Junkers Ju-52 BEA, Revell 1:48

[Shar2]

Junkers Ju-52 in BEA colours

Revell 1:48

The Ju 52 was similar to the company's previous Junkers W33, although larger. In 1930, Ernst Zindel and his team designed the Ju 52 at the Junkers works at Dessau. The aircraft's unusual corrugated duralumin metal skin, pioneered by Junkers during World War I, strengthened the whole structure.

The Ju 52 had a low cantilever wing, the midsection of which was built into the fuselage, forming its underside. It was formed around four pairs of circular cross section duralumin spars with a corrugated surface that provided torsional stiffening. A narrow control surface, with its outer section functioning as the aileron, and the inner section functioning as a flap, ran along the whole trailing edge of each wing panel, well separated from it. The inner flap section lowered the stalling speed and the arrangement became known as the Doppelfl�or "double wing".

The outer sections of this operated differentially as ailerons, projecting slightly beyond the wing tips with control horns. The strutted horizontal stabilizer carried horn-balanced elevators which again projected and showed a significant gap between them and the stabilizer, which was adjustable, in-flight. All stabilizer surfaces were corrugated.

The fuselage was of rectangular section with a domed decking, all covered with corrugated light alloy. There was a port side passenger door just aft of the wings, with windows stretching forward to the pilots' cabin. The main undercarriage was fixed and divided; some aircraft had wheel fairings, others not. There was a fixed tail skid, or later tail wheel. Some aircraft were fitted with floats or skis instead of the main wheels.

There is probably no other aircraft in civil or military aviation that is more well known than the Junkers Ju 52. During the 1930's she epitomised flight safety and was a synonym for reliability. It was initially designed - at the request of the cargo airlines - as a single-engine aircraft. Airlines such as Lufthansa however preferred a three-engine variant for safety for its passengers. In addition to robustness, it should require only short take-off and landing runs and still deliver low maintenance and low cost operation. The first aircraft with three-engines took-off on its maiden flight on 07 March 1932. In this series, the BMW 132A radial engine with an output of 660hp was used. With these engines the Ju 52 achieved maximum speeds of between 250 and 290 km / h (155 mph and 180 mph). The Ju 52 had a low cantilever wing, the midsection of which was built into the fuselage, forming its underside. It was formed around four pairs of circular cross section duralumin spars with a corrugated surface that provided torsional stiffening. A narrow control surface, with its outer section functioning as the aileron, and the inner section functioning as a flap, ran along the whole trailing edge of each wing panel, well separated from it. The inner flap section lowered the stalling speed and the arrangement became known as the Doppelfl�or "double wing".

The outer sections of this operated differentially as ailerons, projecting slightly beyond the wing tips with control horns. The strutted horizontal stabilizer carried horn-balanced elevators which again projected and showed a significant gap between them and the stabilizer, which was adjustable, in-flight. All stabilizer surfaces were corrugated.

The fuselage was of rectangular section with a domed decking, all covered with corrugated light alloy. There was a port side passenger door just aft of the wings, with windows stretching forward to the pilots' cabin. The main undercarriage was fixed and divided; some aircraft had wheel fairings, others not. There was a fixed tail skid, or later tail wheel. Some aircraft were fitted with floats or skis instead of the main wheels.

The Second World War interrupted the development of civil air traffic. When the War finally ends in 1945, a huge demand for passenger carrying capacity was identified and the search began for suitable aircraft for civil aviation. British European Airways, which on 1 August 1946 began air services from Croydon, Gatwick and Northolt to the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man, Ireland, Scotland and Paris, began to feel the effects of the lack of suitable aircraft. One way out of this predicament was the use of Ju 52's captured by the Royal Air Force in Europe. In this way BEA acquired eleven Ju 52/3m in different versions. The British European Airways Junkers Ju 52/3ms were in constant use until the end of 1948, before they were scrapped at Ringway, near Manchester.

The Model

Whilst this kit has been released in at least two different guises, civil and military it�s nice to see it in this unusual and yet operationally short lived scheme. This kit has been released in Revells Icons of Aviation series and comes in a top opening box with a great picture of one of the options flying over Paris. As a gift set the kit also comes with a paintbrush, glue and six paints. On opening, the box is pretty much full of plastic. There are eight sprues of silver coloured styrene and two of clear. Strangely, Revell have included two sprues which, the parts of which are not required, along with many number of parts on the other sprues that are used in the military version.

