Roden 1/48th Fokker D.VIIF (Fokker-Built, Late) By Ken Zelnick

Introduction

A brief history of this airplane was provided in the First Look article published in the February 2004 edition of Internet Modeler. Decals for three schemes are provided, Hermann Goering, Bruno Loerzer, and Erich Loewenhardt. For my build, I chose Loewenardt's mount.

Construction

Although the parts are very well molded, construction was not without a few pitfalls, along with some stupid mistakes of my own doing. I will detail these as I get to them.

My first mistake was forgetting to wash the sprues to remove the mold release. I discovered this when I tried to apply the first coat of acrylic paint, which was reluctant to adhere. A thorough washing in lukewarm soapy water cured this.

I decided to start by painting some of the smaller, more delicate parts on the sprue. While this worked well in some cases, I found that I would have been better off waiting until after construction for some of them. Notably this included the engine support framework. It would have been not only possible, but preferable, to paint them after the sub-assembly was complete. Enough problems for now. On to actual construction.

The engine goes together first, and is a good fit all the way around. Two engines are provided in the kit, but the instructions are very clear on which parts to use. Very little cleanup was required, and my only addition was some very thin copper wire to simulate spark plug wires. These may be a waste of time, depending on which option you take later in construction. The exhaust manifold doesn't appear until later, so make sure you don't install it now. It will only get in the way. More on this later.

Step two involves a tank that will be mostly buried in the fuselage. However, there are three inlets to the tank that project through the upper part of the fuselage. In order for these to align properly, the two starboard (right) inlets must angle to the right, and the port (left) inlet must angle to the left. I found the instructions a little difficult to interpret on this point.

The interior goes together fairly well, except that I chose to offset the control surfaces, requiring me to also offset the cockpit controls. The only part that gave me trouble here was the control column, which has a tube running through its base to the rudder pedals. With the column offset, the tube doesn't want to lie properly. I took care of this by enlarging the tube's mounting holes in the rudder and column ever so slightly. It still didn't align with the tube support at the aft end of the floorboard, so I removed the support. This will be hidden by the seat, in any case.

The wings and tail surfaces are molded with separate control surfaces, so offsetting them is easy. However, some trimming was necessary in all cases to get the control surfaces to fit properly. Molded control horns are also supplied. NOTE: The two control horns for the elevator are on separate sprues. Don't make the mistake I did of taking two control horns from the same sprue, although they are close enough in size that I doubt anyone will notice on the finished product.

The wing upper and lower surfaces go together quite well, with just a slight mismatch at the trailing edge. A little sanding will take care of this. Some putty was required at the wing tips to get a nice, smooth joint there.

Since my chosen scheme requires the use of the included lozenge decals, I decided to apply them now. In retrospect, it would have been easier to apply them before attaching the control surfaces. Had I done so, I might have been able to avoid breaking the decals around the wing edges, resulting in incomplete coverage there. Because the wings must still endure considerable handling, I overcoated the decals with a coat of Future floor finish. There are pieces of lozenge decal for rib tapes, but it is necessary to cut them into thin strips. To do this accurately, I taped two steel rulers to a piece of glass, 0.7 mm apart as per the decal sheet. One ruler was taped directly to the glass, and the other had a layer of masking tape under the ends. This allowed me to slide the decal under the slightly raised ruler until it made contact with the edge of the other ruler. I then sliced thin strips of the decal with an X-Acto knife. To apply these thin strips, I laid them on a small stainless steel spatula after soaking. I could then slide them off the backing paper and into position fairly easily.

There are a couple of options when assembling the engine mount. The engine can be completely enclosed in panels rendering it almost completely hidden, or it can be left open. The engine is so nice I wanted to be at least partly visible, so I decided to install a panel on one side and leave the other side open. This "hybrid" construction may have caused some alignment problems, though.

It was at this point that I discovered I had prematurely painted the engine support framework. Had I waited, I wouldn't have had to scrape paint off to achieve a good gluing surface. Even so, the framework went together quite well. Once the framework was complete, the engine inserted into it with only a little effort. I then installed the radiator and starboard panel only, as I wanted to leave the port side open to expose the engine. NOTE: The instructions seem to show the exhaust manifold installed at this point, but I think this is for illustration only. If you install it now, it will get in the way. Besides, it is clearly shown as being installed in a later step.

I was now ready to start installing the sub-assemblies in the fuselage. I started by painting the molded-in framework aluminum, and the panels CDL (clear doped linen). A hand pump is included, with instructions showing it to be installed on the starboard side of the cockpit. There are two locating pins here. Make sure you install the pump below the locating pins or it will interfere with the instrument panel later.

