Roden 1/32 WW1 Engines
By Mike Whye
Have you read reviews that state something like, “The engine in this kit is a kit all by itself”? I know they’re out there because I’ve written statements like that from time to time.
Well, Roden has taken the engines of three of its 1/32 Word War I aircraft kits and has made kits of them. Really. So far, Roden has produced six of them and in this in-box review, I’m looking at three of them: the Mercedes D. III, the Hispano-Suiza 8A and the Gnome Monosoupape 9B. Each comes in a 1-½-inch-deep box measuring 5 x 8 inches that contains a clear plastic bag holding a four-page set of instructions, a sprue of gray plastic styrene engine parts, another sprue of engine stand parts, a black plastic display stand and another smaller bag holding a gray styrene propeller and a fret of photo-etch parts which are basically a nameplate for the display stand and small details for each engine.
So, let’s look at the three kits.
Mercedes D. III, Roden Kit No. 623
The Mercedes D. III was considered one of the best engines used by the German Air Force and Germany’s allies during World War I. Introduced in 1914 with 160 horsepower, the D.III was improved to 180 hp by 1918 and the 6-cylinder, water-cooled, inline engine was used by most of the German fighters toward the end of the war. These fighters included the Albatros D.1, D.II, D.III, C.1, W.IV; Fokker D.IV, D. VII, Halberstadt CL.II, CL.IV; Hansa-Brandenburg C.I, W.12, W.29; Junkers CL.1; LFG Roland C.II, D.II; Rumpler C.1, 6B; Pfalz D.III, D.XII and Germany’s giant aircraft of the era. More Mercedes D.III engines were built than any other type at that time.
Fourteen parts make up the model engine. About the only places for sanding is the front and rear cylinders of the engine block once you glue parts 10 and 11 together plus the bottom joint of these two pieces. The bottom of those two parts, when together, form the engine block which is to be painted aluminum while the upper parts, the cylinders are to be painted burnt iron…so some masking will be involved when you paint these two assembled pieces. After this, the parts are smaller and are painted a variety of metal colors, particularly copper for the pipes.
Once the plastic parts of the engine are assembled, a process that looks easy, you’re into four diagrams of PE work involving 30 pieces. While the instructions call out the colors the plastic pieces are to be painted, you’re on your own with the PE pieces. Sorry, folks, I’m not a Mercedes D.III expert and can’t help you other than to suggest you take your cues from the pictures at this website.
The assembly of the engine stand is simple and straightforward: build it, paint it whatever color you want (the instructions suggest medium green); paint the display base if you wish; then put the stand on the base, attach the PE nameplate and put the engine on the stand.
Your last step in each of these kits is adding the propeller and if you want ideas about how to paint it, visit Hyperscale where you will find Roger Fabrocini’s way of painting a wooden propeller. Another site shows another technique to paint wooden propellers.
Hispano-Suiza 8A, Roden Kit No. 622
With a double-barreled name reflecting its Spanish and Swiss heritage, the Hispano-Suiza 8A started as a modification of a V-8 car engine that went onto power many aircraft flown by Great Britain, France, Italy and Russia during WWI. More than 6,000 engines were built and powered such aircraft as the SPAD VII; RAF S.E.5 and S.E.5a; Sopwith Dolphin; and some SPAD XIIIs.
Again, the engine parts, 31 of them, are on one sprue. The cylinder banks are separate from the engine block, which makes painting them easier than the cylinders on the Mercedes D.III. These then assemble onto the two-piece engine block and many small parts round out the engine
assembly. About the only things you’ll need to prep are sanding the seams of the two-part assemblies and scraping the mold lines of some other pieces. Like the earlier kit, this one also has PE and once more you’ll find no reference as to how to paint them. So once more, I’ll direct you to a website which has a beautiful color drawing of an HS-8 made in 1919 by the Wright-Martin Company.
By the way, if one plans on building several of these kits within a small time, be aware that the paint schedule is different between kits so don’t always rely on A to be Burnt Iron and so on.
The stand in the kit is the same as the other as are the display base and the nameplate.
Gnome Monosoupape 9B, Roden Knit No. 621
Designed and built by French engineer Laurent Sequin, the Gnome Monosoupape 9B rotary engine was a successor to the earlier 5- and 7-cylinder Gnome engines which had various problems. The new 9-cylinder, air-cooled Monosoupape (which means single valve in French) produced up to 100 horsepower, was called the Gnome Delta and powered many allied aircraft including the Airco DH2, Vicker FB5, RAFFE 8, Nieuport 28 and Gunbus.
One unique quality of this engine was that it could not be throttled back to land without over-heating; it had to revolve at a high enough rpm to cool itself. Thus, upon landing, a pilot would have to quickly cut its electrical power to briefly stop the engine, which would slow the airplane down, then restart it to continue with a forward airspeed and then cut it again, and so on until the plane could land. Also, the engine produced a large amount of torque which made turning the planes it was in quite fast, well, at least in one direction. In The Aviation History On-Line Museum, one pilot was quoted as saying, “Why, it puts both eyes on the same side of your nose!
This is the simplest of the three kits in this review to build. The engine sprue has just six parts, yup, the same amount of parts to build the stand. The cylinders are part of the engine housing which causes a problem because the housing and cylinders are separate colors. Aside from the housing and cylinders being one major part, the other is the rigid ignition harness. Once you painted the four colors needed on the various pieces, assembling them will take oh, say, five minutes. A PE piece fits atop each cylinder head and one piece above the hub. Paint the stand, assemble that to the display base with its nameplate, attach the engine and that’s all there is to this kit, folks!
Beside the three kits reviewed here, Roden also makes 1/32 scale kits of the Oberursel UR.!!, Hispano-Suiza 8Ab and the Wolseley Viper engines. I cannot find the MSRP but an online search turned up one store that was selling them for U.S. $13.80 apiece. If you’re looking for a way to show off some engines that are nice kits, here you go!
Thanks to Roden for all three engines for review.