1/48 Bf-109E/F

"Operation Barbarossa" 

product # CED48243

$8.99 from Meteor Productions

Review by Steve Bamford on Jan 22 2004

The BF-109 first flew in Sept 1935.  The Bf-109E had a large caliber cannon that fired through the centre of the propeller spinner, which was a marvelous engineering feat....but this cannon was prone to jamming and was not installed on later Bf-109's.  The Bf-109 was a very competitive fighter and fought in all Luftwaffe theatres with good success.....sometimes stunning success.  The plane had it's strengths and weaknesses......as with all fighters.  One of it's main strengths has always been it's fuel injected inverted V-12 engine....which is an engineering masterpiece.  The E and F versions were flown in the early parts of WW2 and were phased out by the improved versions later in the war.  The fact the 109 served in the North African desert and Russian winters is a testament to the machine as well as the ground crews and pilots.

The first plane is a Bf-109E-4/B flown by Ofw. Reinhold Schmetzer of 8./JG 77 on July 20 1941.  The paint scheme is a field applied dark green scheme in either RLM 70 or RLM 71 or a combination of both.  This plane has an top rear engine cowl panel that was froma  different air craft, so this panel is blue.  Code numbers on the fuselage are red "5" with a white outline.  This number is presented in 2 layers so the white outline decals lines up perfectly with the red number decal.  The spinner is Dark green with a red ridge around the cannon opening.  Artwork includes a black Wolf's head on a white crest on the engine cowling.  This plane has a yellow fuselage band with a red outline.  This plane has a centreline bomb rack.

The second plane is a Bf-109F-4 from 7./JG 54 in Dec 1941.  The paint scheme is a white wash winter scheme applied over the standard RLM 74/75 scheme.  The canopy is in the RLM 74/75 scheme.  Some of the white wash has worn off on the yellow engine cowling.  Code numbers on the fuselage are yellow "6" with a black outline.  The spinner is black.  Artwork includes a large red devils head on the engine cowling.  This plane has a yellow fuselage band.  This plane has has it's main gear covers removed.

The decals were flawlessly printed and the clear carrier film is trimmed very close to the crisply printed colored areas, which is always good to see. 

A full selection of stencils is provided so you can complete one aircraft.  Colours are solid and will cover very well.  This decal sheet has a good variety of noseart and colour schemes.  I especially enjoy winter camo schemes, so this sheet has special appeal to me.