When you talk about Junkers, it always comes to mind the rugged shape of the Ju-52 or the strange look of the Ju-87, the Stuka. Furthermore, some modelers focused on the "only aces" modeling stream will even look down on this little gem of early aviation engineering.
The F.13 was the first practical, designed as such, passenger aircraft in the world. With its ruggedness, ease of flying, and closed passenger cabin, its career spanned all around the globe over 20 years and a bit more. Before and after the creation of Luft Hansa, it remained as the backbone of its fleet. While it outperformed most of the contemporary designs, it was also a bit small for the ever growing european routes both in passenger (4 seats) and mail or freight capacity, thus the G.23/24/F.24 and W.33/44 families were born. This family of planes, quite a common sight everywhere in Europe with its corrugated aluminum clad, culminated in the quite modern for the time G.31 and Ju-52.
One of the least known and most important job carried on by the F.13 was that of air ambulance. In this case, two machines used by the Spanish Red Cross in the 1925 campaign of the spanish army against the moroccan tribes in North Africa.
To begin with, I used the old and trusty F.13 packed by Revell AG. If data is correct, the original mold was made by the East-German company VEB-Plastikart, also responsible for a Junkers G.23, both molds being pressed in the 70s.As reference I used an old Avions REVUE, a spanish magazine devoted to aviation and highly recommended, for it had a nice article on the spanish Medevac Junkers.
The only real difference with the transport machine was that it had a stretcher and a seat for a medic. As a variation it could acommodate 4 lightly wounded soldiers and the medic. I started by adding a stretcher made of plasticard and a seat to the pax. cabin and lapbelts in all 3 seats. It was all painted RLM 02 from ModelMaster and the instrument panel decal placed on the dashboard provided. Otherwise, the interior is built as per the instructions.
After that, roof, wings and tailplanes were fitted, cutting off the rudder and elevators for a more realistic look. I decided to glue the elevators in a down position and both control columns in the forward position as in the pictures I had. I left the rudder apart for ease of paint and at a later stage it was set centered before the final varnish coat. I decided to build it with floats, since it made the most part of the photos in that article. Floats are a very simple afair and the unusual quality of the moldings shows when building them. The only awkward moment was glueing the somewhat complex strut arrangemente used by Junkers in its floatplanes, but ones I went through with it, I had a very sturdy and stable base for this large winged tin can.
The paint scheme was based on the pictures and data in the article: white fuselage and upper surfaces with a black nose and undersurfaces including the floats. Humbrol paints were used for it, namely H33 and H22. All paint was done with an airbrush. Codes were masked and then retouched with a brush, for they had been painted over and hand painted once operations began in Africa.
And the undersurfaces:
Fooling with the floats, just to check how they fit:
Next and to prevent me from knocking everything off, I started to decal the model. I'd put all appendages after decaling and before the final coat. I airbrushed the kit with Revell's Gloss Varnish and once dry, proceeded to decal it, all the necessary letters, numbers and insignias coming from the decal dungeon or the sheet provided by Revell. I used Decalfix from Humbrol, I don't have the time or patience to use Set & Sol, etc.
At this time I changed my mind and sprayed the Semigloss varnish, glueing everything after a thourouhg dry:
For the varnished wood on the propeller, I painted it with Humbrol H63 and later on with Humbrol H186, then scratched with a needle. I varnished the propeller, applied the manufacturer's logo and varnished again. Here's the result:
I'm not happy with it, though, and I'll return to the usual H-63 - Faber Castell pencils - Varnish. It gave excellent results in both a IL-400b and Ar65E propellers.
All that was left was to weather the model by drybrushing with H-56 and H-33, then washes with the same colors and glue the propeller to its boss. And that was it, I had a F.13 from the Spanish Red Cross. I took it to a couple of contests and it was well received amongst the swarms of more often built models.
Is it a bat gone white? Nop, it's an air ambulance...
A majestic livery for a graceful design:
I hope you've enjoyed it, please let me hear your comments about it. I have 2 more F.13s on the shelf, nice liveries for them too.
