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Reverse Engineered Kitbashing The de-construction and building techniques of converting a 1:72nd scale Airfix kit of the German pre-WW2 Henschel Hs. 123A-1 into a Racing Air Craft. Text and Photos By Andrew Trimmer Introduction - Working the Philosophy

The completed build with all the ‘reversed’ modi- The 1970’s re-issued release kit of the 1/72nd scale fications altering the original design into a canard Henschel HS. 123 that will be reconfigured. based racing flyer.

Reverse Engineered Kitbashing inaccuracies in the mouldings and hyper-details a standard factory kit. ‘Scratch Built’ - full construction build-up from plans or drawings using a broad selection of third party Turning a 1:72nd scale Airfix kit of the pre WW2 Henschel Hs. 123A-1 materials and techniques augmented with sculpting, vacu-forming, computerised ‘CNC’ routing, laser Dive Bomber back-to-front to cross the line as an Air Racing Craft. cutting, and 3D rapid prototyping, including casting and mouldings of special parts. Text and Photos by Andrew Trimmer ‘Hybridised Kit-Bashing’ - taking several genre’s of subjects, e.g.; , cars, tanks, and armour, and This step-by-step making of article over twenty chapters features the model building techniques ‘bashing’ together selected components to create a new custom design. and procedures to modify an existing model aircraft kit into a hybrid ‘Air Racing Vehicle’ concept that is part of on-going developments in a broader publishing venture involving the history and develop- ‘SW Greeblies’ - with its origins in the mid-sixties in 2001; A Space Odyssey, and made famous in the ment of alternate reality reverse-engineered ‘Air Racing Sports’ vehicles across eight decades. 70’s retro classic Star Wars universe by scratch-building space ships and adding thousands of detail parts from multiple kits to the surface, this approach used all of the above techniques (minus the 21st These techniques are based on general model kit building standards with a few added specialised century CAD prototyping technology) to create its unique design philosophy. procedures used to customise existing kit features. The design philosophy used here to establish the look of the vehicle is based on one of five model building strains in the hobby. In this article the build will follow a combination of ‘Out-of-the-Box’ and ‘Scratch-Building’ to achieve an adapted ‘front-to back’ canard wing prototype with only the kit parts, plus a few ‘spares’. ‘Out of the Box‘- standard construction of cutting, gluing, and painting a complete step-by-step injec- tion moulded kit of one subject. “The Henschel HS 123 was designed as the first dive-bomber to equip the new . During the the HS 123 was used with great success in the close support role and gained great popu- ‘After-Market’- standard build-up of the base kit with the addition of ‘After-Market Detail Parts’; small- larity for their reliability and rugged construction.” run customised resin cast detail sets, photo-etched brass metal detail sheets, and decals that rectifies www.andrewtrimmer.com Reverse Building the 1:72nd Henschel Hs.123A-1 2 Introduction - Working the Philosophy

New front undercarriage struts, gear doors, rear horizontal stabilisers mounted as canards at the nose, The larger upper wings have been flipped and and retro-fitted twin vertical stabilisers on the upper brought to the bottom, the smaller wing flipped to wings. the top, with new front door. 11 12

Upper and lower wing sets have been flipped and The pilot’s line-of-sight position in profile with new turned around so the aerofoil shape faces the new wing shield canopy and side mirrors, with the head- front. The engine cowling becomes the exhaust cone rest becoming the engine intake scoop. with the addition of sports extractor manifolds.

13 14 www.andrewtrimmer.com Reverse Building the 1:72nd Henschel Hs.123A-1 3