ARADO AR-196 A-3 Water Diorama

AR-196 ARADO A-3 DIORAMA BUILD

Materials/tools used

Kit:                            1/72 scale Airfix AR-196 Arado A-2/A-3 (A02019)

Diorama Base:          ½ inch Plywood and expanded polystyrene with plaster of Paris

Water effects:            Casting Craft 2 part polyester resin and Liquitex Heavy Gloss Gel

Ground materials:      Woodland Scenics

Paint:                          Testors enamels (Aircraft and figures) and Tamiya/ other acrylics (diorama)

Sandpaper:                 800 grit wet/dry paper

Figures:                      Airfix RAF ground crew (converted to Luftwaffe) set A01747

Introduction

I love float planes and having bought the kit, decided to do a water diorama based on the WW2 pictures  of 2./ Aufkl. Gr. 125 at Suda bay, Crete in 1943 (only because I liked the bright yellow wing tips). Having created a previous water diorama of a TBF Avenger, I felt happy to give it another try. The diorama won 1st at IPMS Ottawa local meeting.

OVERVIEW OF THE BUILD

Interior

The Airfix Arado kit doesn’t come with and cockpit floor, just some seats and bulk head between the pilot and observer/ gunner so I put in a styrene floor, gunner seat and some photo etch seat belts. For the observer radio I used an old JU-88 radio set which is the same basic type and trimmed it to size. The stock control panel and decal is a bit clunky but had to do for now. I also used a better detailed MG-13 from the JU-88 set and scratch built the MG swivel mount in the observer compartment.

After installation and painting and shading it fit ok. With the canopy attached, visibility is fairly limited anyway. The fuselage fits pretty well together and only needed a bit of filler and CA glue along the seams – nothing major.

 Engine

As this is a simple kit, the stock radial engine is fairly low on detail and is inserted through the back of the cowling. I drilled out the forward facing MG barrel opening and added two air filters to the top of the engine. The large propeller nose cone will cover a lot of the detail anyway. I painted the engine in Humbrol gunmetal and then scratched off some of the paint along the piston heads and rods for weathering.

Fuselage & Wings

The wings and fuselage fits well in this kit although the elevators and ailerons are a bit large and clunky and needed gluing in the up, down or level position. The fuselage has a lot of raised panel lines but are not horrific although the cockpit section lacks some detail such as the engine exhausts. Joints at the wing roots are clean and did not need a great deal of filling or sanding. I added the crane hoist cables on the forward part of the fuselage using thin copper wire from inside electrical flex.

 I made the decision to assemble the floats and struts and rig them before attaching to the fuselage. After much testing of the rigging (I used stretched sprue), to avoid sagging after gluing to the fuselage I attached the finished assembly and painted the rigging with well diluted black enamel.

Since the diorama included a bomb trolley, I cut the kit 250lb bombs off of their brackets and sanded everything down to a rather basic bomb clamp shape under the wings.

Painting & finishing

I airbrush pre-shaded all the panel lines in gloss Testors black enamel and then added the 2 tone RLM 70 (Model master 2080 Schwartzgrun) and RLM 72 (Model master 2082 Grun) camouflage pattern on the upper surfaces. I added a touch of white to the RLM 72 and highlighted the panels to add a bit of depth to the paint.

 Masking the floats and struts was somewhat fiddly but once completed I used RLM 65 (Model Master 2078 Hellblau) in several coats to let the pre-shading show through. RLM 04 (Model master 2072 Gelb) was used for the wing tips and engine cowling underside.

 

The red propeller spinner was neatly painted using a drill bit size gauge as a mask which worked out well and better than using masking tape.

 

The kit decals were well done as are the newer Airfix types with small edging. The fuselage crosses and letters needed a few coats of Microsol to soften them up to fit over the molded fabric and rib detail.

