1/72 Roden Albatros W.4 (early)

by Iwan Winarta

--------------------

 

Derived from the Albatros D.I fighter, the W.4 version was developed based on the requirement of the Military Command of Germany in 1916 to protect naval bases along the Flanders coast. 

The exploitation of this aircraft in naval environment encountered problems : salt water spoiling the fabric-covered wings, wooden floats and propelers.  Despite improvements in performance in the later version, the W.4 did not continue its military service.  At the end of 1917, the successful exploitation of 2-seaters like Friedrichshafen FF33 and Hansa Bradenburg W.12 proved that 2-seater fighters were more suitable for naval service. 

In total, 118 Albatros W.4 were built.  In August 1918, only 9 were still in military service.  The remaining were either at training squadrons or under repair. 

The Kit 

When I saw this kit at the local hobby shop, there are 2 things that attracted my eyes.  The floats and the wooden fuselage.  Okay, I have built 2 biplanes before.  But a biplane with floats…. and wooden fuselage……  I just know that I GOT TO HAVE THIS KIT ! 

Click on images below to see larger images

There are plenty of flash especially on the trailing edges of the wings. Fitting of the kit was relatively okay but the plastic are brittle though.  I managed to broke several detail parts of the engine. Details of the engine itself is superb though. The struts are very fragile.  I broken almost half of them.  End up replacing the interplane struts with stretched sprue and wire for the float struts, since the float struts will bear the weight of the airplane and I don’t think stretched sprue will be strong enough. 

The wooden panels on the fuselage are simulated using undiluted burnt sienna oil paints on sand acrylic paints, using stiff bristle brush.  Creating the wood streaks are the fast part, only took about 15 minutes to complete.  The slow part is letting the oil paint to dry.  I left it for 2 weeks before touching the fuselage again. 

The decals are a bit off registered.  They are brittle and easily broken. It went well using Future as decal solutions though.  After the sub-assembly was painted, decaled and weathered, rigging was added from stretched sprue. 

Finally, the fuselage and floats are painted semi-gloss, while the fabric wings are flat coated. 

Cheers

Iwan 

Jakarta, Indonesia

Photos and text © by Iwan Winarta