The Modelling News: Preview: Miniart's new 35th scale Focke-Wulf Triebflügel takes off at Shizuoka

A surprise announcement at the Shizuoka Hobby show was from MiniArt - The new kit of the Focke-Wulf Triebflügel in 35th scale was there in all its glory - proudly erect! We have now the full set of images and info of the boxart, sprues, aircraft colour schemes and feature set in our new item preview...

Miniart still going straight up with their latest release...

Focke-Wulf Triebeflügel Interceptor

MiniArt

1/35th scale

Kit No #40002

Six marking choice in the box

Product Link on the Miniart Website

At the recent Hobby Show in Shizuoka MiniArt had a stand attached to the GCI Creos booth - of interest especially this year is the MASSIVE surprise 1/35th scale Focke-Wulf Triebeflügel kit. This is a part of their "What-If?" series of models - we would love to see this one come to light - only a year after their "Kolibri" design was introduced with much success.

The Focke-Wulf Triebflügel, or Triebflügeljäger, literally meaning "thrust-wing hunter", was a German concept for an aircraft designed in 1944, during the final phase of World War II as a defence against the ever-increasing Allied bombing raids on central Germany. It was a vertical take-off and landing tailsitter interceptor design for local defence of important factories or areas which had small or no airfields.

The Triebflügel had only reached the wind-tunnel testing phase in mockups when the Allied forces reached the production facilities. No complete prototype was ever built.

This Focke-Wulf VTOL (Vertical Take Off and Landing) fighter/interceptor was designed in September 1944. The three untapered wings rotated around the fuselage and had a gradually decreasing pitch towards the wingtips, thus acting like a giant propeller. At the end of each wing was a Pabst ramjet, Since ramjets do not operate at slow speeds, either the rotor had to be driven by a fuselage mounted takeoff-booster or small Walter rocket engines could have been fitted to each ramjet pod.

The pilot sat in a cockpit near the nose and the armament consisted of two MK 103 30mm cannon with 100 rounds plus two MG 151/20 20mm cannon with 250 rounds. Although the Triebflugel was not constructed, a wind tunnel model was tested up to a speed of Mach 0.9.

Specifications:

General characteristics

Crew: one

Length: 9.15 m (30 ft 0 in)

Wingspan: 11.5 m (37 ft 9 in)

Gross weight: 2,500 kg (5,512 lb)

Powerplant: 3 × Pabst ramjets, 8.9 kN (2,000 lbf) thrust each

Powerplant: 3 × Walter liquid fuel rockets

Powerplant: 2 × standard German Walter 109-501 RATO units , 14.71 kN (3,306 lbf) thrust each

Performance

Maximum speed: 1,000 km/h (621 mph; 540 kn)

Never exceed speed: 2,700 km/h (1,678 mph; 1,458 kn)

Minimum control speed: 230 km/h (143 mph; 124 kn)

Service ceiling: 15,300 m (50,200 ft)

Rate of climb: 50 m/s (9,800 ft/min)

Armament

Guns: 2 × 30 mm MK-103 each with 100 rounds + 2 × 20 mm MG-151 each with 250 rounds

This new 1/35th scale Focke Wulf Triebflugel Interceptor kit from MiniArt
Moulded in plastic in 1/35th scale, this kit is soon to be hitting out local hobby shops with the test shot already designed, moulded and built up as we saw from the photos at Shizuoka. Usually, it is at this phase that they are looking for any last-minute bumps and fit issues, and with no real aircraft to measure it against, MiniArt has done a smart thing by re-creating this What-if? aircraft as the first in their aircraft model series...

The feature set of the kit: