The "Broom" of the Nachthexen (Night Witches) - 1/72 Po-2

Marina Raskova was the first Soviet female navigator, and was able to convince Joseph Stalin to create female combat units. Three Regiments were formed.  One of those units was the 588th Night Bomber Aviation Regiment (later renamed the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment, nicknamed the "Night Witches" (die Nachthexen) by the Germans):

Natalya Melkin (her married name) flew 840 sorties for the 46th Taman.  The Guards in total flew 24,000+ sorties and produce 24 Hero's of the Soviet Union of which Natalya was one.

Their aircraft was the Polikarpov Po-2, a very outdated trainer biplane. They were the only one of the three regiments to remain solely female (including groundcrew) throughout the war, a distinction they went to some lengths to maintain

.

Well trained.....

.....and proud.

The "Witches" attacked at night at low altitude and shut the motors down and glided over the targets with only the whistling of air rushing past the rigging - like a witch on her broom. The targets were rail yards, ammo, fuel and supply depots keeping the Germans short on everything and creating panic among the German troops who feared getting bombed in their sleep.

There was not so much fear from enemy fighters because the Po-2s top speed was the stall speed of the 109s and FW 190s - a definite risk at tree top altitude.

Flak was a different story.

(Thanks to Ennis and Braun for the Graphic Novel images)

All pilots wanted to fly in fighters (Yaks) in the 586th Regiment, but the war needed bomber crews for the PE-2s of the 587th Bomber Regiment and the 588th Night Bomber Regiment.

The Polikarpov U-2, (later designated the Po-2 Upon the death of Nikolai Polikarpov in 1944), was one of the most produced aircraft of the war.  Although a trainer and obsolete for combat, it was uncomplicated and found a useful home in the hands of the women of the 588th Night Bombers, later designated the 46th Taman Guards due to their outstanding performance.  The Po-2 could land and take off almost anywhere.  It was easy to fly and withstood a lot of punishment while still keeping airborne. 

As with all airplane kits the interior is the first to work on.  The ICM kit is detailed in 1/72 virtually the same as their 1/48 version.  Alhough some parts are extremely tiny at this scale, cost and storage guided me to 1/72..  It should be a good challenge.

One thing I appreciate with  ICM is the high quality of the instruction "booklet".

After installation and painting of the molded instrument panels the fuselage gets closed - good fit with no seam issues.  The cockpit floor with seats and controls is part of the lower wing construction and is attached later.

Rudder and elevator control cables are exterior, so I figured I had better set these up now.  Here is the rudder control cables out of a forward slot in the fuselage (attached to the rudder peddles). 

Besides the cables,  I will paint and apply decals to the fuselage.  It is certainly easier to paint now with nothing in the way, except the cables.

Elevator control cables are tied off and glued to the control arms while on the sprue.

The arm can be snipped off the sprue and attached to the fuselage.

Next I painted......

......then applied all the decals on the busy port side.  Poor Starboard gets only the Star.  Now I will put the tail assembly together so that I can attach the control cables.  The decals come off the paper backing easily, but caution should be taken when sliding onto the model as the film is thin and will easily wrinkle as they are moved into place.  A Microsol product should definitely be used to minimize this.

The tail assembly is glued in place.  After sufficient dry time the rudder cables are pulled tight and held with the tweezers until the cyano gel applied is dry.  Note the other cables are taped down and the scissors counters the pull of the tweezers on the cable.  With the Starboard rudder cables glued and dry I can move to the Port side, then to the elevator cables.  No more rigging for a while😁

Top down view of the starboard side shows the control wires attached.  My Brother thought it odd that there are two cables for the rudder.  I agree, but have no answer or info.

I switch over to the bottom wing to which the control peddles, seats and yokes are to be attached.  The seats are fiddly 5 piece constructs but I was able to put them together with only two parts dropped to the carpet monster (both retrieved).  Painting is in accordance with instructions supported by a few photos.  The pilots are the only parts not from the kit, but salvaged from my stash and painted in accordance with photos of the Night Witches in flight gear..

So the pilots are fitted in the seats and wing painted and it is finally time to attach the wing.....

......to the fuselage. 

 It worked although the control yokes are hidden under the instrument panel. Oh well!

.Note that the tail/elevator surfaces are painted.

My process for attaching control cables to rudder and elevator is to tape everything down, then grab a cable with the spring tweezers and stretch the cable to the point of attachment.  For the elevator I needed to place something on the tail so the cable touched at the correct height on the control arm - in this case a pin drill bit worked for that.  A drop of cyano gel and let it dry.

