1/48 Monogram He-111 H-2

Gallery Article by Colin Latta on May 13 2014

 

 

1/48 Monogram He-111 backdated to an H-2

In honor of the upcoming 75th anniversary of the Battle of Britain, I’ve just completed Monogram's 1/48 HE-111, backdating to an early H-2, of 9/KG53, Lille, France from the Battle of Britain.

I'm using Xtradecals “Battle of Britain 70th anniv.” decals, Lion Roar belts, Mike Grant inst. decals, Griffon photoetch gunsites, and Koster's resin HE-111 "early exhaust's", all else is scratch built. I've scratch built a complete radio compartment interior, based on photos and plans in Aero Detail #18, and added details in the cockpit. Opened up the sliding plywood panel for access to the bombsite, scratch built a Lofte 7 bombsite and new pilots inst. panel (the kit one is wrong - it's for an H-20), opened the sliding roof hatch and pop up windshield. Both the sliding hatch and the pop up windshield are made from a 1 liter Pepsi bottle, cut to shape, and re-arced with boiling water, with an inner frame of styrene strip.

 

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The kit dates back to 1994, and features engraved panel lines, clear fairly thin transparencies and nice (if inaccurate) cockpit details. Unfortunately, it also features shockingly bad fit on the lower wings and engines, and lower cowls and radiators that suffer from poor research or incomplete mold making.

The engines required some work, I've extended the supercharger intakes, oil cooler intakes and exhaust, and made screens and coolers out of fine mesh. The rad intakes required re-profiling (for some reason Monogram made them square and sharp edged) and made rads out of fine mesh and stretched sprue, and the lower cowl also needed re-profiling (also sharp edged and square for some reason).

The kit is painted with Tamiya acrylics, using an Aztec airbrush, sealed with Future, and weathered with pastels, oils and prismacolor pencils.

Thanks for looking, and I hope you enjoy.

Colin Latta    IPMS Winnipeg

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Photos and text © by Colin Latta