The build begins with the very detailed cockpit comprising of the front cabin bulkhead, pilots and co-pilots seats, control yokes and columns, rudder pedals, what looks like a header tank, a lovely instrument panel with separate throttle quadrant panel and internal fore and aft bulkheads with the trim wheels. The instructions are a little unclear with the fitting of these so it will be good to test fit before gluing. Moving right aft, the rear passenger cabin bulkhead has what looks like the attendants seat, plus supports attached along with a grab handle. Behind the bulkhead a slatted door is fitted. This is the entrance door to the washroom, which is fitted out with a wash basin and another grab handle. In the passenger cabin the modeller has the option to build as either a standard layout or smoker cabin layout. The three piece seats are the same for both, but the standard layout uses ten seats, five on each side with a central aisle whilst the smoker layout uses twelve, eight as the standard layout, but with the seats angled slightly inboard, an additional bulkhead separates four seats behind the cockpit bulkhead. Before the fuselage sides are glued together, the clear window parts are fitted and the port and/or starboard doors can be removed to be posed opened the removed parts are replaced with separate doors, but it would be advisable to remove them as carefully and cleanly as possible. Once the interior is finished, clear parts added and the doors removed, the fuselage sides can be joined together. The fuselage roof has the clear �portholes� added along with the luggage racks, and what I presume are luggage netting supports. Since no netting is included the modeller will have to improvise and add it themselves. The lower fuselage needs very little doing to it before adding to the completed fuselage halves, other than to choose whether the cargo doors are to be opened up or not. The roof and bottom fuselage can then be added, thus completing the fuselage. It should be noted here that plenty of dry fitting and very careful gluing should be carried out when fitting the top and bottom of the fuselage to prevent any requirement for filler, as the corrugations make it difficult to sand and file without causing damage that would be difficult to repair.

Once the fuselage is complete, the port and starboard horizontal tails surfaces, elevators and support struts can be fitted, as can the three part tail wheel and rudder control horn. Each half of the port and starboard wings can then be glued together then attached to the fuselage. This would make the model really quite large and unwieldy, so it may be advisable to leave the wings off until the majority of painting has been completed. Continuing to go along with the instructions though, the next parts to be built are the undercarriage. Whilst the spatted wheels and struts are included, these are not required for this build and the un-spatted undercarriage should be used. The two part wheels are attached to the main axle strut and mounting plate followed by the rear strut, which look like it makes a strong assembly. Whilst the model is upside down, the cargo bay doors can also be added, as can the landing lamp in the port wing. Now that the basic aircraft is complete it�s onto the engines. Each of the three engines comprises of the cylinder bank, valve control rods, front engine cover, fuel pipework and exhausts, building into very nice representatives of the real things, which will benefit some careful painting and weathering. The completed engines are then fitted with their respective cowlings, long for the wing engines and short for the fuselage engine, and fitted to their positions. Externally, oil coolers, fuselage radiator, and exhaust outlets are then glued into position along with the underside aerial. The final major assembly is the addition of the very long and flexible flaps. Care and patience should be taken when fitting these as the attachment points are not the biggest or strongest seen on a model. Once they are attached then the lower control horns can be added. Turning the model back onto its wheels the final parts such as the aerials, upper flap control rods, side door and ladder, props and cockpit canopy can be added. It may be of note that the canopy is quite a tight fit and if pressed too hard into place it might deform and cause the header tank within the cockpit to break off, so a bit of dry fitting and sanding will be required.

Decals

The large decal sheet is really well printed, with options for G-AHOH which flew out of Gatwick and G-AHOF which flew out of Croydon. The decals are all in good register, opaque and slightly matt. Due to the size of the registration codes it might be an idea to cut them down a bit to add fitting. Even then though, decal setting solution will be need to get all the decals to settle into the corrugation grooves, again patience and care will be the order of the day.

As stated above, this kit comes with a paintbrush, Revell Contacta glue and six pots of acrylic paints. These include two pots of Aluminium 99, Panzergrau 78, Hellgrau 371, Anthracite 09 and Lederbraun 84. Extra paints will be still need to be sourced to paint the model in the required colours. Also, since the model is so large I would have thought it would need a lot more than two pots of Aluminium. But it's a gesture.

Conclusion

This is a very nice model of a very well known and recognisable aircraft. In this scale it is also a big one, and will require quite a bit of space to display, but it will be well worth it. It is unusual to see one in BEA colours and I have learnt something in researching for this review as I didn�t know they were used by a national airline. There are a few areas that need some care and attention to put together without the use of any or at least very little filler, but I feel it can be done. I'm still not sure about the colour of the styrene and feel a coat of primer would be a good idea. So if you�re interested in German transports aircraft or just the British civil aviation business, this would be an ideal model, which I can happily recommend.

Review sample courtesy of

[AndyC]

Nice review Dave - it's a great kit. I was looking at pics of the the British Airways Ltd one at Cosford - looks to be a similar finish to this one

[Shar2]

Thanks Andy. Yes, the one at Cosford is very similar, having seen her during the research for this kit. But being Spanish built it's actually quite a different aircraft.

[AndyC]

Thanks Andy. Yes, the one at Cosford is very similar, having seen her during the research for this kit. But being Spanish built it's actually quite a different aircraft.

Yes, I'd noticed when researching for mine too. That's a lot of Alclad too!

[Shar2]

Sure is, especially if you use their primer as well.

[Artie]

AFAIK, the Cosford example was presented by the Spanish Air Force to the RAF....It's a 50's spanish built CASA 352, with Emmasa Beta engines (the same used on spanish built Polikarpov I-16 Mosca), different cowlings, different nose and different acces doors layout, wich would make any transformation very diffucult to achieve, due to the corrugated skin.

One of the best looking civilian Junkers I've ever seen is the swedish floatplane (Scandinavian Air Services).....

By the way, a very good review.

Best regards..

Edited January 5, 2013 by Artie

[richellis]

Its only in BA colours as they did the restoration work

[khimbar]

'Broadsword calling Danny Boy'.

That's the one I want to make.