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REVELL 1:72 FOKKER DR.I |
Reviewer:
Kevin Ronayne (
kevin.ronayne@nuigalway.ie
)
Kit Review submitted:
30 March 2004
Above is the box art from the new kit, and is meant to represent Manfred von Richtofen's last Dr.I (425/17) some months before his death. Although not visible from this artwork, the representation is wrong: the wing under surfaces should be blue-grey and not red. There may also have been other parts of the aircraft painted either white (fin/rudder and wheels) or unpainted (cowling and struts).
The Fokker Dr.I was designed in the spring of 1917 as a hurried response to the British Sopwith Triplane and (to a lesser extent) the Nieuport Scout. The Dutch designer Anthony Fokker was one of those asked to produce a new aircraft to counter the threat. After speaking with front-line fighter pilots and seeing the Sopwith Triplane in action (possibly a captured aircraft), Fokker returned to his factory and briefed his chief designer Reinhold Platz. Platz was tasked with producing a triplane fighter, which was an original design as he had never seen the Sopwith.
Two of the first three prototypes (known as F.I's) were delivered to the front in August 1917, where they were acquired by Manfred von Richtofen and Werner Voss who took them into combat. The production DR.I's differed little from the prototypes: the most noticeable change were the wooden wingtip skids, which reduced the chances of the aircraft tipping over when landing or taxiing. After some early crashes with early production aircraft, the wing design had to be strengthened, and the German pilots had to revert back to their old Albatros D.Va fighters. Only in December 1917 did the DR.I enter service in considerable numbers.
The normal engine was the German Oberursel rotary engine (output: 110 BHP). This was a copy of a French Le Rhone engine. The original French engine was regarded as being more reliable, and some German pilots managed to fit their DR.I's with Le Rhone engines salvaged from Allied fighters! The DR.I was armed with two 7.92mm air-cooled machine guns. In some respects, the performance of the DR.I was mediocre. Its main strength was in its rate of climb and maneouvrability. By the late spring of 1918, the Fokker D.VII biplane began to replace the DR.I, although some pilots continued to use the type for months afterwards. Approximately 320 were built.Although the DR.I was flown by a number of very famous German experten such as Werner Voss and Erich Loewenhardt, it will always be forever associated with Manfred von Richtofen, aka The Red Baron. Actually, Red Baron was a post-war nickname - wouldn't you know it! Manfred actually flew several Fokker Triplanes, including the prototype F.I. The last DR.I that he flew was 425/17, and this remains one of the most famous individual aircraft in history. On the 21st April 1918, after scoring 80 victories, he was shot down and killed behind Allied lines. To this day, there is controversy as to whether he was brought down by the Sopwith Camel of Captain 'Roy' Brown, or by Australian gunners on the ground.
The last kit of an aircraft from The Great War that I built was the old Revell kit of the Fokker DR.I. This was in the late 1980's, although the kit itself was a lot older. At the time, I think the only other kit in 1/72 scale was the Airfix kit. Now, we have kits from Roden, Eduard and this new Revell offering. Roden are completely dominating the market for World War I aircraft, and Revell have not produced a new World War I kit for many years. Maybe it was a matter of national prestige for Revell Germany to produce a new kit of this most famous aircraft.
The new kit is clearly of the highest standard in terms of design and detail, which is just what we have come to expect from Revell. There are 37 parts on two sprues molded in a shade of deep red. Hint to Revell: most of us can actually paint! The slightly garish colour tends to obscure the quality of the parts, but the quality is clearly there when you examine the sprues closely. The kit does not seem to be related in any way to the much older kit. The sprues are packaged in a resealable plastic bag and the cost is as low as Revell could possibly make it: only 6 Euro here in Ireland, or STG £ 3.50 from Hannants.
There are two subject options, and it's a family affair. Apart from Manfred von Richtofen's 425/17, you also get an aircraft (454/17) flown by his younger brother Lothar. Lothar scored 40 kills, and survived the war only to die in an air crash in 1922. His aircraft featured a multi-coloured paint scheme, and this was the option that I chose to model. The instructions are generally very good, but I am not completely satisfied with some of the painting instructions supplied by Revell - some of the paint scheme details are questionable, as are some of the paint shades. I will discuss this in more detail during the review.
The kit starts naturally enough with the cockpit, and it is very impressive for such a tiny aircraft. The sidewall detail is very good and very accurate going by pictures of restored aircraft. However, some of the framing detail would be very difficult to paint in 1/72 scale, as it is extremely fine - that is to say, very narrow. There is a rear cockpit bulkhead, onto which the bucket seat is attached. Then there is a wooden floor section with a control run going down the middle and foot pedals at the front. This was painted (obviously!) a wooden colour (Humbrol 110), as were the triangular plywood inserts on the walls. The rest of the cockpit was painted Hu 121 pale stone, which was the closest matching colour to the Revell paint guide and published pictures. The seat was also painted this colour in accordance with the instructions. One restored aircraft has the seat in a different dark brown colour, and some other cockpit areas are also painted differently. For consistency, I followed the kit instructions as closely as I could for the cockpit.