Take care and till the next installment, goodbye.
The modelist underdog.
The F.13 was the first practical, designed as such, passenger aircraft in the world. With its ruggedness, ease of flying, and closed passenger cabin, its career spanned all around the globe over 20 years and a bit more. Before and after the creation of Luft Hansa, it remained as the backbone of its fleet. While it outperformed most of the contemporary designs, it was also a bit small for the ever growing european routes both in passenger (4 seats) and mail or freight capacity, thus the G.23/24/F.24 and W.33/44 families were born. This family of planes, quite a common sight everywhere in Europe with its corrugated aluminum clad, culminated in the quite modern for the time G.31 and Ju-52.
One of the least known and most important job carried on by the F.13 was that of air ambulance. In this case, two machines used by the Spanish Red Cross in the 1925 campaign of the spanish army against the moroccan tribes in North Africa.
To begin with, I used the old and trusty F.13 packed by Revell AG. If data is correct, the original mold was made by the East-German company VEB-Plastikart, also responsible for a Junkers G.23, both molds being pressed in the 70s.As reference I used an old Avions REVUE, a spanish magazine devoted to aviation and highly recommended, for it had a nice article on the spanish Medevac Junkers.
The only real difference with the transport machine was that it had a stretcher and a seat for a medic. As a variation it could acommodate 4 lightly wounded soldiers and the medic. I started by adding a stretcher made of plasticard and a seat to the pax. cabin and lapbelts in all 3 seats. It was all painted RLM 02 from ModelMaster and the instrument panel decal placed on the dashboard provided. Otherwise, the interior is built as per the instructions.
After that, roof, wings and tailplanes were fitted, cutting off the rudder and elevators for a more realistic look. I decided to glue the elevators in a down position and both control columns in the forward position as in the pictures I had. I left the rudder apart for ease of paint and at a later stage it was set centered before the final varnish coat. I decided to build it with floats, since it made the most part of the photos in that article. Floats are a very simple afair and the unusual quality of the moldings shows when building them. The only awkward moment was glueing the somewhat complex strut arrangemente used by Junkers in its floatplanes, but ones I went through with it, I had a very sturdy and stable base for this large winged tin can.
The paint scheme was based on the pictures and data in the article: white fuselage and upper surfaces with a black nose and undersurfaces including the floats. Humbrol paints were used for it, namely H33 and H22. All paint was done with an airbrush. Codes were masked and then retouched with a brush, for they had been painted over and hand painted once operations began in Africa.
And the undersurfaces:
Fooling with the floats, just to check how they fit:
Next and to prevent me from knocking everything off, I started to decal the model. I'd put all appendages after decaling and before the final coat. I airbrushed the kit with Revell's Gloss Varnish and once dry, proceeded to decal it, all the necessary letters, numbers and insignias coming from the decal dungeon or the sheet provided by Revell. I used Decalfix from Humbrol, I don't have the time or patience to use Set & Sol, etc.
At this time I changed my mind and sprayed the Semigloss varnish, glueing everything after a thourouhg dry:
For the varnished wood on the propeller, I painted it with Humbrol H63 and later on with Humbrol H186, then scratched with a needle. I varnished the propeller, applied the manufacturer's logo and varnished again. Here's the result:
I'm not happy with it, though, and I'll return to the usual H-63 - Faber Castell pencils - Varnish. It gave excellent results in both a IL-400b and Ar65E propellers.
All that was left was to weather the model by drybrushing with H-56 and H-33, then washes with the same colors and glue the propeller to its boss. And that was it, I had a F.13 from the Spanish Red Cross. I took it to a couple of contests and it was well received amongst the swarms of more often built models.
Is it a bat gone white? Nop, it's an air ambulance...
A majestic livery for a graceful design:
I hope you've enjoyed it, please let me hear your comments about it. I have 2 more F.13s on the shelf, nice liveries for them too.
Take care and till the next installment, goodbye.
The modelist underdog.
Comments
Just found Your page. I was wondering about modeling Spanish F-13 too. Is it posible for You to scan this article from Spanish Avions for me?
M