Special Hobby's
1/48 Sack AS6V-1

By Chris Banyai-Riepl

History

Germany has a history of coming up with some of the most interesting aircraft ever seen and some such as the Me163 and Horten Go229 actually made it off of the drawing boards and into service. One of the lesser-known but far more bizarre aircraft flown by Germany during the Second World War was the Sack AS6. This plane was built in 1940 by a Bavarian farmer and aircraft modeler. After some model flight testing, he built the full-sized copy out of wood, using the canopy and landing gear from a Bf109. The wing is a circle, earning it the nickname "Fliegende Bierdeckel", which means 'Flying Beer Tray'. From April 1944 the same squadron flying the Messerschmitt Me163, JG400 tested it and found that it was not as good as expected. Before improvements could be made, the Luftwaffe lost all interest in the project and the sole prototype of the AS6 was destroyed when the Luftwaffe retreated from Brandis.

The Kit

This kit is basically just a scale-up of the Special Hobby 1/72 kit, and the only real difference between the two (other than the size) is the resin parts. There is one tree of plastic parts containing the wing, engine nacelle, tail pieces, and landing gear. The resin parts make up the cockpit interior and the front of the engine. The canopy is vacuformed.

The plastic is cleanly molded, but there is a roughness in some places. A quick swipe with some sandpaper will take care of that, though. Construction is extremely simple on this one, and most of the construction time will be with building up the interior. Two sidewalls, an instrument panel, and a cockpit floor make up the basics of the tub. A nicely cast resin seat fits inside, and the control stick finishes out the interior. All the parts are molded by CMK and are very crisply done. With the lack of photos of the Sack AS6, the interior details may not be accurate, but they look good and will help make the front office look busy.

The manner in which the kit goes together means that there will likely be a bit of filler needed in blending the nacelle into the wing, but that would be about it. The resin engine front is very well done and will look really nice under a coat of paint. You'll definitely want to mask off that opening in the cowling when it comes time to paint the plane.

Since there was only one AS6 ever made, there isn't much in the way of marking choices. The camouflage is stated as being RLM71 over RLM65, but the research I did for building the 1/72 kit shows that it was in fact painted in 70/71/65, in a standard splinter scheme. The markings are a simple cross on the upper and lower wings, and the swastika on the tail along with AS6/V-1 on the rudder.

Conclusion

While this may not be the most prolific plane of the Second World War, this one did actually get built and did actually fly (for a short bit, anyway), so this isn't one of those paper projects or Luft '46 things. With this plane using some Bf109 parts, it would make an interesting addition to the back of a Bf109 collection, and would definitely be a conversation piece.