1/48 Hobby Boss Blohm & Voss BV-141

[mustang1989]

Ok everybody. I’ve got my next aircraft lined up and ready to put on the bench next to my other couple of builds that are going on. This one is a bit of a different style bird than most folks are used to seeing.
The Blohm & Voss BV-141 derived from the need for a Reconnaissance / Light Bomber role for the Luftwaffe in 1938. The idea behind this highly unusual aircraft was to allow an unobstructed view to any area being surveyed from the R/H side. The aircraft never saw operational service due to the German Air Ministry’s disapproval of it’s odd appearance and being underpowered despite its power plant being that of one of Germany’s “Top Dog” fighters, the Fw-190A series. Having a top speed of 229 mph was not enough to impress the Ministry and the project was cancelled in favor of the much nimbler and sleek conventionally designed twin engine Fw-189 reconnaissance aircraft.
Several 1/48 scale kits have been released to replicate this unusual aircraft in scale but IMO (as well as the general modeling community) this seems to be the best kit in which to do that with. The kit I’ll be going with will be Hobby Boss’s release of the BV-141B. I’ve been wanting to build this aircraft for about 15 years and now’s my chance.

[mustang1989]

In flight photo:



and in-flight video:

https://youtu.be/V9GqxOAofio

[TarheelRick]

That is one strange looking bird.  Looking forward to what yo do with it.

[cobraman]

I really like that odd styling. Looking forward to finished photos.

[Ken Gilkeson]

very unusual, I'll be following. you do great work.

[Mike999]

Good luck!  That Hobby Boss kit gets great reviews, for being easy to build and looking good when finished.

Though several Bv-141 kits were done in 1/72,  AFAIK, only one regular plastic kit was released in 1/48 scale. That was from the Czech company Historic Plastic Models (HiPM), back in the 1990's. 

It was a short-run kit with photo-etched parts. It had a reputation as a...challenging...build, with all the parts butt-jointed together - no locator pins etc. The whole cockpit was molded as 2 big pieces of clear plastic. So after gluing the 2 massive clear parts together, a seam ran right thru the middle of all that glass, and had to be sanded/polished out.

For nostalgia, here's a review of the HiPM kit.

http://www.olddogsplanes.com/141.html

Edited August 5, 2019 by Mike999
goof

[stavanzer]

I had the 1/72 Airfix kit, back in the 1980's. I thought it was unreal, even then. I hope your build goes smoothly.

[dmthamade]

Man, look at all that canopy!!! You going to use an Eduard mask set?

 

Don

[Mike999]

Here's a review of that Eduard Mask Set.  The builder said it took him about 1 hour to mask all the glass.  Figures it would have taken 5 to 6 hours without it.

https://www.web.ipmsusa3.org/content/bv-141-masks

[dmthamade]

10 hours ago, Mike999 said:

Here's a review of that Eduard Mask Set.  The builder said it took him about 1 hour to mask all the glass.  Figures it would have taken 5 to 6 hours without it.

https://www.web.ipmsusa3.org/content/bv-141-masks

Yup!! I've gotten lazy, won't even think of masking the canopy the old school way, no matter how simple it is. The Eduard masks work great!!

 

Don

[89AKurt]

One of the few WW2 airplane kits I have!  I also got the mask, plus the Eduard photo-etch and the True Details propeller.  I also saved the Squadron catalog article about building it.  I built the Airfix 1/72 last century.  Look forward to seeing you actually build this!  It would be cool to build a full size plane too.

[mustang1989]

Sorry for the late reply guys. Been out for a bit due to things getting crazy at work. I've already got a Montex mask set for the glass. There's no way I'd build this sucker without one. lol