Central Powers' Model Aircraft Images
by Ken Zelnick

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A-H Albatros

After two years in the making, I finally finished the Glencoe A-H Albatros in Friedrich Navratil's markings. This is without a doubt the hardest model I have ever built. Nothing fit, so a lot of modifications and some scratchbuilding were needed just for an OOB build. The left and right fuselage halves weren't symmetrical, so I did some sanding on them, the space in the horizontal stabilizer was nowhere near the same shape as the fuselage either before or after my modifications, so I had to fill in gaps with plastic card. The wings weren't bad, but I did thin them a little bit. The lower wing had almost no attachment points to the fuselage, so I inserted a brass rod (a pin, really) that would go through the fuselage from wing root to wing root. The interplane V struts were too short, so I scratched some more out of split bamboo skewer, and I think the result was too wide and too thick. I used them anyway, as I was sick of looking at this model. I painted it with a base coat of Testors Radome Tan, followed by Ceramcoat thinned with Future, applied with a Q-Tip stick with the cotton bud cut off. It was time consuming, but it came closest to achieving the look I wanted. The decals are from the kit, and went on well.


Hansa-Brandenburg W.29

Done in the markings of Oblt. z. S. Friedrich Christiansen from July 1918.  This was my first attempt in a long time at a 1/72 scale model.  Since I used my OptiVisor 100% of the time while building it, I noticed flaws that aren't nearly so visible when it is viewed with the naked eye.  Use the 10-foot rule, and it doesn't look bad at all, IMHO.  The molding was pretty rough, and required a bit of cleanup.  I don't know if this kit was a late release, but it looked to me like the molds may have been draged somewhat.  The kit was built pretty much OOB, except that I had to scratch some of the undercarriage struts from bamboo, as the ones from the kit were too short.  I also added some lead weights to the fronts of the pontoons before assembling just in case the model proved too tail-heavy to set properly.


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