LT. TEODOR MOSCU

Kit Used: HELLER, kit number 240

About the aircraft modeled:

The Heinkel He-112 fell victim to politics and lost out to Messerschmitt's Bf-109 in becoming the Luftwaffe's primary fighter, even though its performance in all categories save rate of climb was better than the 109's. It was therefore only built for export and served with the air forces of Spain, Hungary, and Rumania.

Japan received 30 He-112E B-0s (E for Export) during 1937-38, but there was no recorded combat of the type by the allies. Most were assigned to research institutes (it's been rumored that the design of Kawasaki's Ki-61 Hien was based on research gained from the He-112). The remaining aircraft were to serve as trainers within the IJN (the allies expected to meet it in combat and it was assigned the code name "Jerry").

The model represents one of the 30 He-112Es exported to Rumania (14 He-112B-2s, later 16 He-112B-2/U2s). Altogether 98 production line He-112s were built, the last batch of 16 going to Rumania in September 1939. Black 13 survived the war and was the last of six He-112s to leave Giulesti for its flight to the scrap heap in Popesti-Leordeni airfield in April 1946. It was the first to score a kill during the war with the Soviet Union and altogether scored four victories.

Additions, modifications, etc.:

Interior:

HELLER's cockpit was quite complete, it even had sidewall detail molded into the fuselage interior halves. I scratch-built the Revi gunsight from white and clear styrene sheet. It's too bad that HELLER's canopy is thick and distorted, as you can't really see the detail present, even with a coat of FUTURE applied to the interior and exterior. Since not much detail could be seen, I only used masking tape for the belts, which were painted dirty white and flat aluminum for the buckles and latches. The openings in the seat for the shoulder harnesses were simply done with black decal trim film. Instrument gauges (if you can see them) were done with Waldron-punched disks of white decal trim film, followed by Waldron-punched Reheat Models instrument decals. The cockpit was painted RLM 02, with various controls and radio equipment picked out in flat black and silver as per reference. Although not seen, I added rudder pedals from True Details to the rudder stubs molded in the cockpit floor.

Exterior:

The gun ports on the fuselage inserts were drilled out. The holes for the cannon ports in the wings were oversized, so I cemented a like-sized piece of styrene rod to the ports, sanded them flush with the wing's leading edges, and drilled out a proper sized hole (it also looked like a port instead of a hole in the wing). I added cannon to each wing from sections of a 25 gauge hypodermic needle and styrene rod. The rear aerial wire mount was made by wrapping 34 gauge aluminum beading thread around a sewing needle until I got the size hole I wanted. Smoke colored invisible thread was used for the aerial wire and attached in the final assembly. Otherwise, it's as per instructions.

Painting and decaling:

Interior:

The wheel bays and interior sides of the gear doors were painted Gunze RLM 02 Gray, with oleos brushed in bright silver. The canopy was masked with Bare-metal foil and attached with Model Masters clear parts cement. The canopy area received a coat of RLM 02 and the landing gear bays were masked with index card templates, cut oversized and lightly glued in place with drops of Elmers glue (this easily was released and cleaned up with a cotton swab dipped in warm water and blotted out until damp and not wet).

Exterior:

The exterior was first painted Polly Scale RLM 63 overall to serve as a primer as well as the undersurface color. After this had dried, I masked the under wing tips, mid-wings stripes, fuselage stripe, and fuselage engine front and painted the exposed areas Polly-Scale Chrome Yellow. The area around the exhausts was masked and painted flat black, with the exhausts hand painted with Gunze Burnt Iron and followed by a heavy wet wash of Pactra Rust. After removing the masking I gave the model a coat of Min-Wax Polycrylic to prepare the surface for decals.

The pilot figure came from a Preiser Luftwaffe figure set. The figure was primed in RLM 76 and hand painted with acrylics before shading with ink and oil washes. The only research refeference I could find showing a color illustration of a Rumanian pilot during World War II, showed his uniform to be a medium blue-gray. The closest color match I could find (without mixing colors) was Gunze Intermediate Blue, after it had been coated with clear flat.

With exception of the six National Insignia, I used decals from AeroMaster's sheet for the He-112 (sheet number 72-135). Curiously AeroMaster included roundels for the National Insignia, which were used before and after the war. Since I wanted to show the aircraft in its World War II markings, I had to use the very out-of-register crosses from an ENCORE kit sheet for the He-112. This necessitated the very time consuming task of filling in the out-of-register crosses with tiny strips cut from white trim film, thirty-six such strips being required to get an acceptable result. After the decals dried, I applied india ink washes to the recessed control surfaces and powdered black pastel to the exhausts and gun ports. I then applied a coat of Polly Scale Clear Flat to the model and rubbed this out after two days to give it a slight sheen. Masking was removed from the canopy and the canopy polished out with Meguire's Mirror Glaze before receiving a coat of FUTURE in the clear areas. Wing navigation lights were lastly applied using a drop of bright silver followed by drop of Kristal Klear on each wing tip. These were painted clear red on the port wing and clear green on the starboard wing, once the Kristal Klear had dried completly.

July 2000