A few dry test-fits showed that I needed to trim either the floorboard or the framework to get a good fit. I chose to shave off the framework where it interfered. After installing the fuel/oil tank, cockpit assembly, and aft bulkhead, I added two short lengths of wire from the rudder pedals through a hole in the bulkhead. I did not install the seat at this time, as it would not be centered in the fuselage if I did. Instead, I will wait until the fuselage halves are glued together. Once these modifications were made, it was time to close the fuselage. The top fit together well, but the bottom panel was uneven, and required putty along the whole length of the seam. I ran a strip of thin styrene across the fuselage to support the seat, as the provided pins were too short. The seat and a fuselage cross-brace finished the interior details. The instructions show the front deck and machine guns being added now, but in retrospect I think it would have been better to wait and install the guns after attaching the engine. This would simplify the task of finishing the seam between the fuselage and cowl.

There are two gauges that attach to the deck. One of these gauges is simple, it simply goes through a hole in the middle of the deck, between the guns. However, the instructions on the other are somewhat vague, and I had to locate a cockpit photo to be sure of its placement. It should be positioned so it attaches to the brace at the front of the cockpit, between the guns. The control cable (or tube, as the case may be) runs forward over the instrument panel and between the guns. A spare face from a set of German photoetch gauges completed the look.

With the main part of the fuselage assembled, it was now time to add the engine. Whether it was because I didn't use both side panels or the parts simply don't fit, I had to remove quite a bit of material from the aft end of the upper cowling to achieve a good fit. As a guide, I used the trailing edge of the side panel that I had installed. Once it fit properly, I attached the engine assembly to the fuselage. Some putty was needed along the upper joint.

To enhance the appearance of the exhaust pipe, I hollowed out the end with some small drills and an X-Acto knife. I decided to wait before attaching it so I could better paint the cowl.

The tail surfaces attached pretty well, but I had to do just a little trimming in order to get the rudder situated properly. This may have been because I offset it and the elevator. The lower wing needed didn't fit properly, and some sanding and trimming was needed both on the wing and the slots in the fuselage that receive the wing. Once the trimming was done, I was able to obtain a good fit.

I decided that this would be a good time to paint the fuselage, so I applied several coats of Ceramcoat bright yellow. Painting the fuselage at this time allowed me to get at the areas that would later be obstructed by small parts.

There are two parts that the instruction sheet did not adequately show for placement, so I went to the WWI Modeling website and found a picture. These parts are listed as 14C, and appear to be bullet guides, designed to prevent bullets from straying down into the engine or radiator after leaving the gun muzzles. As such, they should lead from the gun muzzles to the top of the radiator cowling. I also attached the exhaust pipe at this time.

I wanted to enhance the cockpit coaming, so I got a piece of insulated wire, split the insulation lengthwise along one side, split it again a short distance away to create a gap, and pulled out the wire. I then cut this to length and pressed it around the lip of the cockpit, then painted it to resemble leather. I didn't use any glue, but may have to later if it decides to pop off.

It was now time to attach the struts. The forward cabane struts are designed to run through holes in the side engine panels. Since I left one of these panels off, that strut was easy to attach. Positioning the other was slightly more difficult, and I had to enlarge the hole in the panel just a bit to get the strut to fit properly. I then attached the interplane struts, leaving the rear cabanes for later. When I test fitted the upper wing, I found that either the cabanes are too long or the interplanes are too short. Whichever it was, some adjustment was required for the wing to contact all the struts. To correct the problem, I sanded the upper ends of the cabanes and shortened their attachment points on the upper wing. This was enough to bring everything into alignment. Once the wing was attached, I added the rear cabanes. It was necessary to shorten these as well, but a good fit was obtained. The horizontal stabilizer struts needed shortening as well, but they installed easily.

There are slots in the top of the landing gear "wing" to receive the gear struts, but these were too short and narrow. A little work with an X-Acto knife and dental pick enlarged them enough to receive the struts, and the gear went together well. I also had to enlarge the holes in the wheels to get them to fit.

The propeller was the last piece to go on. I gave it a base coat of my own mixture of Ceramcoat "wood" color, then drybrushed with a darker brown to simulate wood grain. After it dried, I overcoated it with Future floor finish and applied the decals.

I touched up the paint in a few places, then overcoated everything with Future floor finish to give it more of a gloss finish and seal in the decals.

I used steel beading wire from the craft store for control wires, drilling holes in the fuselage and wings to receive one end, and used CA to attach the other end to the control horns.

Conclusion

This was a fun build that looks good straight out of the box. If you've been hesitant to get into WWI modeling because you're afraid of rigging, this would be a good place to start - there isn't any. If you're into super detailing the open cockpit will be your playground, and if you just want to build it out of the box you'll wind up with a good-looking model.

Thanks to Roden for providing the sample, and Matt Bittner for allowing me to build it.