.

I'll be doing 7161/17 "Stropp" of Jasta 46 (1918)



I'm going OOB on this one with the exception of Gaspatch turnbuckles. Work has started modestly with some cleaning up of cockpit parts. Pictures coming soon.

[deafpanzer]

NNNIIICCCEEE!!! You definitely have my attention...

[JimD]

Welcome aboard! Look forward to dragging you along on this one

First paint laid on this one.

These interior pieces are wood. These will be shot with a base color and I'll do wood simulation with oils...

Why the black I don't know. Just habit now. Won't be having any variation of the base color.

[JimD]

Not one to waste any time, I've started the wood grain.

I sprayed some Gunze Radome as the base color....mostly because that was the closet thing to what I was looking for that I had in acrylic and I didn't want to be slowed waiting for enamel to dry. I began the grain with Burt Sienna.

This will dry and then perhaps I'll add some variation with a different color, or just move on the a clear stain to make it look more varnished.

Before and After:

[wing_nut]

OH MY! I'm in! This was my 1st WNW kit too. You picked a good one. Take extra care when putting in the engine mounts.

Nice thing about building old WWI bipes... you get a lot of wood. In the box I mean.

[Tojo72]

Great Jimmy, looking forward to your 1st WNW. Great start.

Sent from my SM-N900V using proboards

[JimD]

Thank you, sir, for the tip. I will surely keep an eye on the mount. And please feel free to throw any other tips my way if you have them

This one is particularly woody...hehe...I chose this one to test my myself...since the fuselage is exposed wood it will be a challenge for me. I'm a little obsessive with doing the grain. This one fuselage half took longer than I'd like to admit to get to where I liked it

[TRM]

Nic eone Jimmy!! Count me in! Off to a very nice start!!

[JimD]

Thank you, sir. I'm well into this one now and loving it.

I've got all the wood stuff done...in that I've finished the oils. I did decide to make it a little more pronounced. So I'm throwing in an updated pic.



All the bulkheads and things are done as well...they are just a little delicate to handle until the oils dry.

I'm going to let this stuff dry a few days and in the meantime practice with some tinted clears and move on to other parts of the kit.

[deafpanzer]

Wood looks fantastic!!!! Happy Thanksgiving buddy!

[JimD]

Thank you very much, Andy, and Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family as well. Looking forward to some down time, but there probably won't be much bench time in the coming days

[TRM]

Great wood effect Jimmy!! Make the best of the modelling time over the Holiday!! Happy Thanksgiving!!

[wing_nut]

Nice wood Jimmy. Time for another tip I just thought of. Scrape the paint out of the channels for the ribs and off the outer edge of the ribs themselves. The tolerances are so incredibly tight on these kits the paint can actually make the fit a wee bit off.

[JimD]

Thanks guys. And again, happy Thanksgiving to everyone!!!

Ahh!! I'm on ya there bud!! The channels for the ribs actually are taped off. It's really hard to tell but I did see this mentioned in other WIPs thanks though!!!

[Leon]

Nice work on the wood Jimmy! Looking really good.

[JimD]

Thanks you most kindly!

One last update before the bench shuts down for my second favorite hobby....gratuitous gorging of turkey and pie.

Excuse the cell phone pics. Camera was packed up for travel tomorrow.

Bench time was spent on the engine tonight. You can see the kit part has plastic blobs to represent those springs...whatever they are...so I decided to steal an idea from a WIP I saw elsewhere (may very well have been wing-nut's...and if it was, sir...thanks for the idea!) and scratch some from wire.



Kit part was lopped off and then I made some replacements by twisting the wire around an airbrush needle.



Next was on to wiring the spark plugs. You basically have to do this since the Hobbits were nice enough to give the holes pre-drilled in both the engine block and the rails.



Engine mocked up. I also went ahead and cleaned up the various parts and laid down some black for the Alclad and other colors to come.



And I promise some high res images when things start to come together.

Everyone have a happy Thanksgiving...and for you non-American pals have a great normal Thursday

[wing_nut]

Dude, that is outstanding. Might well have been mine but if I thought of it... I am sure someoen else did 1st

Here's a link to most of my build.

WNW Albatros


And "gorging"? That doesn't even begin to describe the carnage and sparks flying off the silverware that will commence here soon enough Just got to keep it short of

[petros]

Very nice, will be watching this great build!

[JimD]

It was your build!! I had seen it months ago researching the kit and remembered I wanted to do that. Do wish I had some finer wire but still better than OOB I think.

Sitting here watching water boil haha but the gorging will commence soon

[Leon]

Nice work on the wiring Jimmy ! Try not to over indulge on the turkey.

[John Everett]

The scratchbuilt springs are a huge improvement.

[deafpanzer]

HOLY COW! What a HUGE improvement... loving it!!!

[JimD]

You fellas are too kind. Thanks for the encouragement...its really appreciated.

So no update a while, but work it ongoing. This build should be well past this stage, but I managed to forget to do the oil on some pieces not once but twice...which has resulted in a major slowing down as I wait for the stuff to dry.

We are getting really close to buttoning up the fuselage. The control stick will be popped in last minute. Other than that the pit is pretty much ready and waiting for the engine.

I'm opting to go with a not heavily weathered aircraft, so really nothing much in the cockpit area. Then engine will get some detail wash and that's about it.

(Note: harnesses are not secured where they are supposed to be. Made an error in judgment with the steps and it was darn near impossible to anchor them on the cross beams. Also, the shoulder harness looks like it will have to sit this ride out...just a simple screw up in following the steps and I'm at a point where I think I'd rather live without them than screw something up.)





The engine is really a beautiful and simple piece of machinery. The added wiring from the plug rod to the little black thing at the rear of the engine (technical terms) was a real PITA...not perfect, but acceptable.

[wing_nut]

Outstanding job on this one Jimmy.

[petros]

Why are you placing the photos of a real museum engine here?

Fantastic work!

[deafpanzer]

This is so sick... engine looks STUNNING!!! The wood panels too... it is going to be a beauty!

[JimD]

Gracias gentlemen. Much appreciated.

Progressing somewhat.

Weathering and finishing off the engine.





And the interior bits. Interesting...didn't even notice it until I sprayed down the interior green, but the clear coat I put over the oils has apparently cracked. The oils dried for a week before a clear coat, so I'll be going with some different brand clear from here out over oils.





Still can't close things up. The engine mount wound up giving me so much trouble that I had to strip and repaint it...mucked it up with CA....it's 2 days into a week long drying...so I started other bits.

Wings have been primed and I've painted then underside light blue.



A little test fit..



Finally, will be doing some salt chipping here, so some aluminum base.

[deafpanzer]

Very realistic weathering on the engine... now I am starting to see a plane?

[petros]

Great thing! However, I would say that that cracking pattern of the clear is very realistic and would fit the weathering. Especially in wartime the paints were strategic, and their quality was quite low, so cracking would be realistic on the stressed structures.

[wbill76]

Making good progress on this one Jimmy. Got to love the detail and finish on that power plant for sure.