Flying Artillery of the Blitzkrieg

Historical Background

The design of the Ju 87 had its origins in the 1933 Sturzbomber-Programm. The Ju 87's principal designer, Hermann Pohlmann held the opinion that any dive bomber design should be simple and robust. This led to one of the Ju 87's most distinctive features - its fixed and spatted landing gear. When the Nazis came into power, they took interest in the design, specifically by Ernst Udet, the former World War 1 ace who liked the concept of the dive bomber after testing a Curtiss Hawk II biplane. Junkers built a prototype fighter/ dive bomber named Junkers Ju K47 through its subsidiary, AB Flygindustri SV in Sweden. Apart from fixed undercarriage, the K47 also featured inverted gull wings and double vertical stabilisers to give the rear gunner a better field of fire. From the K 47, Junkers build the prototypes of the Ju 87, using British Rolls-Royce Kestrel engine. The prototype was built by AB Flygindustri SV and was secretly transported to Germany in late 1934. It was to be completed in April 1935 but due to the inadequate strength of the airframe, construction was not completed until October 1935. However, the mostly complete Ju 87 V1 made its first flight on 17 September 1935. The RLM was still not interested with the aircraft however, and was unimpressed with the choice of a British engine. In late 1935, Junkers suggested fitting a Daimler Benz DB600 engine, with the final variant powered by a Jumo 210. This however, was only accepted as a temporary solution by the RLM. The reworking of the design began on 1 January 1936 but test flights could not be carried out for two months, due to inadequate airframes.

The situation was worsened when the V1 prototype  crashed on 24 January 1936, killing Junkers' chief test pilot, Willy Neuenhofen and his chief engineer, Heinrich Kreft. The twin tails proved to too weak; they collapsed during the testing of terminal dynamic pressure in a dive. The crash prompted a change to a single vertical tail design. A heavy plating, along with brackets riveted to the frame and longeron, was fitted to the fuselage. The V2 prototype was fitted with a BMW 'Hornet' engine due to shortage of DB600 and the single tail fitted in place of the twins. The changes resulted in delays, setting back testing until 25 February 1936. In March the Jumo 210 was finally fitted. Although the tests went well, Oberstleutnant Wolfram von Richtofen of Technisches Amt told Junkers representative that the Ju 87 have little chance of being the Luftwaffe's main dive-bomber, as he felt that the aircraft was underpowered. On 9 June 1936, the RLM ordered the cessation of development, in favour of the rival Heinkel He 118. Yet, on the next day, Ernst Udet countermanded the order, and development continues. On 27 July 1936, Udet crashed the He 118 prototype and soon after announced the Ju 87 as the winner of the dive-bomber development contest.

The Ju 87 was an all metal, cantilevered monoplane with fixed, spatted landing gear. In the early models, fixed armament was two wing-mounted 7.92mm MG17 machine guns and a single MG15 7.92mm machine gun for the radio operator. The Ju 87 was also fitted with an automatic dive recovery system that engaged when the bombs were released. Production of the Ju 87 commenced in 1937 with the Ju 87A series. While capable of carrying a 1,100lb bomb, it was at the expense of the radio operator/rear gunner as the Jumo 210 engine was still underpowered, even in its later D version, reducing operational bombload to just 500lb. The A version was replaced by the more powerful B series, the first variant to enter mass production. The B series has a completely redesigned fuselage and landing gear and was powered by a Jumo 211D engine producing 1,184 hp. The B series was also fitted with propeller-driven sirens, mounted either on the leading edge of the wing or on the front edge of the landing gear fairing. Known as Jericho trumpets, the siren was used to weaken enemy morale and to enhance the terror effect of dive-bombing. The device however caused a loss of 20-25 mph of speed through drag. Furthermore, as the war goes on, the enemy were used to it and were no longer intimidated by it. Although officially unnamed, the Ju 87 gained the name 'Stuka' from the German word for dive-bomber : Sturzkampffleugzeug.

