1/48 Italeri Ju87-B Stuka

[antonowski]

Hi all!

I've been building various aircraft off and on over the past month or so when I can. Thought I'd share my progress so far on this kit with you all. Always been fascinated with the Stuka since seeing one at Hendon in the early 90s, so thought this kit was a relatively inexpensive delve into the Stuka world. Turns out that the kit isn't actually that bad, either!

It's got some lovely box art, I do wonder whether companies are obligated to show at least 1 Axis aircraft being shot down on any box art, but hey ho...



So, I got to work first of all by assembling the wings, cockpit and engine. Assembly was relatively straight forward other than some weirdness in steps with the engine hoses...but as long as you're careful it's not that big of a deal.


There's some nice photo etch details included in the kit as well, which are easy to cut and manipulate into place for the most part. The part I struggled with was the instrument panel cowling. The instructions aren't overly clear on placement and the holes for the tabs on the inside of the cockpit wall make it look as though the cowling should be in place there. However, the cowling should be above the cockpit slightly. You can see the gap that resulted in this misplacement below:



After that was fixed, I attached the wings and the two fuselage halves together. This didn't require too much fettling to fit but the fit around the wing roots isn't the best I've seen (it's certainly not the worst, either). The engine isn't glued in place at this point, but looks cool already! I'll be building this Stuka grounded, battle-damaged and also being serviced so the engine cowling won't be present on the model.









The next step for me was to try some battle damage on the plane itself. Since starting and getting feedback, I'll be taking everyone's advice on thinning out the plastic below any damage prior to building so it looks like damaged sheet metal a little better. For now, these are just practice!

I initially drill the holes with a pin vise, changing up the size of the drill bit for some variation. I then use a blade to "gouge" out some of the surrounding interior of the hole and to bevel the edges a little, just to make each hole unique and a bit more visually appealing.



Once this is done I use a small battery operated engraver to gouge some more of the material out to created pieces of flak-based damage. Mileage may vary on this technique, I'm sure it would have looked better with the thinned out plastic.



I also cut away some of the plastic on the rear horizontal stabiliser. I've seen people comment that the control surfaces are fabric but on the Ju87 I believe they are actually a form of aluminium. So it's staying like this! xD





After applying some of the damage to the wings and fuselage, I painted the prop and nose and attached them to the engine. These can be dirtied up and chipped at a later date.






Next step was onto the painting. I was initially going to lay down a gloss black primer coat for the metallic basecoat, but AK Interactive's Xtreme Metal is just so good that it's not needed. So, a couple of coats to the whole plane of Xtreme Metal Aluminium...





After this was dry, I hit the whole plane with a coat of AK's Worn Effects chipping medium and let that dry also. I then got to painting the undercarriage of the plane with Vallejo's Model Air "Hellblau". This looks a little desaturated but I'm sure with t gloss coat it'll come up nicely.




And this is where I'm up to so far! I'll post more updates once the top side painting/masking is underway. Having a lot of fun with this one, just hope those bloody canopies fit properly!

Cheers,
Ant

[Tomcat64]

That's off to a cracking start.

I love the crank-winged shape of the Stuka, and good to hear the kit is mostly behaving even if the instructions are doing their best to lead you astray.

Looking forward to seeing this develop

[antonowski]

That's off to a cracking start.

I love the crank-winged shape of the Stuka, and good to hear the kit is mostly behaving even if the instructions are doing their best to lead you astray.

Looking forward to seeing this develop

Cheers Neil!

It's not the cheapest of kits to be honest at £30 (When you consider the F22 Raptor from Italeri at this scale is nearly a tenner cheaper, larger and with more parts) but the fit isn't as bad as I was expecting it to be. Ok the engine isn't the most detailed or best fitting in places but the joy of building the kit is going to outweigh that I think. Can't wait to get the camo scheme painted up on it!

[Kevthemodeller]

That's off to a cracking start.

I love the crank-winged shape of the Stuka, and good to hear the kit is mostly behaving even if the instructions are doing their best to lead you astray.

Looking forward to seeing this develop

What he said,

[digger303]

Wow nice going. Making me want to finish my self queen.

[antonowski]

Cheers chaps! Appreciate the comments.

Appears as though some of the undercarriage details have snapped off somehow, also including the left gun barrel somehow! :O

Today on lunch I'll be cracking on with the masking and painting of the upper wings/fuselage and gloss varnishing the underside. Can't wait!!!

[Garion77]

Nice start ! my hat to you for trying the battle damage ! Came out great

[antonowski]

Hi guys.

So I got some paint down for the splinter camo scheme today. And it came out.....wellllll I'll just show the pictures!


I gave the plane a couple of coats of Vallejo's Dunkelgrün before masking...



I then spent some time masking off for the Scwarzgrün for the 2nd colour of the splinter camo. Some areas were a little tricky particularly around the horizontal stabilisers (should have done these separately in hind sight).



