Albatros D.III Build

On Friday, August 30, 2002, a friend gave me the RODEN Albatros D.III (Oeffag s/153) late kit. I guess he thought I did not have enough kits on my shelf. Well, I thanked him profusely and opened the box. What a lovely kit. Nice crisp molding, very little flash and enough decals for a squadron. As I studied the kit, I wondered how long it would take to build it. A month, a week, a day? Yes, a day. But if I built it in a day, I would have to have photographic evidence that I indeed built it in that short of a time period.

So here is what I'm going to do. On Monday morning, September 2, 2002, I will start the build and with Tech Support on the computer, I will try and finish the kit in a day. I will update the web site every hour or so to show the progress. I have already studied the kit but other than open the inner bag, no work has been done. The kit is sitting on my desk waiting for Monday morning. See you then.

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Monday morning, 3:55am. Check air brush, change Xacto blade. Get on my mark, get set. GO!

First off the sprue is the top wing. The attachment points are heavy so careful sanding is necessary.

There is also a fair amount of flash on the wing so this had to be carefully removed. After clean up, the wing is glued and put aside. This took seven minutes.

The rest of the hour was spent cleaning the fuselage and engine.

The interior is painted. There is slight warpage but nothing that a clamp will not take care of. Dry fitting the upper deck reveals a good fit.

No surprises in a quick build are allowed. The engine is detailed and the six exhausts are drilled out. Must resist AMS.

At 6:00am the engine is complete, the fuselage is closed up as everything can be dropped into the fuselage. I love this type of system. It allows for a good fit of the fuselage halves and you can still get to everything inside. The nose cone is attached. The engine is mounted and it fits perfectly. The seat and control stick are mounted. Must resist AMS. Resistance is futile. A side instructment panel is added and some gauges are painted for mounting later. The top deck is slid into place. One exhaust leaves for places unknown. Never even said goodbye. Should have left them off. Others will probably join their partner before the day is done. I have resisted waking up Tech Support. Bruised modellers get very little done.

7:00 am. Tech Support is up and has set up the next display. An hour is spent preparing the photos for the web site. It is now 8:00am and the first three hours of work are ready for viewing. Breakfast is being prepared by Tech Support. Lower regions of body are numb. Must resist AMS. Must resist AMS.

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8:45am. Breakfast finished, brain refueled, kinks in the back relieved. Back to model.

The wings and tail surfaces and tail skid are attached and given 15 seconds to dry. Putty is now applied to

seams and while the putty is drying, all DURAS attachments holes are drilled in the struts and landing undercarriage.

As soon as the putty was dry, I was at the sink wet

sanding the seams. Some detail was lost but I can add that to the sanity that I have lost for attempting this project. As soon as the sanding was complete, I sprayed the CDL, a mixture of Model Master British Gulf Armor Light Stone, some yellow and some gray. Two pieces of sponge, two egg cups of green and I am applying "Summer" to the upper and lateral sides of the model. For someone who had no idea what he was doing, I must say the results were rather pleasing. It was by far the easiest paint scheme I have ever applied. Think about it. How are you going to mess up painting with a sponge? No overspray, no masking. I'm now ready to take on "Autumn Leaf." I did have to mask off the gray on the nose and then dab it with the greens.

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A little more putty on the bottom to take care of seam that wants to stay. While that was drying, the wing was glossed and the decals added. The next step will be to finish the putty work and spray the lower surfaces light blue. That will be after about an hour's break. So far, about 6 hours of building time.

After taking my son and his friend shopping, I returned to put the final touches on the kit. All painting has been accomplished, it is assembly time. I had some problems with the cabanes but I'm not sure if the problem was not of my own making. I may not have set the lower wing correctly. But with a little coaxing, I got the top wing on without any problems. The balance of the build was putting on all of the little pieces here and there. Some dials and knobs were installed but did not increase the building time to any degree. The kit is rigged and final touch up finishes the kit.

Some observations. This is as sweet a kit as I thought it would be when I first saw it on Friday. The kit goes together with very few problems. I wanted to enclose the engine but the cover does not fit. It appears the engine will have to have a few parts omitted if you want the engine cover attached. I tried thinning it but that did not work. The plus side is the engine detail is excellent and it would have been a shame to cover it.

Total time of the build was about 10 hours which is what I usually spend on my kits. I just don't normally do it in one day. My brain is fuzzy, my back hurts and a song keeps running through my head. How does it go....oh, yes...The're coming to take me away, uh huh, the're coming to take me away, oh, yeah...or something like that. I understand there is nice white coat that ties in the back to keep me from hurting myself.

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