Wingnut Wings 1/32 scale Salmson 2-A2

One thing about building the Salmson: You’re going to pretend you’re a wood worker and stain lots of grain. There’s a bunch of framing on display as well as the prop.

Wingnut Wings has reduced the parts count to a degree by molding some equipment with the aircraft’s structure, but it doesn’t detract from the overall impression of detail.

To replicate wood, I apply oil paints over a variety of base coats, then add grain using a stiff brush.  First,  brushed on light tan. Any light tan will do. I used Tamiya buff (XF-57).

Finally I stroke a stiff brush in the direction of airflow, removing a little of the paint. This is the result before any weathering or detail painting. This method takes only a few minutes per part and is very forgiving.

Here’s the graining underway. The strut on the right has been finished, while the one on the left is waiting to be streaked. Don’t worry about getting paint on other stuff; you can go back and paint details after the graining is complete.

After detail painting, you can really appreciate the variation the wood grain.

Here’s a close-up of the finished right side of the cockpit.

Instrument panels — or boards as they were known at the time (for obvious reasons) — are a highlight of Wingnut Wing’s cockpits. The Salmson has a simple panel, but the surrounding structure is molded on, so careful painting is required.

Here’s the panel underway. I painted the wooden areas prior to finishing the natural-metal areas to avoid masking over metallic paint.

Here’s the finished instrument panel … excuse me … instrument board. Instead of filling the dials with clear gloss, I punched out disks of .005" clear plastic and attached them with Pledge FloorCare Multi-surface Finish.

The Salmson offers much latitude for practicing your wood graining – it has 8 struts, for instance.  Here is the application of the oil paint to the strut, in the direction of the grain.

After the oil is brushed on in loose streaks, I let it dry for an hour or so.

Next, use a stiff brush to streak in the grain, with a few twists and stipples to add some variety. Since I’m usually on a tight timeframe, I’ll let the oil paint dry overnight and then overcoat it with an acrylic flat coat – Model Master Acryl flat clear is my usual standby.

After placing 5 reinforcement strip decals and painting the mount ends, the strut is ready to install. Now I just have to do it again. And again. And … you get the idea.

Did I mention it helps if you like painting when building Wingnut Wings kits or any WWI airplane for that matter? Many components were left unpainted during manufacturer at the time, so no painting everything RLM 02 or interior green.

After a lot of work — and fun — the interior is painted and ready for assembly. You can see the many details included in the kit. About the only things you might want to add are the many bracing wires and control lines running throughout the interior.

A close up of the pilot’s seat shows the photoetched-metal seat belts.

Here’s a shot of the interior assembled and ready to place in the fuselage.

First I had to paint the wood stringers molded into the fuselage halves. After masking with lots of strips of painters tape, I sprayed the tiny area of exposed plastic with Tamiya hull red (XF-9).

To anchor the elevator control cables inside the fuselage, I glued in a piece of .188" x .188" strip styrene with a couple of holes drilled through it to accept the wires.

I tied at least three knots in the end of .007" surgical suture — my rigging material of choice — and super-glued them to the styrene block. It pays to plan ahead when it comes to rigging; ask me how I know …

The fit of the interior parts is so good that I didn’t glue anything in place. That allowed flexibility when I attached the fuselage halves; there are a lot of parts that have to play well together.

The fuselage fits together extremely well. I had to add a whisker of filler behind the gunner’s position, but that was my fault for not noticing the seam was a hair off center when I clamped the assembly to dry.

Here you can see the lack of filler or major sanding — other than my self-inflicted problem. Assemble carefully, and the Salmson won’t fight you.

Like all Wingnut Wings kits, the Salmson comes with a detailed engine. Fit of the complicated assembly is very good. These parts are just pressed together.

This is the rear of the finished and assembled engine. A sturdy engine mount — the blue thing — attaches and aligns the power plant with the fuselage. Superdetailers could spend hours connecting everything with wires and plumbing.

