Axial Flow Turbojet
by Pat Donahue
This model of an axial flow turbojet is the Verlinden resin set out of their Me 262 update set that was released for the Trimaster/DML kit a few years ago. The engine comes in 3 major pieces with resin add ons for the generator, fuel pump, accessory case, etc.. Brass photo etch frames/bulkheads are also included. Verlinden tells you to use some DML parts for some tubing and the accessory frame on top of the engine, but these are only included in the single seat 262 night fighter If you don’t have this kit you are on your own and will have to scratch up these parts.
The resin molding is quite nice with wiring, bolts, electrical switch boxes, etc. molded on the castings, but there is still a lot of work to be done. After washing the major parts, the engine was glued together with epoxy, making sure that the brass frame and the actual engine casings were trued up in all dimensions.
Also make sure that the cast wiring bundles line up with one another as well as making sure that the engine mounting lugs were in proper relation to one another. The two oval access plates on the top of the intake were scribed in using Verlinden’s oval scribing templates and a needle chucked in a XActo blade handle.
The model was then given a primer coat of Testors light gray thinned on a 1:1 ratio with Xlyene. When this was dry the usual smoothing out of the resin areas was done with worn out #600 sandpaper. Any seams between frames and bulkheads were filled with Mr. Surfacer and, in hard to reach areas, were blended in by going over the joined area with a brush full of Testors liquid cement (which will thin Mr Surfacer and remove excess filler). The engine was then given a re-coat of the light gray paint and left to dry thoroughly.
At this point I assembled all the little details of the entire model (the accessory section, fuel pump, generator, etc.) with white glue. Using .012 brass rod, I bent and pre-fitted all the bleed air lines and fuel tubing runs into drilled holes in the various sections of the engine and the accessory section. This avoids any fitting and breakage problems after the model is assembled and painted as the pre-bent piping can be attached with diluted white glue into the pre-drilled holes with out the fear of superglue stains or having to forcefully hold a part in place.
I had heard many good things about Alclad and decided to try it out on this project. Unlike Testors, it doesn’t leave fingerprints. One of the potential problems was that the engine had many nooks and crannies. You need a smooth surface to apply metal finishes. To get this smooth surface without spending my middle-age years polishing my fingers to the nubs, I thought I would use a gloss paint. Since Alclad is a lacquer it would have to be a paint that the lacquer would not attack, like an acrylic. The Alclad people recommend using a light gray acrylic primer like Tamiya or Halfords, but since I wanted a smooth finish I sprayed Tamiya acrylic gloss white thinned with a 1:1 ratio with the Tamiya thinner.
This was sprayed on and it must BE LEFT TO DRY A FEW DAYS! Learn from my mistake here. I let it dry overnight and when I sprayed the Alclad the next day it looked great at first. When I picked up the engine and began to handle it I found that I could move the Alclad around with very light finger pressure, as it had some how loosened the Tamiya coat underneath, almost as if the model had grown a flexible skin! Oh well, live and learn! I laboriously stripped the entire model down with acetone, cleaned it up and started over again. After letting the primer dry for 3-4 days, I applied Testors metalizer burnt iron into the exhaust area and hit it with some sealer. Then making a handling stand out of brass tube wrapped with masking tape and setting the engine’s exhaust orifice down on top of this I applied the Alclad as directed.
I started off with the dural shade on the front half of the engine ( and in the intake) and the white aluminum shade to the rear of the engine. No masking was needed at this time as the front and rear of the engine was separated by the burner section which would be painted black later on. Another note of caution, if you are going to mask this stuff I would let the Alclad also dry like the Tamiya paint and use lo-tack tape (like post it note type tape) to mask it.
The burner section was then sprayed Tamiya gloss black and left to dry. The upper part of the engine was then masked off and tape wrapped section of brass tube was inserted into the intake opening to mask it. The nacelle bell mouth of the engine was camouflaged using a pattern that I found on a Me 262 that was captured at the end of the war. After this had dried I sprayed a couple of coats of Future floor wax on just the intake as protection for the camouflage scheme and as a base for the nacelle decals.
When I felt that all the coatings were able to be handled I painted the wiring harness red and yellow and the burner nozzles Testors Jet Exhaust.
When this had dried I mixed a wash of Testors burnt umber with an equal amount of glaze and cut this with an equal amount of mineral spirits and applied this wash to all the shadow and nook and cranny areas of the model. The mineral spirit based-wash will not affect the Alclad or the Future in any way. When I had achieved the intensity of shadowing that I wanted, any excess wash was removed with a 3-O brush moistened with mineral spirits.
At this point I applied the nacelle decals. When these were thoroughly dry, I applied another couple coats of Future to seal the decals (reusing the mask for the nacelle bell mouth). When this was dried I applied another coat and re-re-using the nacelle mask I then applied a couple coats of Dull Coat. The intake mask was removed and any scaring in the intake mouth was then buffed out with a #8000 micro mesh cloth wrapped around a brass tube. At this point all the accessories were attached with diluted white glue, the model was mounted on it’s stand and any fingerprints were wiped off with a Q tip moistened with water.
Originally I intended to mount the engine under the new Ar234 or Me262 kit, however the engine is 9 to10 scale inches too short (3/16″). This means that it will not align on the fore-aft axis and match the location of the other engine. It seems that Tamiya will give us a clear version of the Me262 judging by the moldings so maybe we will get a true scale Jumo engine soon. One other note, I have also used Tamiya gloss black as an undercoat. Although it takes more coats of Alclad to cover the result is a bit deeper metallic finish.
Photos by Jeff Junker