Rudder and 'elevator controls all attached and the rudder decals applied.

Moving on to details, the bombs are nicely molded in 4 pieces and easily assembled.  They will get the dark gray paint and silver fuses.

The underside color ends up to be Testors Sky Blue.  The color looks correct!  I painted in sections, careful to not overlap the washed panel lines.

I almost missed the depressions.  I happened to look closely in the correct lighting.  I used the end of a 26 gage wire to place little dots into the depressions.

It's difficult to see detail in the Shvetsov M-11D five cylinder radial engine assembly.  There are three layers plus four exhaust pipes, prop and prop shaft.  Gun metal, aluminum and rust are used to detail  the motor.  I will try and focus in on the motor later.  Note that the wheels have been glued to the axel and hubs painted.

The assembled motor is glued to the nose of the fuselage.  The gear legs were first attached to the axel as the attachment points were clearly molded and dictated the correct angle.  The gear fit accurately into the receiving points on the fuselage.  The gear is painted in aluminum with dark gray (rubber) tires.

The rear ShKAS 7.62 gun has been painted (with ammo can on the left side) and attached.  All models of the Po-2 show both seats facing forward.  There are some that think this is a mistake but I followed the instructions for the pieces provided and did not attempt a modification.  After all this was a training aircraft so the seats would face forward being in take off position.  The gun tripod was apparently attached later as the plane was used in combat.  The crews did not wear parachutes so it would not have been too difficult to turn around in the rear seat and fire the gun if needed.

Here is the completed underside with bombs and Stars.  The bomb hard points were easy to attach via the holes drilled by me per the instructions (since the bombs are optional), but the attachment of the bombs to the hard points/rails was a challenge.  Note that I have also snipped straight pieces of monofilament and glued them in place at the aileron control arm (crude arrow points to the wire).

I drilled holes through the wings at the molded markings to accept the aileron controls.  The monofilament is double knotted, tail snipped off and then drawn up through the bottom of the wing and a drop of cyano gel applied.  These wires will then be drawn up through the upper wing later.

The N struts were easy to attach to the bottom of the upper wing as the instructions called for into well molded receiving holes.  However; the angle/cant of the the struts must be accurate for the eventual placement and gluing of the structs to the lower wing.  I eyeballed it by holding the wing over the lower and pushing the structs into position.  Thin cement does not dry instantly and allows movement of the pieces.

The cabane struts have distinct points/pins that go into the holes molded into the fuselage.  The fit was precise and was easy to do.  The outside struts looked to line up very closely with their receiving holes.  The port side fit exactly into the bottom wing.....

....whereas the starboard side needed to be moved into place and briefly held by a piece of masking tape.

Although out of sequence this photo is to show the connection point of the rear most cable (all other wires being tied and glued at the strut connections).  My process is to drill a depression to accept monofilament in which I tied a double knot.  The knot sits into the drilled depression. With a drop of cyano gel it holds tight when dry.  As mentioned before the same double knot it what is used to hold the aileron wires in the holes drilled into the bottom wing.

So here are those wires up through the holes in the upper wing, pulled taught and taped down with a drop of cyano gel applied.

After the glue is dry the tails are snipped off.  Looks good and tight!  Now I will paint the ailerons and the outward wing portions (under the control arm wire).

Here is the DIY option in the instructions for rigging.  It is to scale so one can measure wires if need be.  Since my method is to tie and glue from strut to strut I did not need to measure with the exception of the bracing that crosses in front of the windscreen. Since the bracing was attached to the fuselage I used 26 gage wire instead of monofilament (used for all other rigging).  This is where measuring to scale came in handy.

Five cylinder radial up close as previously promised. Note the aforementioned DIY bracing in front of the windscreen.

The remaining rigging is actually only two pieces of monofilament.  First I tie and glue to the rear cabane; loop around the bottom of the wing strut (and glue) then back up to front cabane, tie off and glue.  The remaining wire begins at the junction of the gear leg and axel - tie and glue; then loop around the gear strut at the fuselage - glue - then up to the top end of the forward wing strut - tie and glue.  I carefully snip off the tails when glue is totally dry and that's it!

The final touch (not in the instructions but in all photos) is the placement of styrene rod carefully glued to the cables and painted.  I am not sure if these are support structures or pitots but they turned out ok.

This is Nadia Popova of the 46th Taman and a survivor of the war.

I hope you enjoy, Do svidaniya!