This is the cover artwork from the old Dr.I kit. This is almost certainly the aircraft of Werner Voss (F.I 103/17) in which he was killed. The illustration is correct in that the aircraft, being a prototype, lacks the wingtip skids. Note the streaked green paint applied on the upper surfaces over the base colour of blue-grey. This appears to be the standard scheme for the Dr.I.
There are two control sticks to be attached in tandem to the wooden floor. These were painted Hu 78 RAF interior green, as were other some other minor details and framing. This included the horizontal bar (part #7) with the instrument dial set in the centre. This is mounted just in front of the machine guns. Other colours such as HU 31 (RLM 02) would also be a good choice for this cockpit detail. Once the completed cockpit was enclosed with the fuselage halves, I then attached the middle wing, and then the 'plate' with the machine clasps. This fits on to the back of the middle wing, and blocks out most of the forward control stick. I thought at first that this was a mistake, but my photo references suggest that this may have been right. The only thing crude about the two machine guns is the bar at the back that joins the two guns together, and it is not actually shown in the instructions. I did not attach the machine gun assembly until the rest of the kit was complete and the fuselage painting was done. The middle wing includes the small fairing where an instrument dial was positioned between the two machine guns on top of the fuselage.
I had to trim the central bar of the lower wing to get it to fit properly - one of the very few problems in a kit that required no filler or sanding whatsoever. The, I attached the 'pass through' main struts that connect the upper and lower wing, going straight through the middle wing without being glued to it. When attaching the upper wing, let it set for a while before adding the parasol struts (#14 and #15). Try as I might, I could not get these to attach to the holes in the upper wing, so I just cut off the very tips and cemented them directly to the wing undersurface. This was the only major problem in the entire kit. The upper wings include recessed detail representing the aileron hinges as well as the raised control horn - but not the control cable, obviously!
More cover artwork from the old Dr.I kit. This is meant to represent Manfred von Richtofen's last Dr.I (425/17) just before his death. Note the white fin and rudder and straight 'Balkankruez', replacing the earlier 'Iron Cross'. As with the new kit, this representation is also wrong: the wing under surfaces should be blue-grey, and the engine cowling and struts may have been unpainted (i.e., bare metal). The wheels may also have been painted white.
I had no problem with the undercarriage assembly, although it is understandably a bit delicate. Likewise, I had no problem with the tail area. The rudder is molded as a separate part, so you can position it slightly off-centre if you want to add that touch of realism! The tail skid, wingtip skids and the delicate 'stirrup' on the port side of the fuselage were easily added, leaving just the engine. The most difficult step here was removing part #20 from the sprue. This is the back plate of the engine with nine delicate pipes all attached to the sprue. I somehow managed to remove it without breaking it! Between this part and the main engine block goes the propeller shaft. This assembly is attached to the fuselage, and the cowling is fitted over it. It looked to me as if the cowling was slightly too wide for the fuselage, so I sanded down the sides slightly. The interior of the cowl was painted red for both Manfred and Lothar - who am I to argue. I removed about 1.5 mm from the propeller shaft, as the propeller should fit very close to the cowling. There was a small amount of 'flash' on one of the blades, which was the only 'flash' in the entire kit. I do not recall seeing any prominent mold seam either.
I did not rig the kit, even though the amount of bracing is quite small, and clearly illustrated in the instructions. Actually, the cables at the rear of the aircraft are not bracing at all, but external control cables for the rudder.
Although I chose to model Lothar's aircraft, I want to deal with Manfred's aircraft first. The popular image of the all-red triplane seems to be just that - a popular image. Even with his last aircraft, the references all seem to agree that the wing under surfaces were painted blue-grey. It is surprising that Revell seem to have made this mistake with all the references available to them - maybe they felt that the myth was more important than the reality when it comes to selling this particular kit!
