Messerschmitt Me 262A-2a "Schwalbe"

Kit:	Hasegawa, 1/72; part of a double Me 262 -kit, bought in 2012 for $25.60. Model finished on 2024-08-21.
Aircraft:	"White 17", W.Nr. 110956, III./EJG 2, Luftwaffe, 1945.

It is well known that the Me 262 was the world's first operational jet, and was used in many different roles. The Me 262A-2a, depicted here, was one of the fighter versions, but the aircraft I have chosen to model was used for training by the Ergänzungsjagdgeshwader 2 (EJG 2, "supplemental fighter squadron"), indicated by the letters "S" (for "Schule", "school"). The aircraft has the early, short-lived camouflage (on Me 262s) of RLM 74/75/76 [5, p.46], more typical on Bf 109s. It carries markings in the style adopted earlier by Kommando Nowotny [2]. The aircraft is documented in [3, p.602], but the pictures of it can be found elsewhere as well [e.g., 1, 4]; in [1, p.41] I found another picture that I have not seen in other references.

Construction Notes

I built the model from the Hasegawa kit with minor modifications. For the cockpit, I used Yahu's photo-etch instrument panel and Eduard's seatbelts. I sanded off the small bulges on both sides of the nose (some aircraft had those, others did not; photos of White-17 do not show these). I added brake lines to the landing gear, and cut wheel well doors from 10 thou styrene sheet. Other than those changes, the kit is a fair representation of the Me 262.

Hasegawa cockpit tubs with Yahu instrument panels and Eduard seatbelts.

Fuselages almost completed.

I prepared the model's surface with Mr. White Surfacer 1000 (by decanting from a spray bottle and then airbrushing) and then painted the model mostly with Mr. Color lacquers: Their formulation of RLM 74/75/76 is fairly good, but I did add some 75 into the 74, because otherwise the color just looked too dark for this scale. I also sprayed a 10% filter of the 75 over the solid areas just to bring the contrast down a bit. The splinter pattern follows what is documented in [5]. Jet engine cowlings appear to be unpainted in photographs of this aircraft, so I painted those with Alclad duraluminum. For the 74/75 mottle pattern I used the same Mr. Color paints, sprayed with low pressure from close distance. I am happy to say the for some of that I used - for the first time - my recently acquired Aerograph Super 63 -airbrush! The fuselage band was masked, first sprayed with Mr. White Surfacer, and then with Tamiya flat yellow acrylic.

I painted the upper wing and fuselage crosses, using masks I cut with my Cricut cutter. The rest of the markings are decals: stenciling came from the kit decal sheet, the rest I made myself by printing on decal paper, white markings being printed with the Ghost White Toner (which replaces the black cartridge, and thus the artwork is prepared in black - see the picture below). I used Alclad's clear gloss before and after decal application, and finished with a semigloss mixture of Testors' Dullcote and Glosscote. Slight weathering (mostly chipping) was done, careful not to overdo this.

Initial RLM 74/75/76 pattern airbrushed.

Mottle pattern with RLM 74 and 75.

Painting completed, awaiting decals.

Artwork I prepared for my homebrew decals.

References Used

The Me 262 is well documented, and I have discussed my reference sources in the write-up of my previous Me 262A-1a/U4 model. Here are the sources I needed for this particular aircraft.

German Jets 1944-1945 (Griehl); Luftwaffe at War 10; Greenhill Books 1999
Jagdgeschwader 7 - 'Nowotny' (Forsyth); Aviation Elite Units 29; Osprey 2008
Me 262 volume 2 (Smith & Creek); Classic Publications 1998
Messerschmitt Me 262 - Development, Testing, Production (Radinger & Schick); Schiffer 1993
Official Monogram Painting Guide to German Aircraft 1935-1945 (Merrick & Hitchcock); Monogram Aviation Publications 1980

Despite the abundance of books and other sources about the Me 262 (more than 100 in my library), I find that most photos that are actually useful for model-building are ones taken by the Allies of captured aircraft.

White-17 with my earlier Me 262 model.