DORNIER Do 217E
The Revell/Monogram kit built straight out of the box and finished in the markings of II./KG100, based at Bordeaux-Merignac, France in August 1943 and armed with the radio controlled Henschel Hs 293 glide bomb mounted on an ETC 2000/XII bomb carrier under the starboard wing and a 900 litre drop tank under the port wing. The appropriate Kehl series radio guidance and control transmitter system was installed as identified by the small fairing on the starboard side of the nose, just to the rear of the nose glazing. (Model by Bill Newton)
featuring the prominent port side throttle levers, detailed sidewalls, rudder pedals, rear bulkhead and radio operator/gunner’s station. Although not all that much will actually be visible under the large but heavily framed canopy, there is still a lot of internal construction and painting to be done before joining the fuselage halves together. The single sprue of clear
parts covers the nose glazing and underside bomb sight section, main canopy, side window gun positions, DL 131 top turret, ventral gun position and underwing landing lights. The MG 15 and MG 131 machine guns are finely detailed and come with separate magazines and ammunition belts as appropriate. The Revell Do 217E-5 kit boxing doesn’t include the flexible nose- mounted 20mm MG FF cannon, or the longer early tail cone (with which many Do 217E-2s were built), but as the braking mechanism didn’t work particularly well, most Es had the short tail cones installed, which is included. The engine nacelles are
moulded in vertically split halves, (and note, the pairs are
going to see very much of them anyway as they are mostly hidden by the cooling fans, although they do need painting prior to being enclosed in the nacelles. The exhaust manifolds are
designed to be inserted from inside the nacelles, prior to the halves being joined, but I found it better to leave them off until after painting the main airframe, and by simply removing their locating tabs, attach them from the outside. Optional external flame dampeners are separate pieces. The mainwheel wells are
nicely detailed with a firewall blanking off the front and a bulkhead to blank off the rear, with additional detail under the upper wing halves which makes up the wheel well roof. The landing gear is also well done and satisfyingly sturdy, and can be fitted near the end of the main construction, which keeps them from being damaged during building. The mainwheels have ‘flats’
moulded on them and the tailwheel is separate and slots in to the tailwheel leg fork. I particularly liked the way the main undercarriage and tailwheel doors fitted with their extended retraction arms slotting into the walls of the bays. Underwing stores include a pair of nicely detailed nine-
piece Henschel Hs 293 glide bombs, with associated ETC 2000/XII racks and a pair of 900 litre long range drop tanks, on two identical sprues, although the usual operational fit for an E-5 was one Hs 293 under the starboard wing and a 900 litre drop tank under the port wing to increase range and act as a ‘counter balance’. The sixteen page instruction
booklet features exploded assembly step views which contain interior painting instructions and assembly tips. Two aircraft are represented on the painting/decal application instructions, both Hs 293- carrying machines from II./KG 100 – 6N+KM of 4 Staffel based at Cognac, France in October 1943, and 6N+FN of 5 Staffel based at Athens, Greece also in October 1943. Both are finished in RLM 72/73 over RLM 65, although the 4./KG 100 option has an RLM 75 mottling over the fuselage and engine nacelle sides. This is an excellent, and easy
to assemble model, for such a relatively large twin-engined bomber, and is an important aircraft in the historical sense and is a definite ‘must-have’ for any self respecting 1/48 scale Luftwaffe model collection.
Warpaint No 24 on the
Dornier Do 217 by the late Jerry Scutts is one of the best currently available references on this aircraft with many photographs and colour illustrations of Do 217E bombers as well as other variants. There are also three different sets of markings for KG 2 and KG 40 Dornier Do 217E-2/3/4s on Eagle Strike decal sheet 48010 (produced some time ago) which I used with a mix of the kit decals, on my model. I finished my model as a
Do 217E-4, U5+MN of 5 Staffel, II./KG 2, based at Gilze-Rijen in the Netherlands in late 1942, but which was temporarily based at Cognac, south of France for Operation ‘Anton’. The aircraft was finished in the standard RLM 72/RLM 73 ‘maritime greens’ splinter camouflage upper surfaces and RLM 65 Hellblau under surfaces, which had subsequently been overpainted in the Farbton 7120.22/RLM 22 Schwarz temporary black distemper. The underwing and fuselage side crosses (balkenkreuze) had been roughly overpainted with the black distemper as were the swastikas (hakenkreuze) on the fins. The propeller blades and
handed port and starboard), with just the front row of engine cylinders moulded on to a back plate, but you're not
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spinners were painted RLM 70 Schwarzgrün, with RLM 23 Rot (red) tips to the spinners, 5 staffel’s colour. Exhaust dampers were not fitted, and the exhaust stains were created by airbrushing a
dark grey base over which a light misting of light tan was applied.
Overall shot of the Revell/Monogram kit which is a relatively large model but is easy to assemble, and is an important aircraft in the historical sense and a definite ‘must-have’ for any self respecting 1/48 scale Luftwaffe model collection.
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