The Ju 87 was first blooded in the Spanish Civil War as part of the Germans' Legion Condor. A single Ju 87A-0 was sent to Spain in August 1938. This was followed by three Ju 87A-1s in January 1938. These aircraft supported the Nationalist forces until they returned to Germany in October 1938. The A-1s were replaced by five B-1s, which were used to support bombings by Heinkel He 111 medium bombers. The experience in Spain helped the crews in perfecting their skills while testing the aircraft under combat conditions. However, the Republicans and their allies did not provide a large and well-coordinated aerial opposition, thereby not exposing the Ju 87s weaknesses until later. During the early phase of World War 2, the Ju 87, acting as the flying artillery of the blitzkrieg concept, reigned supreme against Poland and Norway.  During Operation Weserubung, the Stukas  had success against Allied shipping, including the sinking of HMS Bittern, HMS Afridi and the French Bison. The lessons learned during these early campaigns ensured an even more attention to pin-point attacks, to be applied in the next campaign against France and the Low Countries. Co-ordination between forward liaison officers and attacking aircraft were also excellent, allowing attacks to come within 20 minutes from the call. During the Dunkirk evacuation, more Allied ships were sunk by them. However, at this time, the Stukas' weakness began to unravel. For example, on 12 May 1940, six Hawk 75s from GC 1/5 attacked a squadron of Stukas flying without fighter escort. Only one managed to escape whilst the attackers suffered no losses.

The Battle of Britain finally proved the vulnerability of the Stukas in a hostile sky against well-organised and determined fighter opposition. Although originally still proving very potent against shipping, including the battering of HMS Illustrious (later in 1941 during the campaign in the Mediterranean), it could not be effectively protected by fighters because of its low speed. The Stuka depended upon air superiority, which the Luftwaffe were unable to attain. It was withdrawn from battle in August, depriving the Luftwaffe of precision-attack platform. Despite the exposed vulnerability, the Stuka continued to be used in the Mediterranean and North Africa, where once again they showed their prowess as ship-killers. Following the Battle of El Alamein and Operation Torch, with increased Allied air power, the Stukas once again suffered. On the Eastern Front, with complete air superiority from Operation Barbarossa until the Battle of Stalingrad, the Stukas again wreaked havoc on the Soviets, but the Battle Of Stalingrad proved to be the high point of the Stukas' fortunes. During the Battle of Kursk, the Stukas took a high toll against the Red Army, especially the 37mm cannon-equipped Ju 87G tank-busters but the stronger Soviet aerial opposition caused higher losses among the Stuka arm. From then onwards, the Ju 87 was replaced by ground-attack Focke-Wulf Fw 190F and G in the ground support role with the Stukageschwaders being redesignated Schlachtgeschwaders to reflect their general close air support rather than dive-bombing role.

The Kit

This kit is another uh, relic, from the 1990s, specifically 1994. Anyway, being a Hasegawa kit from the 1990s onwards, it feature crisp and petite panel lines and good raised details, especially in the crew's office. There were 100 parts, spread among nine dark gray and one clear sprues. The nose assembly was separate from the fuselage, so that Hasegawa would only mould the new nose for the follow-on D and G versions (the wing is another matter). There is also no sprue 'G', as this, as it later turned out, is for Ju 87R's external fuel tanks). And unlike most other kits (including Hasegawa themselves) the kit provide paper masking templates for painting. The decals provide markings for three aircraft:

1. 4./StG 77 Russia, Summer 1941 (RLM 70/71/65) (Note: I believe the markings were actually dated prior to Operation Barbarossa, as there was no yellow theatre band)

2. 2./StG 2 (Eastern Front, judging by the RLM 04 nose and fuselage band) (RLM 70/71/65)

3. 3./StG 5 Leningrad, 1942 (white distemper camouflage)

Construction

The cockpit gets the first attention, as usual. The detail for it is adequate for OOB builders like me, although there are no seat belts, even as a decal. On the real aircraft, the gunner/radio operator's seat is made of metal frames which Hasegawa managed to capture its shape well (for injection-moulded plastic that is). The parts are painted while still on their sprues; Tamiya XF-22 RLM Grey for the basic cockpit colour and XF-64 Red Brown and XF-1 Flat Black for detail paintings. The parts were then cut off the sprue and cemented together. The sprue gate scars were then touched up. The sidewalls were cemented to their respective fuselage halves and the latter were then cemented together with the cockpit trapped in-between. Fit is good although I still need to clamp the fuselage halves together as the cement dries. The instrument panel installation is slightly different; the parts are cemented onto a small section of the upper nose fairing. The assembly was then cemented onto the main fuselage. The engine cowling was separate and consists of three main parts. There was no problem here although I was bit concerned about the bomb crutches which is to be installed at this stage. Another thing is that the propellers are also installed at the same stage. I tried dry-fitting the engine cowling and found a perfect fit with the fuselage so decided just to temporarily tack the engine to the fuselage, broke it off after painting and install the propellers later on. The bomb crutches were cemented as I judged that it won't get much in a way like an aerial or pitot probe would.

