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Dujin 1/72 DFS 193
 

Dujin 1/72 DFS 193

By Tracy Hancock

History

Alexander Lippisch's most famous design will always be the Me 163 Komet, but before rocketing to fame, he was a pioneer in glider design and the design of tailless aircraft. A collaboration with rocket pioneer Fritz von Opel in 1929 resulted in a rocket powered canard glider flight, the genesis of the Komet. For the most part, Lippisch's work revolved around two tailless designs, the Storch (Stork) and Delta series. The Storch series were high wing monoplanes with sweepback and evolved from gliders to powered machines into the Delta series. The Delta designs began Lippisch's work on all wing airplanes and included the Delta I, II, III and IV (DFS 39), as well as the futuristic DFS 40 and reaching its apex with the Lippisch DM-1 which in turn influenced the F-102 and F-106 delta-wing fighters.

So where does the DFS 193 fit into all of this you ask?? It was a wind tunnel model for a reconnaissance plane design that was never produced.

The Kit

Dujin's DFS 193 comes in a no frills plastic bag with an A4 sheet containing a brief history (in French), a set of plans and a listing of references. The kit itself is comprised of roughly 20 nicely cast resin parts which will all need some degree of cleanup and a set of vacuformed winscreens which includes an extra for piece of mind. The fuselage halves are hollow cast in two pieces and are quite nice, but care will be needed to remove the joint seam without damaging the stringer detail on the rear fuselage. The wing is cast in one piece and is free from defects and has a commendably sharp trailing edge. All of the struts are provided, but as this is a parasol type aircraft I would recommend replacing them. The wheels and propeller are nice, but the only interior given are two seats; even on a project aircraft most folks will want to spruce up the very visible interior.

Color is given as overall RLM 63 (and why not?) and being designed in 1936 the cockpit color would be RLM 02. The registration given is D-IDFS (probably artistic license on Dujin's part), but no decals are provided.

Conclusion

This kit looks to be a quick build with no dogma attached. Why should the Luft '46 guys have all of the fun!?

References

Dujin lists I.P.M.S. Deutschland 1/86 and Luftfahrt International #8, page 1215-1224 as references for this kit. Can anyone help me with these?