Roden's Fokker DR I triplane.

 

Roden Fokker DR.1 in 1/32 scale.

It was time to stop messing around and build the most famous warplane of WWI. The plane I speak of, of course, is the Fokker DR.I Triplane. This was a remarkable little aircraft, and all the more remarkable in that relatively few were produced, (only around 300), and they saw service for just a short time, (maybe eight months), the little fighter became legendary. Perhaps it was because some of Germany's most famous pilots flew them. Two pilots in particular, Manfred Von Richthofen, (MVR), Germany's highest scoring ace, and Werner Voss, probably one of the most gifted pilots of all the combatants; flew and died in the triplane.

I have three !/32 scale triplanes in my stash. For my first attempt, I decided to do MVR's 477/17, using Aviattic's decal set for the overall finish. I had used Aviattic's lozenge decals on my Fokker E.V build so I looked forward to trying out an entire airframe with them. Besides that, I had Tom's modelworks Photo-etch set for the Fokker. 

The Roden kit + Aviatic decals for MVR's 477/17

My first step was to assemble the Oberursel motor and paint the lamination on the prop. The Motor was a nice little assembly, with fine detail. I took my time and it came out well. As for the prop, I tried masking with 1mm tape at the prop's center, spreading out a bit as the laminations spread out towards the ends of the propeller. This actually worked out pretty well although there was a bit of touchup needed to finish it off well.

Motor and prop.

Next came work on the interior "office". There are many finely molded pieces here, you have to be careful not to break things! I painted the interior walls gloss white to prepare them for the Aviattic decals which represent the plywood fairing. I also added some stretched sprue to the interior rails to simulate the support rigging. For the seat, I added a cushion and painted the back red, as befitted in a Richthofen machine. For the harnesses, I used Tom's buckles mated to some Tamiya tape. I liked the way that worked and will be shopping for more buckles for my future builds.

Interior assembly.

Things get a little fiddly here, you have to connect the interior rails to the fuselage halves, then add the ammo boxes and fuel tank. Dry fitting was necessary to make sure everything was lining up. In the end, it did go together with minimal fuss. 

Fuselage closed up!

Dry fitting the lower wings.

Before any more assembly, it became necessary to prepare the exterior surfaces for the Aviattic decals. This required a coat of gloss white over all the outer surfaces.  

Prepped and painted in preparation for the decals.

First, I applies the fuselage decals, as I had some experience with these with my Fokker EV build. Things went pretty well except for the issue of the "breather pipes". I had removed them as instructed by Aviattic. However, I did not realize that the decals ended up in a slightly different location! Had I realized they wouldn't line up, I would have filled the hole and painted over it. As it was, I was left with this "ghost" hole behind the decal's dot.

A bit of a problem!

Eventually I was able to find the right paint, (Tamiya RLM Grey), to hide the hole.

The rest of the fuselage's decals went on with little trouble. 

I also began painting the items which were to match the decal's red surfaces. By adding a little Flat Brown to the standard Tamiya Flat Red, I got a toned down scarlet hue that was pretty close. Not that I also chose just to paint the wheel covers since decaling those just seemed to be asking for trouble.

Decals applied, looking okay!

Assembly continues...

As I began to assemble the top wing, I realized two problems: One, the cross sections on the ailerons did not line up with those on the wing. Also, the inspection hatch on the decal didn't match the molded one on the Roden wing. I decided to strip the decal off, paint the wing and use the Roden decals for the crosses. 

After stripping off the decal, I masked of the white squares where the crosses belonged to simulate the white background originally applied to the Fokkers wings. Then I streaked some RLM Grey across the rest of the wing.

Finished painting, looking pretty good.

I then applied a diluted mixture of Flat Red and Flat Brown, allowing some of the underlying finish to show though. After applying the red, I removed the masking tape from the underside of the wing. This pulled the blue decal off! So I then had to match the blue undersuface color! Oh boy! After that was done, I applied the Roden decals for the rosses. As usual with Roden decals, this is a step that you must take with great care! Even so, I did have a few cracks appear in the crosses, but nothing that wasn't fixable!

Finally able to resume assembly!

From here, it was just a "routine" assembly. I had to take care not to break some of the more fragile little pieces. For the minimal rigging, I chose to use stretched sprue for the control lines on the rear and EZ Line for the few support cables found on the landing gear and between the cabane struts as well as the aileron control lines.

Adding riggin and wingtip skids.

Just about done!

I had one last near disaster with this kit! After assembly was done, I shot it with Tamiya's Semi Gloss Clear. I spray paint in the garage and it was a little chilly, maybe the upper 40s or low 50s. For whatever reason, the sprayed on finish turned a milky, chalky white! Egads!

In a desperate move, I tried brushing the Semi Gloss by hand. Son of a gun, it worked!

Working the problem.

Well, all's well that ends well, I guess. I really felt like I dodged a bullet there!

Here are the shots of the finished model.

This was a nice build, in spite of a couple of hiccups. I've got two more DR.I's in my stash, I'm looking forward to them!