Lothar's aircraft was painted in a five colour scheme. I was helped by a friend who supplied some of the Humbrol colours recommended by the Roden kit, which also has this aircraft as an option. The front half of the fuselage and all the wing surfaces except for the upper top wing were painted in the base colour of blue-grey. I used Hu 87 steel grey, but Hu 109 light blue is also apparently an option. The upper fuselage and wing surfaces were then over painted with a shade of olive green - I used Hu 155 olive drab. This was not a solid finish, which is what the Revell instructions would lead you to believe. They make no mention of the blue-grey undercoat on the upper surfaces. The olive paint was applied with 3-inch wide brushes, leading to a 'streaky' finish with the blue-grey showing through. To reproduce this effect in 1/72 scale, I used a special brush with the bristles cut almost completely away, and cleaned off most of the paint before applying the brush strokes. Although the instructions don't appear to mention it, the upper surface of the central undercarriage plate should also be painted in this way.
This is the cover artwork from the current Roden Dr.I kit. This is probably Manfred von Richtofen's penultimate Dr.I (152/17). This gives another view of the streaked green over blue-grey finish on the upper surfaces. The streaks were vertical on the fuselage sides, and diagonal (right to left going from front to back) on the upper wing and fuselage surfaces. Needless to say, this aircraft is far from being all red. The fin/rudder and wheels are painted red, whereas they may have been painted white on his last machine (425/17).
The rest of the aircraft was painted as follows: the nose, wing struts and parasol struts were painted red. Curiously, one of the plates of Manfred's 425/17 shows these very areas as being apparently unpainted, i.e., a dull metal finish. I used the 'standard' Hu 60 red, although Roden recommends the slightly darker Hu 153. The upper top wing and rear fuselage, tails and fin were painted yellow. Again, I deviated from the Roden colour of Hu 154, and used the slightly lighter and more 'washed out' standard yellow paint Hu 24. That left the panels around the fuselage and upper wing crosses. The Roden instructions call for these panels to be painted light green (Hu 120). I did this, although I didn't see it in the only plate of Lothar's aircraft that I could find.
The various metal sections on the struts and wingtip skids were painted a dull shade of aluminium. I think I might have been better to use a much darker shade (say, unpolished steel), which would be more in line with what is shown on the cover artwork and various plates.
© Kevin Ronayne 2005
I have one final general observation on colour. As I was painting the kit, I also happened to watch an episode of The First World War in Colour. This is one of those series where old monochrome film has been 'coloured in'. This episode was about the war in the air, and inevitably there was footage of the Red Baron standing beside a Fokker DR.I - probably 152/17. Almost all of the aircraft that was visible was painted red, yet I could still clearly see the 'streak' effect reminiscent of the green paint on blue-grey base coat. It is almost certain that the programme makers incorrectly coloured the entire aircraft red, thus making the same mistake as many other people, including Revell. However, it made me think: what if the red paint was not completely opaque, and the base camouflage pattern did show through. This might also have been the case with other customised paint schemes on many other World War I fighters. Without reliable photographic evidence, I don't know if we can ever be sure!
The decals are excellent in terms of quality. On Lothar's machine, the aircraft serials on the fuselage sides were partially painted over by the extra yellow paint finish. The decal sheet correctly supplies only the second half of the serial for the starboard side, and the first half for the port side. The sheet includes the manufacturer's logos for the propeller blades (decals # 10), although they don't seem to be mentioned in the instructions.
© Kevin Ronayne 2005
Despite having the squadron/signal DR.I reference to hand when building this kit, I don't know if I can comment with great authority on how good this kit. The kit certainly appears to be accurate in all respects. However, since I have no recent experience in World War I aircraft, I may have missed some detail, or may not have noticed that some detail is too pronounced, or not enough.
A great little kit, even if Revell didn't get the paint schemes quite right. I can't compare it with the Eduard or Roden kits, as I haven't seen them - yet! Revell might have taken a leaf out of Roden's book and offered four to six subject options. Perhaps they will release another version of the kit to cover this. With the kit being so cheap and of such high quality, many people will be tempted to build a whole Jasta featuring some of the wide variety of weird and wonderful paint schemes that were used. There was everything from an all-white aircraft (flown by an Obit. Weiss!) to an all-black aircraft (not flown by a pilot called Schwarz unfortunately!), and every exotic combination of colours in between. Indeed, there must have been times when the morning line-up of a Jasta looked as if it had been attacked by Salvador Dali or some other surrealist painter! That huge range of colour schemes is one of the main attractions in modelling German World War I aircraft.
© Kevin Ronayne 2005
I don't think this kit marks the start of new range of World War I kits from Revell. However, if this kit sells well, then I wouldn't be too surprised if a new kit of the Fokker D.VII was produced.
My main printed reference was Fokker Dr.I in action, Aircraft No. 98 in the squadron/signal list of publications. This is an indispensable reference. Issue 1 of the Wings of Fame journal also has some good historical text and pictures in the Jagdgeschawader 'Richtofen' article.
There is no shortage of references on the web, many with some interesting titbits of information, colour plates or photos of preserved or restored aircraft.
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