Eduard 1/48 Albatros D.II

From Wiki

Albatros designers Thelen, Schubert and Gnädig produced the D.II in response to pilot complaints about poor upward vision in the Albatros D.I. The solution was to reposition the upper wing 36 cm (14 in) closer to the fuselage and stagger it forward slightly. Rearrangement of the cabane struts also improved forward view. The D.II otherwise retained the same fuselage, engine installation, and armament as the D.I.  Basic performance was unchanged. Idflieg ordered an initial batch of 100 D.II aircraft in August 1916.

D.IIs formed part of the initial equipment of Jagdstaffel (Jasta) 2, the first specialized fighter squadron in the German air service. Famous pilots included Hptm. Oswald Boelcke (Jasta 2's first commander) and Manfred von Richthofen. With its high speed and heavy armament, the D.II won back air superiority from Allied fighter types such as the Airco DH.2 and Nieuport 11 (but in turn suffered at the hands of improved Allied fighters such as the Nieuport 17 and Sopwith Pup—writer addition to the article)

End Wiki

The Albatros DII Scout was the 2nd model of the famous Albatros family of fighters.  It was not very maneuverable compared to its Allied counterparts but it had a speed advantage over them which smarter pilots exploited.

Energy Vs Turn

The Albatros was probably the first example of the fighter pilot’s maxim “Speed is life, more is better” as it was the first “energy” fighter due to its relative poor maneuverability and energy advantage (aka speed—the terms are interchangeable.)  Fighter planes come in two basic types, energy and turn although modern designs can combine the two.  Energy fighters tend to fly in the vertical plane and are dependant on increased engine power, diving and climbing ability while turn fighters tend to fight in the horizontal and depend on their agility rather than on speed. 

In World War I, most pilots preferred the turn fighter over the energy fighter as they felt that maneuverability was more important than speed.  This was true in WW1 considering the low horsepower and reliability of early aircraft engines; there wasn’t much of a speed advantage for the energy fighter to exploit. 

It wasn’t till WW2 with improved aerodynamic design and engines that the energy fighter showed itself to be superior over the turn fighter as pilots realized that they didn’t have to get into a twisting turning dogfight to shoot down the enemy especially when facing against planes like the A6M Zero who could out turn anything in the sky during the early part of WW2.  Faster energy fighters broke away from slower turn fighters and re-engaged at will because of the relative speed advantage they had over them.  After initial combat most air forces in WW2 recognized the superiority of the energy fighter over the turn fighter with only the Japanese clinging to turn fighters (Ki-27, Ki-43 and A6M) till it was way too late for them. 

Jet age combat and the introduction of the Air to Air Missile showed that one needed to combine both energy and turn abilities into a fighter which led to the designs such as the F-16, the Su-27/33, F-15 and the F-22 etc.

The Eduard Albatros kits are among the easiest to build of WW1 kits.  This is a profipack version which comes with PE for the seatbelts and guns.  It has a similar parts arrangement as the Albatros DV and DIII kits previewed here.

 The parts come in the standard Eduard Olive Grey and have almost no flash (outside of mold seams) while the PE parts are a mix of unpainted and prepainted parts (for the seatbelts and restraints.)

 Decals are by Cartograph.  It is a small sheet as WW1 aircraft weren’t covered with maintenance stencils.

It began with the cockpit.  I decided to try use water color Burnt Sienna instead of MM Acryl Burnt Sienna to dry brush with for the wood effect.  It didn’t work out as well as the watercolor ran in various places when I sprayed on two or three thin coats of Gunze Clear Yellow to get the honey brown wood effect.  Oh well.

 The other parts were painted various colors including dark green and RLM02.

 One of the headaches I have had with the Eduard Albatros kits is lining up the cockpit parts (gun mounting bar and rudder pedals) before closing up the fuselage.  I fixed that problem by using CA glue instead of regular glue on one side to stiffen the join.  Finally I added the seat and the seatbelts to the seat.

 The engine parts were cleaned up, painted and then assembled.  I painted the interior of the engine compartment the same as the cockpit (wood effect covered with two/three light coats of clear yellow) because it was rather open.

 I glued the two fuselage halves together.  I used CA glue except at the tail where I used Tamiya Extra Thin instead.  The only reason I do this is to speed up assembly as my usual method of dealing with phantom seams is to let the model sit for a week to two weeks before working on the seams.  The fuselage seams were sanded smooth without too much issue.

 The other parts were removed from the sprue gates and cleaned up.

