Horten Ho-229

Yeah, another horten, I never get sick of building this aircraft, its so beautiful. This is my 5th or 6th horten but only the 2nd that actually looks really good.

Backround: The brothers reimar and walther horten wheere the pioneers of flying wing aircraft. Even in younger years, they were fascinated with flying. Their other brother was in the luftwaffe so basically the whole families sons were aviators. While first starting with glider models, this soon wasnt enough for th horten brothers. They wanted more, they wanted their own designs and they wanted them to be the best. They worked on planes, that were efficient and new, wih good lift and good efficiency. Their solution was the flying wing, an aircraft completely constructed as ne wing with the cockpit on top of it.By that time the nazis gained control over germany and they actually pushed forward the young generations interest for flying, making yearly gliding contests and usually only members of the hitlerjugend had the chance to make a pilot license. The horten brothers participated in the yearly gliding contest on the wasserkuppe mountain with their horten H I . Their aircraft was successful and they went on to construct more glider flying wings, like the HII. Most of their designs were high performance glider planes but they interested the german Luftwaffe high command in such a way, that the horten brothers got support even by Hermann Göring who was very interested in the horten brothers design. Their parents also helped them a lot. Several designs were planned for the luftwaffe, most of them gliders for training and some motorized trainers . Few were built and almost all were just prototypes. That was untilthe horten H IX came. This aircraft promised Göring a high performance jet fighter with a good range and considerable armament , even with bombs if neccessary. The H IX was based up on earlier results from the horten brothers with their prototypes and was well esigned with 2 jet engines and swept wings. The main structure was made up of wood, only engines and the cowlings as well as other smal parts that couldnt be done out of wood like the landing gear were metal. The hortens planned the aircraft with BMW 003 engines but they were found not uitable and instead the bigger jumo 004 engine was chosen which resulted in an overwork of the aircraft. The 229 was a flying wing with no tail and a tricylce landing gear. When on the ground the aircraft stood higher at the front, giving it better takeoff characteristics. The 004 engies were fitted on the second prototype the v2 ,as the v1 was only a glider. Piloted by erwin ziller the aircraft was several successful test flight before crashing on the 4th flight, killing erwin ziller. Why the aircraft crshed is unknown. V3 was partially constructed when the american occupied the construction and test sites. V3 was shipped to america after the war. There are also reports of a simulated dogfigt between a 229 and the me 262 where the 262 was completely outperformed by the flying wing. Indeed, the 229 offered probably much more agility than other jets of the time which were in that aspect inferior to piston engined aircraft. Armament of the 229 was first planned to be tested in the v6 with 2 30 mm mk 103 cannons while there seems some controversy about he armament as the serial production aircraft should have been equipped with the 30mm mk 108 cannon and instead of 2 , 4 cannons were planned. While the mk 103 had a more harder punsh than the 108, the 103 was also much bigger and heavier and had a less rate of fire than the 108.With either cannon, the 229 would have been a devastating opponent, because it was not only fast and agile, it also had limited stealth capabilities. Its radar crosssection was very small and with the primitive radar of the 40s, it would have been difficult to detect the flying wing. Especially in low level flight, the 229 would have been invisible until 2 minutes away from the target (if for example it flew over the english channel), making a structured interception impossible. All this was found out by a team from northrop grumman , who built a full size replica of the airplane and tested it with radars. If it would have entered serial production, the 229 could have been a decisive factor in the outcome of the war. Fortunately for the allies, it never reached production status. Contracts for the development of a larger version of he 229, the horten XVIII were already signed by Göring in the closing stages of war and even construction of a prototype was ordered to begin on april 1st. A construction hull was already assembled and was found completely empty as the americans found it. No records exist of the construction of the horten XVIII ever began. The XVIII was a large six engined flying wing long range bomber. Equipped with 6 jet engines, top speed was estimated at ca 800 km/h. The aircraft would have had exceptional range allowing it to fly nonstop to america and deliver its dealy payload. Proposed armament would have been atomic bombs mas germany was already working on them.
The aforementioned horten 229 v3 was taken to america were it was carefully examined by the americans . However it seems that they lost soon interest in the 229 and it was stored into the cellar of the national air and space museum where it still awaits restoration together with other german rarities. However, it was stated that restoring the aircraft would be too expensive at the moment and it would therefore have to stay in the cellar for a while. A german restoration team from berlin which is known for its good and accurate restorations all over the world, has offered to take care of the 229 and restore it if it could stay for a while in germany but it seems that the americans dont want to give it away.
I say, thats bullshit, just give the team the airplane god dammit! It wont be long until the aircraft is in such a bad condition that it would be xtremely difficult to restore it, and then this milestone of aviation is forever lost! I hope that germany and the usa will finally arrange a compromise and i hope it will happen soon.

