Scale aviation modeller international

Hungary, and Spain. The decals

look good and are printed by

Eduard so there should not be any

problems with them, although

I didn’t use them in my build.

BUILDING A BABY

To make this Baby you don’t need to

know about the birds and the bees!

The first step is to build the interior.

This is made from two floorboards,

a seat back/headrest, and a control

stick. In addition, there are two

very tiny rudder pedals. There is

also an instrument panel with a

couple of round “dials” on it.

Sadly, the instructions for the

cockpit are not overly clear. They

appear to show the control stick’s

“t” mounted under the floorboards,

with the floor separated around it,

but I found that it actually seems

to fit better when the two floor

pieces are mounted flush. Also, it’s

not clear if the floor attaches to the

bottom or front of the seat back.

This would end up being a

problem with this model; the

instructions put simply, are

actually not helpful when they

need to be. It’s a shame, because

with a kit this low in part count,

you’d think it would be pretty

easy to show things properly

I found fitting the cockpit

into the fuselage was an issue,

probably because I had glued it

together wrongly. But eventually,

with a bit of sanding, I got it to

fit. Before attaching it into place,

I painted it using Model Master

Acrylic (MMA) Dark Tan, which

was followed by a brown wash with

Devlan Mud from Citadel. I also

added a light coat of Baddab Black

on the inside of the fuselage sides

to bring out the frame detail.

The tailplane fits on

passably, and the rudder is a

good fit. However, despite the

rectangular tab on the stabilizer

the fit is not great and it does not

guarantee a proper alignment.

The wings are even worse; the

rectangular block on the top of the

fuselage does not even fit into the

hole in the wings at all. It is too wide

and too tall. Even when you get it

to fit width ways, the wing is too

far off the fuselage. What I thought

would be a 10-minute assembly job

ended up taking far longer than it

should have. Once everything’s

together, though, it does look nice.

To make attaching the

windscreen easier, I used my scriber

to cut a mounting groove for it on

the front fuselage. There’s a slight

indentation showing where the

window goes, so I just thought

I’d help it out. This was one of the

best ideas I’ve had of late, and it

saved me tonnes of trouble later!

I aligned the wings and tailplane

by eye; you could use the bracing

struts, but they’re better added

afterwards, at least in my case. I

knew that I would have underwing

decals and I did not want to

decal around a support strut!

PAINTING THE BABY

For reasons that will be revealed

shortly, I wanted to do the glider as

an NSFK (Nationalsozialistisches

Fliegerkorps – national socialist

flying corps) craft. The NSFK

was formed in the early 1930s

to encourage a resurgence of

aviation in Germany. Doing some

research led me to the conclusion

that the Baby would thus likely

be painted in RLM 05 cream.

My Model Master RLM 05 didn’t

look right at all, so I took a light

yellow mixed paint I’d had for a

while, and made it paler. I did this

until it matched the colour chip

I’d found online. I then primed the

airplane in grey primer, and used

my Badger 155 Anthem to put on a

few coats of the paint. It took about

three coats to cover, and I was

worried that the fine detail on the

wings and tail would be obscured.

They weren’t too badly affected,

though, and I could see them

alright after some light sanding.

This is the very Spartan interior of the Baby. There’s a control stick and rudder pedals, and that’s

about it. You can see the wooden frame texture on the side of the cockpit “walls”. Simple, but with a

wash, it pops out. Sadly, you can’t see it when the Baby’s all built up

This is a picture of my Oma (right) and great uncle (left) when they were kids in the late 1920s.

About a decade later, both would be involved with the legendary Grunau Baby

From this angle, the pastelling on the wing ribs and “solid/fabric” divide is clearly

evident on the Baby’s huge wings and tailplane. Only the control surfaces are

outlined in pencil, where there would be a “break” on the real plane

“I STARTED THIS BUILD WANTING

TO PAY TRIBUTE TO MY OMA WHO

BUILT THESE PLANES AND MY GREAT

UNCLE WHO ACTUALLY FLEW THEM”

KIT REVIEWS

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