Academy 1/35 Flakpanzer IV Wirbelwind

[PrivatePublic]

Hey everyone who reads this.

Decided I shouldn't let my ambition get the better of me this time and to do something simple.

This kit's as old as me, to the year. Released in '94 it was cheap and still quite nice. The detail doesn't hold up to modern productions but it's still perfectly adequate and the detail is reasonably nice with well molded parts, no flash and some subtle but good surface texture.

Part count is fairly low so it should fly together pretty quickly meaning I'll actually be able to finish it in time

Instructions are, again, perfectly adequate. Not too fancy it's easy enough to see where everything's meant to go.

Only one colour scheme printed in greyscale. Gonna look up a few references for this and pick one that catches my eye.
3 crew are also included, they're a bit meh on detail but the most you'll really see is the top of the helmets once in so I might do them

So yea. Oldish kit, simple and straightforward, still enough detail to look the part and easy enough to actually finish in 4 months. Should be good.
I also have the Academy 1/48 P-38 and 2015 release Airfix 1/48 Hurricane in my stash if I wanna do something else as well.

[Lysus]

Still weird to me to hear people say '94 is old. I mean, it is. Just strange to hear....

[Avgas]

Yeah, know what you mean Jase. '94 I was 38....

[Smiffy]

I was the grand old age of 16 in '94

[PrivatePublic]

I guess "old" is a relative term

Been meaning to do an update on the build for a while but I've been bogged down in uni work. That said the actual build has mostly flown together in the couple of hours I can find now and then, it's a really simple kit. Detail is a bit lacking compared to offerings like Dragon but there's something to be said for a build that mostly falls together y'know? It's nice to just spend an hour or two at a relaxed pace while watching something and seeing some genuine progress regardless.

As usual the build started with the lower hull. Each road wheel, drive sprocket and idler has a poly cap inside. They're a bit tight fitting so test fitting everything together is a pain but they'll hold once done so that's nice.

Suspension is as simple as can be, each part is a single piece and the drive housing just sits in a hole in the hull

Again the rear was pretty simple. Not everything fits perfectly, some bits need some bending, sanding or cutting to look alright but for this one I'm not getting pedantic.

Top part of the glacis is just molded flat on the bottom and doesn't mate with the other part. Just needs a little sanding to get it to sit flush though.

Then it's just attaching smaller parts to the main upper hull piece. The hull is just two pieces, all engine deck detail etc just molded on but it looks fine at a glance. There is a large gap at the rear of the upper hull between the engine deck and rear plate that I need to fix when I can be bothered finding my plasticard.


Decided to put one of the figures together to see how he looks, might add a bit of life to the piece...

...Maybe not. The figures are easily the weakest part of the kit IMO.
With the hull done it was time to move on to the turret. That starts with the central "pedestal" that the guns mount to. It required a little encouragement to sit right but went fine.

Attached a few pieces to the back which consist of the aiming controls and sight mounts.

The guns are solid pieces but the flash hiders flare out enough that it's easy to hollow them out

Mounted each pair of guns and test fitting on the central pedestal

Then test fitting everything together

There's not much more to do build-wise now, just a few little things. Then it's on to priming and painting when I get the chance.

So yea, not much complexity and decent detail in a pretty cheap kit. Figures are kinda bad but the rest is pretty good. It's not the most accurate kit but it's a decent representation of the vehicle. There's not much to complain about in the instructions either, they're simple and easy to read with no noticeable errors apart from some weird assembly ordering in one or two cases. Marking options are limited in the kit itself but there's plenty more out there on the internet. It's just a good example of getting what you pay for

[PrivatePublic]

Another little update

Broke out the plasticard for a couple of jobs. First was filling the gap at the rear of the engine deck. It was almost exactly 0.5mm which is convenient. Had to clamp it together because the engine deck bowed down in the middle a bit. The clamp both let me press it against the plasticard to hold it straight while the glue set and ensure there were no gaps.

Bit of Vallejo's plastic putty over top to plug a couple of little gaps

And then sanded back. It may still need a touch up but I'll only really be able to see when I get to paint.

Next I decided to scratch build a very rudimentary interior. There's not much to see through the turret but the kit part has a couple of holes and some ribs for mounting motors/batteries and they'll still be somewhat seen. So looked up a reference or two and just built the firewall and platform under the turret. It's not a tidy job but I just wanted to whip something up and I'm still learning this whole scratchbuilding thing so it's a good opportunity to practice. To fit it I had to carve out bits of plastic and form it around others but it fits nicely now.

And the view from above. Not much to see but it's better than an empty space with light shining through the bottom. This is a good time to talk about one of the most noticeable kit errors. I'm not terribly pedantic typically, if it looks the part then all good but for anyone who is interested the cross bars that are moulded to the bottom of the turret to support the gun are actually meant to be attached to the hull and support the turret as a whole. Tiger213's Dragon kit shows how it should be. I'll leave it be though.


Next stage is priming then painting. Thanks for stopping by

[Tiger213]

for making the interior. Nice scratch.
And great progress...I don't have much time now..maybe next weekend..

Good luck with the paint job

[DrSprue]

Sorry, coming in a bit late, just started my plane on this GB a few days ago. Looks like a nice kit, love the guns! Good luck, ill be watchin!

[PrivatePublic]

Well about a week ago I decided I should actually finish this thing now that I've got some spare time. Unfortunately I forgot to take progress pictures for the most part. That said it was a fairly standard and straightforward build.

I left off with it pretty much completely built. After that all I did was some touching up and final bits and pieces.

Next I primed it with a hardware store grey spray primer which did the job just fine for a kit like this.
The LHS has been running a bit low on paint recently so I ordered Mig's '44-'45 German Standard Colour pack online.

I've never used Mig's paints before and I've heard both good things and bad things but it's a convenient set and I figured I might as well give them a try. That and they had those big bags of M&Ms on sale which I was ordering anyway
The red-brown and dunkelgelb came out quite nicely but the green was a couple of shades lighter than intended. I also found the dunkelgelb sprayed just fine at about 18psi through my H&S Ultra with a 0.2mm needle but the other two needed a bit of thinning to prevent the occasional build-up and sputtering through the brush. It's hard to tell what the interior colour is from the photo but it's a roughly 50/50 mix of Tamiya acrylic white and buff. I wasn't at all worried about trying to be as accurate as possible with this build and it looks alright

It's my first try at freehanding a soft edge camo too. Mostly it went well but I did have a bit of overspray in places. Playing with the psi, amount of paint to feed, speed I was painting etc helped a bit, thinning the darker colours helped a lot but it was still hard to avoid. Maybe there's a trick to it or maybe I'll just have to accept it. Guess I'll keep experimenting and find out.

I painted the whole thing in one go, wheels and all, then went back through with the detail painting. Gunmetal for the... gun metal, rubber black for the tires, that sort of thing.

Once that was done I covered it all in a coat of Alclad Aqua Gloss, great stuff, and then moved on to weathering. I started with some drybrushing for highlights on the sprockets, bogies, guns and magazines. Next I washed the whole thing with AKs enamel wash for dark yellow and wiped it back, picked out some of the details with a pin wash and finished with some pigments (well, pastel scrapings) set with some enamel thinner where I wanted some build up. Finally a quick matte coat spray and done.

Final reveal