Before assembling the wings, holes were drilled into the one-piece lower wing for the dive brakes and the wing bomb pylons. The upper wing halves fitted snugly to the bottom and left to dry. The wing assembly felt solid in my hands and I then proceeded to glue it to the fuselage. But before that I cemented the bomb release observation window. The wing gun fairings were then fitted, although not the gun barrels themselves. The landing light in the port wing is just a hollow cut-out in the wing and should at least be blanked off with plastic card. As usual I forgot to do that, and only remembered after the cement on the clear fairing had dried.....It should also be noted that Hasegawa molded the flap actuator linkages as a solid triangle. To enhance the look, they should be cut and replaced with plastic rods or something similar - I left them as they were. The tailplanes were then cemented although the support struts were left off to ease painting. I did dry-fit them and discovered that the pre-drilled holes in the fuselage were too low. The holes were filled and instead of drilling new holes, I just cut the locating tabs off and fit the struts using Mk1 Eyeball later on.

The spatted undercarriage presented a problem as it would be very hard to paint the tyres inside them. To counter that, I shaved just a bit of the locating pins on the wheels so that I can pop them through after painting. The inside of the wheel spats were painted RLM 65 and the wheel spat halves were cemented together. The wheels spats were fitted with the Jericho trumpet housing, although no propellers were included, just fairings for them. Hasegawa indicated that the siren housing was only applicable to the second marking option (which I had chosen beforehand) and should be removed for the rest of the marking options. The wheel spats were however left off to facilitate painting, although their wing fairings were cemented to the lower wings. The wing bomb pylons were the last parts I glued before moving to the painting stage.

Painting and Decaling

Selection of the painting scheme was easy. I ruled out Scheme 3 as I have run out of rattle-can white paints and I don't trust my ability to brush-paint whites for the entire model. That left the other two and I chose #2 as it added some more colour to the model. I first painted the lower half of the aircraft RLM 65 Hellblau using Gunze Sangyo Aqueous H67. For the upper fuselage colours, I first painted RLM 71 Dunkelgrun overall using Gunze Sangyo Aqueous H64. As mentioned before, Hasegawa provided paper masks for this kit. I however only used them to mark the demarcation lines and instead used Tamiya tapes for the actual masking. For RLM 70 Schwarzgrun, I used Tamiya XF-27 Black Green. The canopies were also painted at this time but separately. Once the camouflage paints were cured, I marked the demarcation line, also using Tamiya tapes and painted Tamiya XF-3 Flat Yellow on the nose.

Then it was time for the decals. The Gunze Sangyo paints dried with semi-gloss sheen so that no extra layer of gloss clear was needed. The Tamiya paint however dried flat, so the areas covered by it were varnished with a bit of Tamiya X-22 Clear. So that I won't forget if done later, the interior frame decals were placed first at the canopy. The decals are of typical Hasegawa vintage from the 1990s - rather thick and having off-white white. While OK for flat areas and needing just a swab of Mr Mark Softer, the same cannot be said for the theatre band and unit markings, as they were situated at curvy areas and were subjected to repeated Mr Mark Softer bath.

Finishing

The still loose parts can now be permanently fixed onto the model. I started with the landing gear spats, so that the model can stand on its own while I glued the rest of the parts. This was followed by the tail wheel and the tailplane stabiliser struts. The nose was taken off in order to install the propeller. Hasegawa engineered the propeller to be moveable but I found that the assembly was quite wobbly and I had to permanently glue it. The Stuka's usual payload of a single SC500 500kg and four SC50 50kg bombs were assembled, painted Flat Black and fixed to the bomb crutch and underwing pylons. Other small, fragile fittings such as the wing machine gun barrels/muzzles and pitot tube can finally be added, followed by the cockpit transparencies and not forgetting the radio aerial and the rear MG 15 machine gun. The model was then subjected to a medium grey sludge wash for the undersides and the usual black-brown wash for the upper fuselage.

Conclusion

First, I must say that for anyone building up a collection of World War 2 aircraft, the Stuka is a must in their collection. and for those building 1/48 scale warbirds, the Hasegawa offering is the kit to go, not least because it includes the evil swastika decals, something usually missing from most European brands. While there is no perfect kit, the Hasegawa Stuka is close enough with that solid flap actuators and the blank landing light recess being its major shortcomings. The parts fit well however and I really enjoyed the build.