Arado Ar/Ta 235 N-0 "Stachel"

[peterlepold]

Hello

My name is Peter and I'm from Germany. I have been following for a long time with interest this forum. Now I want to show you a what if model of mine.

It is the Arado Ar/Ta 235 N-0 "Stachel".

The model is a mix from Revells Arado 234 B-2 / N & Focke Wulf TA 154, scale 1:48, figures are from ICM and Preiser.
Wings, engines and landing gear are from the Revell TA-154 partially changed. I changed front landing gear, engraved some new lines. The cockpit refined and build new the radio operator space. I added new brake lines, gun barrels from needle cannulae and scratch built the flame killer.
Radar FuG 218 V / R "Neptune" (combined night hunting and reverse warning device) and Fug 400 "Athena" are complete self-made.
900 liter auxiliary tank from Italeri, and a lot of new details. Painted, weathered and washed with colors from Revell, Testors and pastels.







The story about this plane:
About the Arado 234 I do not need tell much, only this: The B-2 was the first jet-powered bomber in the world. In December 1944 the first B-2/N underwent as a night fighter its test flight, but the existing jet engines for effective long-haul operations had a lot of problems.
In early September 1944, the much improved DB 603N engines were tested successfully, elsewhere the radar FuG 400 "Athena" used for the first time and the Arado engineers immediately had an idea ...!

In close collaboration with Kurt Tank (Focke Wulf), Walter Blume (Arado) built in the shortest possible time from the AR 234 B-2/N an aircraft in a hitherto unique composite construction.
Fuselage and technology have been used unchanged to 80% of the Ar 234. Wings and landing gear contributed Kurt Tank in which he again virtually unchanged took over from his TA 154 (construction of the TA 154 was stopped) and the engines were borrowed from Daimler-Benz.









With the now called Arado Ar / Ta 235 N-0 they start a early planed concept into practice, to use this aircraft to support as a early warning system for night hunting associations.
The engineers installed into the Arado the improved radar FuG 218 V / R "Neptune" (such as increased range), eg to find British aircraft quickly at night.
In addition, the newly developed FuG 400 "Athena" was installed on the right wing to disrupt the  British AI Mk.VIII night fighter radar.
This converted Arados should cruising in the British air routes to discover the incident bombers and British night fighters faster, in order to warn the own night fighter groups at an early stage.








The crew of the Arado should not even fight the enemy aircraft but only locate it, report the German night fighter associations and track the enemy aircraft, disrupt radio and radar installations of the accompanying British night fighters and also conduct approaching own night fighters quickly and thus more effectively to the objectives ...!

The Ar / Ta 235 was not particularly large, but become quite difficult by the incorporation of the amounts of electronics. In order to increase the reach and useful life of the machine had been applied in addition an external 900 liter auxiliary tank.
However, to save fuel for the flight, they installed two droppable Walter HWK 109-500 rocket boosters to jump start. So at startup, the engines needed less power and therefore less fuel.
The test samples possessed only two 20 mm MG 151/20 in the wings roots, a more offensive armament was not planed about weight reasons.

The Arado Ar / Ta 235 N-0 was equipped with:
- 2 Heinkel pneumatic catapult seats
- pressurized cabin
- FuG 218 V / R "Neptune", FuG 400 "Athena"
- two 20-mm machine guns MG 151/20 in the wing roots
- two Walter HWK 109-500 rocket boosters to kick-start
- two DB 603N engines with two-stage supercharger and 2700 hp starting power
- maximum speed 620 km/h (with the 900 liter auxiliary tank)




















A total of three of these machines were built and one of them was used at the I./NJG 1 (what happened to the other planes is unknown).  From March 22 to April 28, 1945, Captain Wilhelm Kaiser (pilot) and Lieutenant Friedrich König (radio operator) flew a total of 12 night missions in space from the Netherlands to Schleswig-Holstein.
They could locate a total of five times far away British aircraft and warned the German night fighters early..... the first "AWACS system" was born!














Hope you like it.

Many greetings from Germany

Peter

[PR19_Kit]

That, Peter, is TREMENDOUS! 

The idea is great, the model is OUTSTANDING and the figures look as if they're about to step off the page!

Welcome to the Forum, you'll fit right in here with ideas like that. 

[zenrat]

That is excellent.  And believable.
Well done.
I love the dog.

[sandiego89]

Quite an entry! Welcome Peter. Really well done, really like the engines and paint. Great work!

[Old Wombat]

If you hadn't told us otherwise, I would have bought a story saying that this was a rare kit of a rare variant of the Arado 234.

Brilliant build & diorama!

[Librarian]

Absolutely  . Very inspirational. Got a spare Ta-154 around somewhere..... . It really does have potential as a whiffer's kit.

[NARSES2]

What an entrance ! Wonderfull build 

[Hotte]

Willkommen hier im "What if" Forum.
Kenn Deine Kiste ja schon aus dem FF 

Hotte

[Martin H]

Now that was an introduction with pure style.

That is a stunning build.

[Army of One]

WOW.....!!!!! What an awesome build.....and welcome to the forum........

[rickshaw]

Can't argue with that one, the quality is superb!  I love Adolf Galland inspecting the aircraft.  Who's the dozy ground crew sitting down in the presence of officers?   

[Dizzyfugu]

Nice, and great finish! 

[peterlepold]

Hello

Thank you for the kind welcome and positive words about my model.

The idea for this conversion was: I like the basic design of the Arado, but I do not like jet engines.....I'm a fan of propeller aircraft.
The jet engines at that time were not designed for long-distance missions, therefore I built the Arado with conventional prop engines.
The original wings of the Arado are too narrow for prop engines, that's why I built the wings of the FW-TA on it. That was most of the work to adapt the Focke Wulf TA wings to the fuselage of the Arado.

Can't argue with that one, the quality is superb!  I love Adolf Galland inspecting the aircraft.  Who's the dozy ground crew sitting down in the presence of officers?  

This is not Galland, it is the General of the German night fighters Josef Kammhuber at the inspection of the new aircraft and the ground crew man has not noticed that the officers are present (he was responsible for the defrosting of the aircraft)  


Greetings
Peter

[TomZ]

Great idea. I love it !!!



TomZ

[Howard of Effingham]

excellent way to make an entry. 

very believable bit of 'luft 46' we have here.

and a very well made model too.