Nachtigall on Speed Arado 234 B-2N by DocRob - FINISHED - 1/32 - Fly

[DocRob]

2 hours ago, popeye the sailor said:

good you were able to sort out the tanks.  you a great job with stenciling........it looks so much better than with decals 

Thank you Popeye, the painted variant looked good until I tried to remove the residues of the masks glue . I can live with the decals, silvering on 'silver' is not so much of an issue.

 

Cheers Rob

[DocRob]

I can't tell you how happy I am, to have reached this point. The Nachtigall is not done, there is a lot do do until she is finished, but adding the subassemblies to the underside and remove the masks from the canopy was a major step.

The canopy had some staining on the glass, where I'm not sure, where they came from. Luckily,  could rub them carefully away with a cut toothpick. The framing needs to be decaled with rivets, the black color is only the base level.

I hope the landing gear holds up, as the Arado is a really heavy bird with all the heavy resin bits inside and the heavy nose weight as well.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cheers Rob

[CDW]

There was an elderly gentleman at the IPMS show I attended earlier in the year who told me some facts concerning the Arado 234 that is part of the Smithsonian Museum in Washington DC. He said he had worked there helping to restore that particular aircraft. I wish I had written down everything he told me as he was explaining facts about how the canopy parts fit together but I could not follow without a clear visual image of what he was talking about. Maybe one day I will run into him again and have him tell me about it one more time. This time I will take notes. He had donated a 1:48 Hasegawa Arado 234 and detail sets which I won in a raffle held at the show. Maybe one day I'll get around to building the 1:48 version.

Your model looks great at this stage. Keep up the beautiful work.

[Jack12477]

39 minutes ago, CDW said:

This time I will take notes

Use the voice recorder app on your phone or buy a cheap digital  pocket size "tape recorder".  I have one (micro cassette) in my camera bag. 

[DocRob]

21 hours ago, CDW said:

There was an elderly gentleman at the IPMS show I attended earlier in the year who told me some facts concerning the Arado 234 that is part of the Smithsonian Museum in Washington DC. He said he had worked there helping to restore that particular aircraft. I wish I had written down everything he told me as he was explaining facts about how the canopy parts fit together but I could not follow without a clear visual image of what he was talking about. Maybe one day I will run into him again and have him tell me about it one more time. This time I will take notes. He had donated a 1:48 Hasegawa Arado 234 and detail sets which I won in a raffle held at the show. Maybe one day I'll get around to building the 1:48 version.

Your model looks great at this stage. Keep up the beautiful work.

What an interesting encounter. I hope you can repeat the meeting and maybe prepare yourself beforehand. When I get the chance, I will visit the museum to see the real thing. Like I said before, the Arado 234 is one of my favorite planes in many different aspects. 
I'm also eager to see, you doing your magic wit the Hasegawa kit. I thought about buying one as well, but when I decide to build a second 234, it will be another Fly 1/32 kit, possibly the reconnaissance version.

 

Cheers Rob

[Roger Pellett]

Beautiful work, up to up to your usual standards!

 

Can anyone explain how the drag chutes work?  It would appear that they need to be ejected against the slipstream to then wrap themselves around the wing.  Or, do the pods swivel?

 

On a slightly related note, Duluth is home to the Sirius Aircraft Company.  Their production facilities are located at the Duluth Airport about 5 miles from my house.  Sirius is supposed to now be the largest producer of general aviation aircraft in the US.  Their composite fuselage high performance aircraft feature a parachute that can be deployed to float the plane back to earth in an emergency.

 

While the system works, in the hands of an inexperienced pilot it can be dangerous.  My wife’s distant cousin owned one of these planes.  Taking off from an airport, the plane’s engine apparently faltered and he deployed the chute at low altitude.  Instead of floating the plane to a safe landing it dragged it into a tree line killing him and two passengers.

 

Roger

[CDW]

1 hour ago, DocRob said:

What an interesting encounter. I hope you can repeat the meeting and maybe prepare yourself beforehand. When I get the chance, I will visit the museum to see the real thing. Like I said before, the Arado 234 is one of my favorite planes in many different aspects. 

Cheers Rob

I visited the Smithsonian museum in 2016 but I don't recall seeing the Arado 234 on my visit. Maybe it was there and I just missed it. I was rather rushed through the visit because my wife, daughter, and granddaughter were with me and as one can imagine, their interest in aircraft didn't nearly match my own. One can spend several days in DC and never begin to make a detailed study of the sites to be seen there. The air and space portion needs at least a full day all on its own.

What he was telling me about, in general, was how the canopy sections fit together and the black gasket material that was between the sections. There was more, but I just don't recall everything he said about it.

[DocRob]

1 hour ago, Roger Pellett said:

Beautiful work, up to up to your usual standards!

 

Can anyone explain how the drag chutes work?  It would appear that they need to be ejected against the slipstream to then wrap themselves around the wing.  Or, do the pods swivel?

 

On a slightly related note, Duluth is home to the Sirius Aircraft Company.  Their production facilities are located at the Duluth Airport about 5 miles from my house.  Sirius is supposed to now be the largest producer of general aviation aircraft in the US.  Their composite fuselage high performance aircraft feature a parachute that can be deployed to float the plane back to earth in an emergency.

 

While the system works, in the hands of an inexperienced pilot it can be dangerous.  My wife’s distant cousin owned one of these planes.  Taking off from an airport, the plane’s engine apparently faltered and he deployed the chute at low altitude.  Instead of floating the plane to a safe landing it dragged it into a tree line killing him and two passengers.

