Meng 1/32 Dr.1 Red Barron

Donald Dickson II
So, something completely different for me. A WWI plane. Aside from the fact its the Red Barron, i decided to do this plane for a few reasons. First and foremost. Lack of rigging! Second, this was actually a Wingnut Wings mold, but they went out of business before they could release it. Meng smartly snagged the molds, so this was my chance to try one of their kits without the God awful price.

So first on my agenda is the prop. I have never done a wood grain of any kind, so this will be a challenge. A good brown for the base.

Second up is the red. We all know there isnt just one shade of ANY color. So after research, I found that the red for his all red plane was best achieved by a mix of Insignia red and brown in an 8;2 ratio. So I mixed some up and this is the first coat. Only problem, I used up what I mixed but it wasnt enough for all the parts. And of course I didnt do EXACTLY 8:2. So I need to mix a good bit more and go from there.

Rui S
Interesting. I'm in 😎

Johne 69
Good Start so far 👍

Donald Dickson II
Thanks guys.

So i didnt much like the guns with the kit. I hate trying to roll PE and all that So I went a looking on Sprue Brothers for guns. There are a nice Brassin set, but it wasnt really sparkling with me. But this master set...

Turned barrel and cooling sleeve, lots of detail. But wow, the small parts to bend. *sigh* This is gonna be almost as much of a project as the kit itself.

Donald Dickson II
Oy. That is a standard toothpick in the pic. Even in 1/32, nothing about this kit is big. It took me about an hour to assemble that gun and the barrel for the other.

The barrel has 5 parts. The body of the gun has 2 parts. The mechanism on the side of the gun has 6 parts. And there are two parts to the ammo belt that have to go on yet. I took a break before doing the other gun.

You guys that do 1/700 ships with PE are flipping NUTS! LOL

Johne 69
Well done Mate 👍
Can you make a picture with the gun from the Box please?

Donald Dickson II
The gun kit is on the project inventory. Only thing besides the kit. And thank you.

Donald Dickson II
Oh, wait. You mean a pic of the kit gun with this one??? I am not building the kit guns.

So after getting the other gun together and spraying both Nato black, I worked more on the prop. After a few tries I got what you see in the pic. Not as good as I would like, but not sure how to get it better. From what I have seen, they were definitely more than 3 pieces of wood. Not sure I can get 4 or 5 bands and not have them look like crap.

John
Making plastic look like wood is a huge challenge. I think yours looks fine as is. You could maybe paint it one color, add really thin strips of tamiya tape and lightly spray another wood color, then make light scratches in the outer layer with a scriber tip to represent the wood striations. That sounds like a lot of work...

Donald Dickson II
John, this was using 1mm tape to get good edges. LOL I am going to sand with very fine grit to knock down the adges and use a wash. Hopefully the brush strokes will be highlighted enough that way to get the grain effect.

John
Ha, hard to get much smaller than 1mm. Sounds like a plan though. Add some drybrushing maybe?

Johne 69
Other Modeller spray a Coat of clear Orange to get a wood optic.
By my Nieuport 24 in 1:72 I have Tried this and for me it has wordked.
I wanted a comparsion between the Meng Gun and the Master G
un.
Now I take a Look in my Meng Fokker kit.
Sorry for my english its not the best one🙂

Donald Dickson II
Johne, I didn't build the kit ones because I hate trying to roll PE, and the barrel cooling sleeves are flat PE that needs to be rolled. They actually look to be fairly nice.

Donald Dickson II
Got the prop where I am relatively happy with it.

Cockpit done and dry fitted in the fuselage. All is good.

Donald Dickson II
Slow progress. Busy weekend last weekend. Life stuff etc.

Got some generic USAF decals as I needed to replace the ones on the Tbird F-84 I did, so that was a little side thing.

Then the Dr 1. After all the crap trying to get the finish glossy, I grabbed a can of Krylon colonial red and sprayed the parts. I figured its just paint. If it doesnt look OK Ill strip everything and try something else. While it may not be an accurate color, its got a good gloss finish now.

Started actually building the damn thing today. LOL

Donald Dickson II
All done. I really need to remember to dust the model before pics.