Painting

I began working on the fuselage wood effect for the fuselage, the bottom wing, the prop and the rudder.  I took a worn flat brush with a little amount of MM Acryl Burnt Sienna and began to dry brush the surface.  I kept spreading the paint in one direction for the entire panel.  Once the panel was done, I would make curves in the wood grain effect.  Other panels I would add more or less paint or change direction to show it is another panel of wood.  I thought about adding knots, but decided against that as it would require I wreck another 0 pt brush as I have found that the wood grain effect is hazardous to the health of my brushes.  When it was dry, I realized that I had REALLY over done the wood effect.  I took some Vallejo Ocre Yellow and repeated to reduce the amount of burnt sienna.  It didn’t look that great, but I figured that once I got the clear yellow on that it would be fine.  The parts were set aside to dry for a day before the clear yellow would be added.

 I sprayed on three thin coats of Gunze Clear Yellow and crossed my fingers.  It looked pretty good.  Over done for the scale, but not as over done as it could have been.

 Once the clear yellow was dry, I sprayed the prop hub, the struts and various sections of the fuselage (using the masks provided) with Xtracrylix RLM 02 and the rudder was painted with Tamiya Red Brown.  The wings were done next with the undersides (and landing gear parts/wheel hubs) painted Tamiya XF-23 Light Blue while the top sides were painted in the pattern used by decal option number four with a combination of Tamiya Red Brown, Tamiya OD and MM Acryl FS34092.  Unfortunately, I had a bit of dyslexia when I read the painting instructions.  It should have been FS34102 which is a pale green instead of that really green dark green that is FS34092.  I repainted those sections with Polyscale PC-10 which was close enough to FS34102 as I could not find the bottle in the container where I store all my paints.

 The clear yellow areas needed to be lightly wet sanded with various grades of Micromesh sanding cloths due to slight orange peel before the decals went on.

 Note:  at this point the entire model was assembled before the decals (details in the final construction section.)

 Decals

The Eduard decals (Cartograph, actually) are pretty good and went on one self created issue and little if any silvering.  Fortunately, there weren’t that many stencils with WW1 aircraft.  The one self inflicted issue I had was when I accidentally ripped off part of the upper starboard iron cross.  I was lucky that I only tore off part of the white square background rather than the cross so I repainted it.

 Weathering and Final Coat

Once the decals were dry, I wiped away the excess decal solution and proceeded to do a simple wash (highlight certain panel lines and add some grime underneath including the undercarriage.)  The excess was removed using slightly damp Q-tips.

 The final coat was two thin layers of Xtracrylix Semi-Gloss thinned 50% using Xtracrylix thinner.

The machine guns were made with PE and plastic bits.  I opted not to remove the plastic cooling jackets on the Spandaus and just covered them with the PE ones because I have had a hard time in the past to make them perfectly round.  They were a bit fiddly and some care is necessary to add them in.

 The most painful part of any biplane is the assembly of the struts and the alignment of the upper wing/struts in relation to the rest of the plane.  The Eduard Albatros is a relatively easy plane to assemble but it still is rather fiddly. 

 I glued on the four outside struts first.  Next I added the upper wing of the Albatros and glued it on.  I used clothesline pins as alignment guides (the pins clamped to the base of the strut on the lower wing to keep it at a right angle.)  Next I added the interior struts.  I glued upper attachment points using Tamiya Extra Thin and the bottom attachment points with CA glue.  The reason I use CA glue on the bottom is because the attachment points are almost worthless and CA glue is necessary to keep them in place.  I hold the whole thing together with the Mark One Mod Zero type clamps aka my hands.

  The landing gear for the Albatros DII is a little more fragile than the DIII or DV but it is easier to align that the others.  I glued the wheels on using CA glue, adjusted them and turned the plane over to let it cure overnight.

 One area of difficulty was the exhaust pipe.  I glued it on using CA glue based on my previous experience with these kits.  After looking at the cover art, I realized that I had put the pipe at the wrong angle.  I snapped it off and tried it again.  Unfortunately, the angle was in the way of one of the guns.  Since the gun was hidden by the pipe and the upper wing, I merely winced and put the pipe in the correct slot.

 Eduard provides PE parts for the tail that detail the rigging for the elevator.  These were carefully glued in with CA glue.

 The final stage was the rigging using the rigging diagram provided by Eduard.  I went with my old standby of 0.008 brass wire and white glue.  I measured each section using compass dividers, cut the 0.008 brass wire and glued it in place with small dabs of white glue.  It took about three hours to rig.

 The Eduard Albatros DII is an excellent relatively easy to build WW1 biplane.  It is an excellent kit and provides practice platform for those who would like to try working on their version of the wood grain effect.  I had fun building this kit, but I wouldn’t recommend it for the first time builder because of the wood grain effect unless you want to give it try.

 Dan Lee

October 2010