Gothic People-mover.

[VickersVandal]

After the treaty of Versailles, German aviation was virtually nonexistent. However, Deutschlanders still needed to travel and aviation was here to stay. Somehow in the melee of Fokker-smashing after 1918, some Gothas G.Vs (the ones that had survived landing accidents, that is) slipped through unscathed. They were quickly whisked away to a safe location to have major modifications made and go on to become part of Der Vaterland's fledgling civil aviation industry as the Gotha G.8 airliner, before Junkers came on the scene with his corrugated sheds with wings.


The kit is Roden's 1/72 Gotha G.V and the inspiration is the Handley Page W.8 conversion of the 0/400

This may be biting off more than I can chew (I have to confess that I've been defeated by Roden's Felixstowe F.2A in a group build before) but nothing ventured, nothing gained..... plus, without some inspiration like this, both Roden Gotha kits are likely to sit in the bottom of my stash until the end of time.

[Modelling_Mushi]

Hey VV this sounds great! Looking forward to seeing this one .

[Mossie]

Good to see a WWI subject, not enough of those about.

[Captain Canada]

Yes this will be interesting !

[VickersVandal]

Thanks, gents. I hope not to disappoint. The beauty of this approach to the kit is a simple paint scheme and no dramas with Roden decals. Should speed things up. Wing alignment is still likely to be Armageddon though. Time to break out the lego......again

Haven't been able to make a start on it yet. Work is killing me....absolutely killing me. Hope to get some bench time this weekend though.

[VickersVandal]

Bit of a start on this sucka. The cockpit is moving to the very front and behind that will be the enlarged fuselage with passenger cabin.

[Captain Canada]

Love it...the original Guppy !

[jcf]

 

Cool, very much in line with the R-Plane based airliner concepts of the period. 





Interestingly Zeppelin-Staaken was originally V.G.O (Versuchs Gotha Ost) which was a cooperative combine
of Zeppelin and Gotha.

http://flyingmachines.ru/Site2/Arts/Art5747.htm

[zenrat]

So to be truly gothic will it have flying buttresses, gargoyles and bats in the belfry?

[Mossie]

I like this project and the shape you've got for the upper part of the passenger deck, it's very much in keeping with the look of the period.

I'm trying to get a sense of scale to the R.IX, an eight engined flying double decker bus...

[Captain Canada]

So to be truly gothic will it have flying buttresses, gargoyles and bats in the belfry?

lol that would be pretty cool ~ The gargoyles would have their wings spread to aid lift 

[zenrat]

Or would the crew all be dressed in black with pale faces and too much eye make-up?

[NARSES2]

Or would the crew all be dressed in black with pale faces and too much eye make-up?

That's what I've been thinking. Can't get Radish out of mind when I see this 

[zenrat]

I'm sure Steel Penguin can direct Vickers Vandal in the direction of some appropriate figures.

Only on an internet forum would that make sense...

[VickersVandal]

Please! Won't someone think of the children??!!!  

Anyway, jcf, thanks for posting up that info. That's exactly the concept I was going for, though I was unaware of the R-planes. The HP W-8 was my main inspiration but now this gives me more inspiration for how to add some realism to the concept - I now plan to use the cabin layout of the Aviatik R.III.

Unfortunately no progress on this for the moment. Work has been hell and what little modelling time I've had has been spent trying to finish off a 1980 Nissan Skyline in lout-spec   though I guess I could have militarised that into some kind of fully sick anti-aircraft gun rig....