Dear all,
A fellow member of this forum very kindly gave me this Roden kit earlier in the year. It even included a set of resin aftermarket resin wheels, HGW seat belts and some paint masks. I used all these items bar the masks as being brush painter they are sadly not so easy to use.
I finally got round to building this immediately after my Revell Fokker DVII and completed yesterday. This was one of those really enjoyable projects that I could not put down - hence fairly soon after my last project.
On the whole, these are a great kit from Roden but there are a few areas that require a bit of careful attention:
Quite a bit of work tidying up the fuselage join especially on the underside;
I paid a fair amount of time devoted to ensuring the upper wing fit was correct on the cabane struts;
If you want the cowling closed over the engine (as I did) you need to be aware that if you follow the instructions the two upper cowling panels do not fit. I tackled this by only assembling the lower half of the engine keeping the two crankcases separate until I got to this point. To make mine fit properly, it was necessary to cut away the lower portion of these crankcases;
The decals have a tendency to break apart so I had to carefully apply these 'jigsaw' style and paint in as best I could any gaps.
The above things are all doable so don't let that put you off from tackling this good kit.
I have added some very minor (numerous) details including altering the kit seat back to look more accurate.
Rigged with combination of 'Pryme' knitting elastic and 3lb fishing wire where I wanted some structural strength.
Painted in the scheme of R S Dallas, France, May 1918.
I'm actually really pleased how this one has turned out and the SE5a is my favourite British WW1 aircraft. I thought the Dallas scheme looked a bit more interesting so is why I chose this one. The scheme is quite complex so may not be as accurate to Roden's painting guide so I will simply say this is my interpretation of it.
Many thanks, Richie!
Regards
Dave