What a tragic story, Roger.
If you refer to the parachute on the two Rato starting rockets (Walter HWK 109-500), these will be dropped shortly after the start and the parachutes will be released through a thin rope, which is connected with the wing and opens the parachute when the Rato rockets falls down. They burn only for a short period of ca. 30s, helping the heavy plane to accelerate faster for take off. The Rato's are reusable and drop near the airfield.
The ropes for this mechanism will be added later to my build.
The Arado 234 also has a braking parachute in the aft fuselage, which to my knowledge is released with an explosive charge, pulling out the parachute. This is the strange loop, you can see on my belly pic of the Arado.

 

Cheers Rob

[DocRob]

Progress is slowly, as there is not much bench time and I started another in between project, but I finished the underside of the Arado, adding pitot tub, antenna, the parachute release ropes for the starting rockets, steering horns, ... I also touched up the underside color, where necessary. 

 

Flipped to the other side, I started decaling the canopy framing with the supplied rivet decal strips, a task, I wasn't looking forward to. I don't like to work on canopies, but the Arado needed it all, sawing, sanding, painting, masking, gluing, drilling, in other words, many ways to potentially damage the canopy. Luckily this was not the case and the decals behaved mostly well, some, I hope to lay down better with following coats of Micro Sol, fingers crossed. The framing isn't finalized, which will be done, after the decals have thoroughly dried.

 

 

 

Cheers Rob

[mtaylor]

The canopy is looking great just as it is now.  I hope the rest of the work on it goes well.

[Canute]

Don't know if you've heard of Solvaset. It's a pretty strong decal setting agent. Some of the older decals were pretty thick and Solvaset helped to get them set on car sides. It's pretty much a last resort. to get decals laying flat.

[DocRob]

9 hours ago, mtaylor said:

The canopy is looking great just as it is now.  I hope the rest of the work on it goes well.

Thank you Mark, until now everything turned out ok. My major concern in the moment is the front wheel strut. I hope it holds the hefty weight of the Arado.

Cheers Rob

[DocRob]

8 hours ago, Canute said:

Don't know if you've heard of Solvaset. It's a pretty strong decal setting agent. Some of the older decals were pretty thick and Solvaset helped to get them set on car sides. It's pretty much a last resort. to get decals laying flat.

Thank you for the suggestion, I heard about Solvaset, but don't have any, but other possibly stronger setting agents than Micro Sol. I think the Micro Sol will be sufficient and I will apply several coats first, before switching to hotter agents. I really don't want to damage the clear canopy, there is no respraying, if something goes wrong .

 

Cheers Rob

[DocRob]

I finished decaling the canopy fastener strips, but still have to add more Micro Sol in some places. I used the sawed out clear hatch and decaled the fastener framing in and outside.
Left of the canopy, you can see a hatch for the operators compartment, which was cut and bent from some clear food container. I will add an opening lever later.

 

On the upper fuselage, I added the ring antenna and the Naxos radar with it's clear cupola. The antler radars got also glued together and are awaiting some color.

 

 

Cheers Rob

[CDW]

Loads of detail there. Looks great.

[DocRob]

15 hours ago, CDW said:

Loads of detail there. Looks great.

Thank you, it's somehow strange, how a straightforward design, cross shaped no gimmicks plane got cluttered with tons of equipment.

 

Cheers Rob 

[DocRob]

Phew, the Nachtigall is finished .
It was a long journey, which started in 2019 and led to two long pauses in the SOD. Nevertheless, I never questioned my desire to finish this demanding build, because of the fascination of the Nachtigall. It is one of those kits, you simply cannot put aside permanently. There is so much detail provided, especially with the resin parts, which are simply stunning.

Aftermarket bits where used, namely HGW seatbelts, Master brass antler antennas and Yahu instruments, camo masks from LF and marking and stencil masks from 1ManArmy. 

You have to be a bit masochistic for this build, mainly around the canopy glazing, which cost me tons of sweat with all that sawing, sanding, drilling, gluing, painting, decaling and these vulnerable pieces are the focal point of this build and there is no margin for errors.
I expanded my self torture by wanting the canopy opened, which required more surgery.
Speaking about errors, I made some, which I will not point out here. If you read through the build log it's all there. I'm happy with the result, which of course could have been better, but somewhere you have to draw the line.

The kit needed modifications in several areas, mainly to reinforce the landing gear with brass rods for a bit more stability, because the Arado has a hefty weight.

 

Cheers Rob

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Jack12477]

Great looking model. Congratulations!  

[popeye the sailor]

such a beautiful looking plane  the stenciling is a really good process.  it works well around covers and hatches.........hard to do with decals.  super nice job with all the extras you put into this bird.  

[DocRob]

21 hours ago, Jack12477 said:

Great looking model. Congratulations!  

Thank you Jack, it took some time, but now I'm relieved, that the Arado is done.

 

17 hours ago, popeye the sailor said:

such a beautiful looking plane  the stenciling is a really good process.  it works well around covers and hatches.........hard to do with decals.  super nice job with all the extras you put into this bird.  

Thank you popeye, it is indeed a beautiful plane, even with all the clutter, like external tanks, Rato rockets, ..., which distract a bit from the slender shape of the Arado.
You can't beat the results of these 1ManArmy masks, but they are a PITA to apply, especially with German planes, being multi colored and sporting extensive walkway markings.

 

Cheers Rob