This is the old Italeri’s 1/72 Dornier Do 24. This is based upon a picture of this aircraft left rotting away on the shores of the Mediterranea Sea, in Egypt or Libya, during the Allies’ reconquest of Northern Africa.
A lot of work went into the kit. The aircraft has been robbed of most useful parts and this meant opening up access panels and adding some sort of interior and avoid any too obvious ‘see-through’. The thick ‘canopy’ windows were drilled out and cut away and the cockpit and cabin had to be detailled, even if most of the useful bits have been removed for spares. It’s a good thing because if left intact, the ‘canopy’ is much too wide for the fuselage… With the windows off, I was able to force it into place without much need of sanding. However, the fit of other parts is sometimes very poor and quite a bit of putty and sanding is required in the end.
The small Bren Carrier is from RPM, and although quite nice, is a real pain to build, mostly given the tracks are all tiny individual links.. The crew is made up of modified resin and plastic figures.
Wow, well done! This is a very convincing scene… I’m genuinely intimidated by taking on a “wreck” project as I feel this requires much more skill. Contrary to the casual observer that might seek to turn a goofed model into a wreck, in practise every defect must be made with absolute intention… Love the little Bren Gun Carrier! That was an excellent choice of vehicle to juxtapose against this German Giant.
I take great pleasure in recreating, preferably from photographs, damged vehicles and aircraft. It takes a lot more planning than completing a ‘normal’ model particularly because most, if not all, of the damage must be done before final assembly and the final assembly, while being usualy far more fragile than a complete kit, must still be handled for painting, decalling and so on. I find the weathering the most difficult but interesting phase because in most case, the model must be secured to the rest of the diorama before it can properly be done. In terms of detailling, in this particular case, there is little avaiable in terms of references, so most of it is, if not fantasy, just based on what I thought would ‘work’. The fact that the aircraft has been stripped down actually helped a lot. It just had to look busy and messy.
