The last Starfighter(s)

Remember that god-awful 1984 movie?

How it gets 3.5 stars out of 5 on IMDB is beyond me. The only saving grace was Dan O'Herlihy, who I always liked. It's a shame that they had to make him up like a turtle. Anyway, moving right along....

I guess the title of this post should actually be "The last West German Starfighters", as I'll still need to do a couple of Belgian ones after this. The Belgians were one of the few other European countries that were foolish enough to use a high-altitude, high-speed bomber interceptor as a ground attack aircraft. 

This weekend, I've finished off my two long-delayed Luftwaffe F-104s and I've given them the Norm 72 camouflage that's appropriate for 1981:

I've worked on a couple of other things this weekend, but neither of them are to the posting stage yet. More from me next time!

Making a start on Bundesmarine aircraft

I received a small shipment from Dom's Decals today, in amongst which was a pack of four 1/600 Tumbling Dice F-104 Starfighters, which I intend to paint as West Germans and divide equally between the Bundesmarine and the Luftwaffe. 

West Germany occasionally used their Starfighters in the interceptor role, which is what they were designed for, but the vast majority of use was as a fighter-bomber. The German fleet of F-104's were virtually all G models:

The G being an attempt by Lockheed to improve (or more likely to obscure) the aircraft's appallingly poor flight characteristics at low speed and low altitude. If there was ever an aircraft that was less suited to the ground attack role, I can't think of it. Perhaps a 747. West Germany lost 292 out of 916 F-104's to various accidents, generally related to low level, low speed ground attack training. That's 32.88%! Other countries that used the G model had similarly high loss rates, from 30%-40%. Those countries that used the Starfighter solely as a high altitude interceptor experienced a much lower loss rate. 

As an aside, a grim joke that was common in West Germany in the 1960's and 70's was "What's the best way for a civilian to obtain ownership of a Starfighter? Buy a small plot of land and wait". It's interesting to note that Lockheed was eventually found guilty of bribing quite a number of European, Asian, and Arab politicians in order to get the F-104 purchased by their respective governments.

The TD models really are very good and fairly free of flash, defects, etc.:

Just a minor molding seam and a few casting vents, all of which are easily removed. After fitting the one-piece horizontal stabilizer assembly (a slightly fiddly process), this is what you get:

It's probably a C model, as it doesn't have the extra large rudder fitted to the G:

which was an attempt to give the pilot more control during low-level flight. As you can see, it extended well past the afterburner nozzle. I'll use them as a G. In this small scale, it's not noticeable. 

The West Germans used the F-104 in the Bundesmarine as a maritime strike aircraft, armed with Kormoran anti-ship missles, though all Navy pilots were cross-trained to also operate against land targets,:

as well as in the Luftwaffe as a ground attack aircraft:

As you can see, the Germans applied a fluorescent orange to the wing tanks as an aid to increase visibility from the ground and yet painted the aircraft in a camouflage scheme. Is it just me or is that...umm...stupid? Needless to say, I don't keep international orange paint lying about, so I'll have to order some before I can finish these models. 

I'll paint the Luftwaffe jets in a standard Norm 72 that I've discussed before when I was painting Alpha Jets. The Starfighters were camouflaged on the upper surfaces only and the lower surfaces remained in bare, but not polished, aluminum. For the Marine, I'll use their Norm 76, which was basalt grey upper surfaces, though a slightly darker shade than was used by the Luftwaffe (until it faded). Lower surfaces were again in bare aluminum:

which became lightly oxidized fairly quickly and thus generally appeared to be a light grey. I must say, I'm very tempted to use a very pale light grey paint, however, I'll try some aluminum first and see how I like it. 

For the "MARINE" decal, I'll simply chop the S off a couple of American "MARINES" decals and there we go:

Here are two of my four Starfighters on their flight stands, primed and ready to be painted for the Bundesmarine and then have their stands textured and flocked:

(Sorry about my hand in there, but I needed a background to get the camera focused on the foreground.) I'll show you the finished products as soon as the necessary paints arrive in the mail!  More next time!

My West German Alpha Jets

They're finished! First off, this is what I was striving for; Norm 72:

This photo shows the centerline 27mm Mauser gun pod that German Alpha Jets almost always carried. The two outboard wing hard points were wet and so generally had drop tanks (the Alpha Jet had very short legs. A range of only about 380mi/610km loaded). The two inboard hard points were reserved for ordnance, generally SNEB rocket pods or CBU's of one variety or another. The total payload capability was 5500lb/2500kg. 

