Here is the last piece of aftermarket that I wanted to share. It's something that caught my eye over at another forum. When I saw this man's work, I thought, "How cool is that??? I gotta get some!" Since his work is not widely available through retailers, I thought it warranted a post of its own.
Henri Daehne produces resin prop and spinner assemblies for various WW2 Luftwaffe aircraft. I ordered three sets directly from him. Price is very reasonable for the quality of the work and the level of research that goes into his prop assemblies. I paid 50 euros for three sets to be shipped to me from Germany. That's around $16 for each set.
The set that is relevant to my build is, of course, the VS 111 prop for the Fw190D-9.
Henri packages his props with a detailed, multi-page pamphlet that includes some reference photos of the actual parts that he has drawn measurements from. The instructions are very detailed and include helpful measurements so that the modeler can ensure that parts cut from their casting blocks are prepared for assembly.
The resin pieces themselves are finely cast in a shiny resin that I have not seen before. They look more like finely molded styrene plastic than the textured resin that I normally see.
The detailing is exquisite as you can see, especially on the hubs. I hope this detail at least is visible when the prop spinner is placed over the blades.
There are some thin bits of excess resin hanging onto the parts, most notably the openings in the spinner but the resin on the parts looks immaculate.
The comparisons between the HD parts and the kits parts indicate to me that Hasegawa did a very good job at portraying the shapes of the spinner and prop blades. Outside from the lack of riveting on the Hasegawa spinner, the differences between the two are subtle and may not be deemed to be significant to all modelers.
One notable difference is the increased length of the HD propeller blade at the base nearest to the hub.
Interestingly, on my last Dora build, the Hasegawa prop assembly was questioned by an enthusiast as being inaccurate since it appeared that the blades would not clear the front of the radiator cowling if the blades were fully feathered. The longer shafts at the base of the HD propeller blades may correct this inaccuracy.
That finishes the pre-build inventory of the kit and aftermarket pieces. I still need wrap up a few obligations before jumping back into the modeling workshop so this build won't start in earnest for at least a couple of weeks.
No guarantee of success is going to come from my mouth. If I had to choose between well-finished kit parts that lack detail and poorly-finished AM parts with loads of detail, I'll choose the first every time. So... just because I bought it doesn't mean I'm going to use it. I've experienced poor QA from resin manufacturers as well as botching some by my own hand. S we'll just have to see how it goes.