Creating the Diorama

The diorama base was made from 8 x 8 inch plywood (1/2 inch thick) and the beach section made from a sanded and cut block of expanded polystyrene (although in future I wouldn’t use this with the polyester resin due to several accidents where the styrene dissolved. I used a thin crust of Plaster of Paris painted over the beach for texture and painted the surface in acrylic paint (I forgot to seal the paint with clear gloss which reacted with the resin turning the colour a bright yellow/ green).

 

I used a mix of grey acrylic paint and masking tape to create the concrete launching ramp (the tape used to affect raised ribs) and added small stones and fine sand to the areas below the water line glued with Woodland Scenics spray glue.

 

The jetty was made from thin balsa wood sanded with fine paper and glued with white wood glue in individual planks and support pillars (made from cocktail sticks). Woodland Scenics pine tree bush (painted sponge really) was used as seaweed clumps on top of the darker green painted sea floor.

 

Water Effects

After all the work on the Arado and the diorama, the time came to add the resin water. You can always use Woodland Scenics water effects but it isn’t as good for optical clarity or layering as the polyester type. Casting Craft polyester resin is a two part type that requires absolute and exact measurements of each part in order to work well, not crack, heat up or deform the diorama so it is worth testing before hand on a mini diorama!

First clear acrylic walls were taped to the sides of the base and made water tight (otherwise the resin will escape). Clear acrylic is good to check the filling progress. Avoid using thin plastic as it will heat up and warp (1/8 inch min is best, although the sturdier the better). I used food colouring (blue and green) to tint the mixture (Hint: the colour will always look darker in the pot and lighter once poured into the diorama)

 

Once poured, the resin needs to be prodded with a stir stick to soften the shore line of the water.

 

Once the aircraft is placed in the water, I raided the tail up slightly and poured the rest of the resin so that it “floated” realistically and didn’t rest on the sea bed.

The resin will naturally dry either in ripples, or perfectly flat depending entirely on the heating effect, mix ratio and other black magic that I’ve yet to perfect although the end result was better than I could have planned. I used a stir stick to raise the resin up in soft peaks as it is setting to make ripples and waves on the shore and around the floats.

The waves and froth at the shore and around the dock was created using Liquitex Heavy Gloss Gel (from artist stores) which goes on like thick acrylic paint but dries clear. Once dry, the gel was painted with white artist’s acrylic paint and then coated with future to get a gloss wet shine.

Diorama Detail

Figures. The 5 figures are all re-purposed from the Airfix RAF ground crew set and made from older plastic that doesn’t sand at all well and have large flash and mold lines down each leg and arm which are hard to remove. They are simply tan painted and detailed although actual Mediterranean Luftwaffe wore mostly shorts and short sleeve shirts. The trolley is a modified RAF starter cart to carry the 250 lb. bombs cut off of the Arado kit.

Launch Ramp.  I used fine electrical copper wire to make eyelets for the rope on each float and set into drilled holes with CA glue then painted with Testors aluminum paint. The bollards set into the ramp are the butts of 1/35 scale Tamiya Sten guns glued into the ramp and stained with rust paint and a mixture of thinners and Valejo brown wreathing pastel.

Dock Detail. The dock was made from individual planks cut from thin balsa wood sheet, fine sanded with 800 grit paper and glued together with white glue. It was painted with thinned Tamiya acrylic paint to show the wood grain. Un-thinned paint was used to detail the rusted nails.

Foliage.

The foliage (Grass: T42 fine turf earth; Reeds: FG173 Field Grass; Bushes: Realistic Tree Kit) in the diorama is from Woodland Scenics. Acrylic paint was used to highlight the bushes to a more dried Mediterranean look.

Conclusion

Overall this was a very nice kit to build even though it is an older 1966 Airfix mold. Decals are new in 2011 and they show well. The plastic is nice and hard, easy to trim and sand with limited flashing and minor parting mold lines. Resin water is definitely an acquired art and it’s highly recommended to practice on smaller (2-4 inch size) dioramas to test the drying, layering and surface effects.