 

And here are mine. On the first one, I gave the upper surfaces a Gelboliv base coat and then painted the areas of Basalt Grey over the top of it:

(Sorry for my hand in there, but I needed a background to get the camera to focus for a closeup)

The flash makes the Basalt Grey appear much bluer than it really is. I think it turned out quite well. You can see the silvery grey canopy in the first photo. As an aside, I have to say that decals that small are a damned pain in the ass!

For the second one, I reversed the process just to see if there was any appreciable difference. I used Basalt Grey as the base coat and painted Gelboliv areas over it:

I really can't say that it looks any different to me. I didn't use the flash on this one either, so it doesn't look blue!

I thought that since I already have a metal wire sticking up from the base, why not use the excuse to add a tree to the stand. I painted the bottom bit of the wire as a tree trunk and glued a green foilage cluster around the wire:

Bingo! One tree! These are my first two Cold War fixed-wing aircraft. I think they came out quite well. Now two more German ones and two Belgians.

Ok, that's it for this time. More next weekend!

West German Luftwaffe camouflage 1981

This weekend, I'm working on the Tumbling Dice Alpha Jets I received (see my July 3rd post). I've started off doing two West German aircraft and I've already put them on wires, based them, primed everything, and textured the bases.

So the first question has to be, "what color are these things supposed to be?" Like everything about the German armed forces (the Bundeswehr) in the early 1980's, Luftwaffe camouflage schemes are a bit complicated. Not necessarily the patterns, but rather what schemes were used when and on which types of aircraft. I'll try to give you the simplest explanation possible. 

The Luftwaffe, in theory, used one scheme on all it's aircraft. Not necessarily the exact same pattern, but the same general scheme in the same colors. The overall scheme was called a "Norm", followed by the two digit year it was to be adopted. By way of example, Norm 72 was predictably introduced in 1972:

It was a simple angled geometric or "wedge" pattern of Gelboliv (RAL 6014 - the same color as army vehicles) and Basaltgrau (RAL 7012) on the upper surfaces and Silbergrau (RAL 7001 - a light grey) on the lower surfaces. 

When a new Norm was introduced, the Luftwaffe, like any military, didn't get everything repainted overnight. It took them a year or more and the interceptor aircraft were always done first, then all the attack, cargo, liaison, etc types came afterwards. Norm 72 lasted throughout the 1970's. However, when the Tornado aircraft began entering Luftwaffe service, a new Norm was introduced just for them, Norm 76, which added in patches of black and abandoned the wedge shapes for large irregular "blotches":

The Luftwaffe planned on changing the Norm in 1981 and so, in late 1980, a variation of Norm 72 was tried out on a few interceptors (known as Norm 72/81), which only added a patch or two of Stone Grey (RAL 7030):

(Sorry, I couldn't find a good photo of the real thing) However, it wasn't found to be any better than its predecessor, so a completely new approach was taken, which was accepted for service as Norm 81:

The basic difference is that "waves" were introduced on upper AND lower surfaces, still in Gelboliv and Basalt Grey, but with the addition of Quartz Grey (RAL 7039 - a brownish grey), while most vertical surfaces were in Stone Grey (RAL 7030). 

Norm 81 last only about 2 years, as it was found to be ineffective and it was replaced with Norm 83, which returned to the irregular blotch pattern, but in three colors: Olivgrün (RAL 6003 - the same color as East German army vehicles), a very dark grey (the best match seems to be Vallejo 862 Black Grey or 995 German Grey) and a dark green (a good match is Vallejo 893 US Dark Green). This was on all surfaces, upper and lower:

So where does that leave me for March 1981? Norm 81 had only just been accepted, so it's unlikely any aircraft would've yet been repainted. If any were, it would have been a precious few interceptors only. Likewise, a few interceptors would've still had their Norm 72/81 scheme. The vast majority of aircraft would've still been wearing Norm 72, except the Tornados, which would've been in Norm 76. So my Alpha Jets will soon appear resplendent in Norm 72. 

Oh, I should point out that the West German Navy (the Bundesmarine or just Marine) had its own aircraft and they used an entirely different camouflage scheme. More on that another time. 

Stand by for a couple of Alpha Jets....