Rather than let the paint sit before I started on this, I just went straight in like an idiot and started to lay down the black green. It went on lovely in thin layers but once I'd started to peel some of the masking tape off there were areas where the paint lifted. To be honest, this was down to pure impatience on my part (you'd think I'd know better) but I was rushing to get it done on my lunch. So here's the "finished" camo pattern...





In all fairness it could have been much worse, and I can pretty readily patch those areas up with some careful airbrushing.

Still pleased with the colours, but I'll be more patient with the next steps for sure .

Cheers,
Ant

[digger303]

Had exactly the same issue with mine. Ever since then I have cleaned the model before painting with isopropyl and a cotton bud because the issue is with the paint not sticking not the masking tape. So far I haven't had a repeat of that problem.
Nice sharp camo

[cor]

Nice work. Looking good despite the hiccups

[antonowski]

Had exactly the same issue with mine. Ever since then I have cleaned the model before painting with isopropyl and a cotton bud because the issue is with the paint not sticking not the masking tape. So far I haven't had a repeat of that problem.
Nice sharp camo

I think that's definitely the issue actually, makes a lot of sense. Before scale modeling I always used to prime before painting. And it's not happened on the jets I've been undercoating. Cheers for the tip! I did clean the model with airbrush cleaner the night before but obviously wasn't thorough enough.

Hopefully I don't make a dog's dinner of the rest of the build!

[Kevthemodeller]

Shame about the lifting paint but nothing you can't sort, annoying all the same

[Garion77]

poor you ! but that's the problem with Vallejo ! in my experience there the ones that you have to let dry the longest before masking and even then they lift sometimes. That's one of the many reasons I'm slowly moving away from them ! but you camouflage work is nicely done ! After the reparations it will look fine ! Keep it up !

[antonowski]

poor you ! but that's the problem with Vallejo ! in my experience there the ones that you have to let dry the longest before masking and even then they lift sometimes. That's one of the many reasons I'm slowly moving away from them ! but you camouflage work is nicely done ! After the reparations it will look fine ! Keep it up !

Yeah I've noticed this with a few of Vallejo's range of paints. Still, I could probably have been more cautious.


So....I got a bit more done during my break/s again (working from home isn't all that bad).

Problem I had during the initial chipping and weathering is leaving the solution too long underneath the paint I think. It wasn't activating at all. So, I resorted to the good old sponge and metallic paint method. Just a shame about the undercoat I worked on!




After the paint had dried (for real this time), I used X22 and some Mr Colour Levelling thinner to give 2 gloss coats to the whole topside of the plane and let it dry for a few hours.

I then got to adding the bigger decals to the top of the wings and the sides of the fuselage. I'll continue with this tomorrow but here's where I'm up to so far:







Cheers!
Ant

[digger303]

You've done well.

[Tomcat64]

That looks great - really well done on sorting out those lifts

I still use Vallejo model air quite a bit, but always prime first & leave at least overnight before masking - yup I had the same problems you did when I tried to mask too soon.

[cor]

The battle damage looks great. You dont see a lot of this on models.

[Tomcat64]

To save clogging up Ant's Stuka build log I've moved the discussion around the use of the swastika and other emotive markings on model kits over to a new topic here for those that wish to continue to the discussion.

[antonowski]

Hi guys.

So. Decals have been applied, gloss coats applied. So far so good.

Then I applied the oil wash. And that went on fine. Used a combination of Winton black and pebeo burnt umber. Cool! Next step was to take it all off, and this is where things have gone terribly wrong....

The effect itself looks pretty good, the topside is a little underwhelming but I can pin wash that later. However...take a look at these photos.




The wheel "wells" or whatever they're called have just sheared off...these were temporarily in place without force or glue, and no real stress has been put on them. I'm really surprised at the fragility of these.

Second point was that most of the underside detailing has snapped off. I wasn't particularly rough on these areas and was especially careful around the teeny tiny bits but it didn't matter....off they came! I could probably attach them later in the build next time but for ease of painting I decided to attach them sooner. My bad, I know for next time!

Overall though, it didn't turn out TOO badly. Got some things to fix but here's where I'm up to...





Hopefully I'll be able to fix these issues and get the build back on track!

Cheers,
Ant

[Garion77]

A good trick is to wait to put the tiny bits at the end or go less heavy with the oil wash... meaning going more localize with in a matter of more a pinwash then a general one all over the place.
Don't give up !

[antonowski]

A good trick is to wait to put the tiny bits at the end or go less heavy with the oil wash... meaning going more localize with in a matter of more a pinwash then a general one all over the place.
Don't give up !

I think in this case you're absolutely right, placing those fiddly bits after that process was probably the right call. Ah well! More opportunities to learn I guess!

I'll keep going on this one until its done. Cheers!

[aur0ra145]

Keep it up, I like how the washes came out.

[Tomcat64]

Ouch - what did you use to clean up the oil wash? It looks like something may have interacted badly with the styrene?

In better news the effects look great on the main airframe so definitely stick with it - maybe incorporate some additional damage if needs be?