Me 163 kits and accessories
Photos found on Ebay
Photos found on Ebay
When I asked around on on the newsgroup rec.models.scale for a better alternative for the badly shapen Condor kit that I was building, some surprising facts came to light. The Victoria Products vacform turned out the be the former Czech KPM vacform. Even more suprising, this vac served as the master for the Condor injection moulded kit! Frank Henriquez made the following pictures of components of both kits, and reported that the parts could be interchanged without any fit problems. Judge for yourself!
My conclusion: with a kit as grossly misshapen as this, you better buy one with thick plastic (i.e. the Condor injected one) so you can carve easier!
While surfing the internet I found the Danish Models in Miniature site (which no longer exists). Shown in the gallery was a very well built Victoria Products Me 163A, built by Jimmy Währens. The following photo is used with permission from the Models in Miniature site.
Jimmy was kind enough to tell something more about his model. he built the model some ten years ago. He reports that the VP vac was only a a rough shell of the actual aircraft and not very accurate either. Wings, nose and bottom of fuselage planform have been altered to be more correct. He filled the lower fuselage with putty and sanded one side to shape. Then the same was done on the other half making sure they would fit when assembled. The kink in the wing's leading edge needed sharpening and the contour of the wing was adjusted also. The area around the rocket outlet was completely reworked. Apart from this only minor details were added, such as slots and some work on the rudder, ailerons, and trimflaps to simulate fabric. Undercarriage dolly and interior were scratch built. The underwing rockets are taken from a Hasegawa Me 262.
After completion Jimmy was not content with the cockpit region. It seemed that the canopy sits too high on the model and that the canopy bottom frame is too straight. A correct canopy should be larger (higher) and the bottom line should curve upwards near the front. He tried to simulate this by adding some pencil lines to visually making the canopy seem deeper.
The colors and camouflage of Me 163A is a difficult subject, and this particular Komet is probably the most interesting of them all. There is just one known photo of this R4M armed example. It is thought this is CD+IO, but the photo does not show it. The square spots could be some form of camouflage (but of a unique kind) or some touching-up of the paint (also of a type never seen elsewhere). Jimmy was clearly in favour of the wear theory. He simulated a very battered example where the RLM65 in places is worn down to a RLM02 undercoat. Some of the worst wears have been touched up with red primer.