The Salmson engine is quite colorful, …

… but the Salmson’s massive cooling gills will hide much of that detail. Wingnut offers both open and closed options. These are the open gills.

Here’s the engine assembly ready to be mounted to the airframe.

Another highlight of warplanes of this era is the visible armament. Here is the twin-Lewis guns and the fitting for the back seat. Photoetched-metal elevation mounts are provided, but everything else is plastic, including the gunsights. Aligning the two guns and their mounts was tricky. Take your time or your guns will be cross-eyed.

Here’s the finished armament. One of the kit’s options is a pair of Marlin machine guns for the nose, a rarely seen option. I couldn’t resist something different from the more common single Vickers gun.

Playtime is over, I needed to get serious and get some rigging prep out of the way. Examine the rigging plan in the instructions carefully. There are double wires everywhere, which doesn’t make rigging difficult, it just doubles the work.  Here I’m attaching eyelets from Bob’s Buckles as anchoring points for the wires to the center wing section. Notice the “sticky squares” n the background. They hold the tiny eyelets while I place each one. It’s a cheap and effective loss prevention idea.

To mask the camouflage, I photocopied the painting instructions to scale, then cut out each section. Taping the paper tight against the surface kept the edges sharp.

As an example, I painted the elevator tan. Then I cut the color sections out of the photocopy, and tape the masks over the elevator.

I’ve painted both the dark brown and black areas.

Remove the mask and, voila!, one camouflaged elevator.

Here are most of the major assemblies laid out prior to assembly. I’d spent a little over 40 hours on the build at this point.

The Salmson had sturdy landing gear with three attachment points on each side. I installed the wires for the rigging before installing the gear, because most of the attachment points are actually on struts. I have left them loose for adjustment later.

Have I mentioned that it pays to plan ahead for rigging? I realized I could run wires from one side of the plane to the other through the upper fuselage. I just needed to drill holes in the corner of the pilot’s bulkhead, then thread wire through.

Deviating from the instructions, I glued the upper-wing center section in place before attaching the outer wings. This made aligning the struts easy and allowed access to the wires. I loosely installed the rigging for the center section because it’s easier to thread wires through the small brass tubes that I use.

Settling in for the long haul, I started adding the inter-plane wires. When using eyelets and tubing for rigging, the easiest method is to attach the wires to the top wing before it is on the aircraft. Here you see the eyelet, installed prior to painting, with wires passed through it and then looped back through a small brass tube. I pull the wire through the tubing to apply tension, then apply a drop of super glue to fix it in place.

It sure looks like I forgot something. Thanks to great engineering, the center section is sturdy enough to hold the upper wing without the struts. This allowed me to run most of the rigging without having to work around obstacles.

Amazingly, the kit’s tolerances are so good that I could pop the struts into place without glue, although I did add a little liquid cement to the outboard struts just to be sure. Notice the taped wires coming out of the cowling panels.

All the wires needed tension applied to the lower-wing attachment points. I use cross-locking tweezers, so I can concentrate on what I’m doing rather than worrying about holding onto the wire. To apply tension, I pull the wire through the brass tube keeping it parallel to the wire from the top wing. the top wing. Once slack is gone, I slide the brass tube down to the eyelet and secure it with a drop of super glue.

Here’s the Salmson with all the wing wires pulled tight and glued in place. At this point, the model looks like it needs a haircut.

I use “Castroviejo Scissors” or “squizzers” — a cross between tweezers and scissors — to carefully cut the excess wire close to the brass tubes. Go slow and keep your eyes on the prize, because it’s easy to get distracted and cut the rigging wire rather than the left over.

Take care with the one-piece elevator, because it is very fragile. I didn’t install mine until nearly all the rigging and detail work was finished. The elevator drooped a bit on either side of the fuselage.  This is a case where rigging supplies structural support, a benefit of using nylon monofilament.