The model kit: As I said I want a more detailed review than I did last time. The kit is from revell , and was firs released in 1994. It was rereleased a few years ago and is now avaialble again. The kit is in 1/72 and costs 9,99€. It is also available as a starter set with glue and colours for 14,99€.
Detail. Revell has filled their horten 229 with exceptional detail. The parts come in light grey sprues with one clear part sprue. Unfortunately, the box is actually too small and the wings end up beeing a bit forced in into the box. The detail of the parts is excellent, the panel lines are engraved and the all the parts are well detailed. The turbine parts look good. The cockpit, albeit beeing very small is also very nicely done, with an instrumental board and decals for it. The seat looks good with seat belts molded onto it. If you are the modeller who always puts extra seatbelt from eduard for example in the cockpit you will find this unhelpful but for me its nice, as I build my kits almost always oob (out of the box). The framework inside the cockpit is also nicely done. Pedals and the joystick also look realistic. The highlight of the kit however, has to be the interior . Inner parts of the landinggear go well into the interior and revell has reproduced this very well. Not only that, but the kit comes with 2 complete mk 103 cannons´. The area where the wing joines the mid secion is also represented very detailed. Unfortunately you cant see most of this in the end. Only if you leave the wings off, if you for example want to represent v3 (although this on doesnt have cannons), this comes in handy. Its quite sad you cant see all the detail in the end, but you dont neccessary have to glue the flaps that cowere the cannons onto the fuselage. You can just stick them onto it and remove it whenever you want, giving at least some insight on the well detailed cannons. It is really astonishing how detailed the interior is, especially if you cant see much of it in the end. It is almost as if revell has studied the v3 prototype. Of course the interior is probably not 100 % complete, but just the fact that here is so much interior detail is very cool. The landing gear itself is also very well detailed, coming with molded cables etc. The wings itself dont have much detail, which is fiting as the wings were constructed of wood and only had some flaps , forewings etc on them. The wheels also look very good. The detail is to say the last, exceptional and very well made.
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Fitting: Construction of the aircraft is very easy, due to its desing as a flying wings. Although the wings dont fit into he box, they fit well together. Cockpit and engine parts also were no problem. Handling the parts is also not very difficutl because there are few fragile parts but those whichare there should be handled carefully like the anenna. Cannon assembly is easy and fitting is good. A very welcomed feature is that the landing gear is very stable, you dont have to wait for hours to dry, the holes where it is placed are big enough and designed in a way that you can put the aircraft on its "legs" immediately after assembling it. Fitting of the fuselage halves is flawless. However, there are a few small issues. Fitting the wings onto the fuselage is good, but no perfect, one side works good, the other one had a small gap. But the gap is really small and you wouldnt notice it when looking at the plane. Also the canopy is a bit offset. Because it has to be constructed from 2 parts, its a bit difficutl assembling it as the front parts is quite small. I had some small problems arranging it perfectly and even in the end you have small gap . I have read that other modellers have encountered the smae problem. But again its nota big gap, just a very small one. However, the fitting all in all is fine, it isnt really a (negative)challenge to assemble it and it is one of those kits, you really enjoy to assemble
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Quality: Despite beeing not brandnew, the kits quality is very good. Only on the front part of the aircraft did I encounter a very small flash sign which was quickly removed with the hobby knife. The rest of the kit shows no flash, and I couldnt see any sinkmarks or ejection marks. Even small parts like the antenna dont have flash. The panel lines are engraved perfectly with no signs of beeing offset.
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Decals: As usual for luft 46 aircraft I use spare decals that I have accumulated  , this time the 22 number from 1/72 bf 109s. The rest are decals from the actual kit and they are perfect
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Extrapoints: Well, the 229 has to be one of the most mysterious and most beautiful looking airplanes of all time. Its low silhouettte and the nice curved lines of rear midsection area , make it one of the most sexiest looking aircraft. Revell has represented this with the kit very nice. The kit is for me one of revells classic and best ones, a kit that I would assemble at any time with joy. It never gets boring making this kit and there is so much you can do with it in terms of alternate markings, so theres is basically an endless variety of 229 s you can make. I really like this kit and give therefore
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Fazit: A cheap, yet high quality opportunety to make one of the most futuristic,yet nostalgic aircraft kit. The kit is in my opinion close to flawless and the 229 is a kit often searched in model kit producers. Few have the 229(still) in their arsenal. Apart from revell, I think dragon has a 1/48 229 but I ´ve read that this one has serious fitting problems and an whole army of flash and sinkmarks come with the kit. While the dragon model has 2 complete engines ans also the good insdie detail of the revell kit, the cockpit detail is nowhere better -and remember, the dragon one is 1/48-much bigger than the revell one so there could have been room for more detail- and the back landing gear lacks the cables and screws the revell kit shows.Dragon also has the never built 2 seat nightfighter variant. Then there is PM model which actually has 2 hortens too, the normal one and the nightfighter variant.While the pm model variant has simplicity on its side, it lacks the extreme detail of the dragon and revell kits. It seems that it also has some fitting problems. Pm model itself is known among modellers as a producer where detail is seldom included. thats true, but they make up for that with their abundance of luft´46 aircraft, and their ta 183 kit, was in my opinion all in all acceptable and actually quite good.
So which kit you choose depends on you but I would recommend the revell one, because it offers nearly the exact amount of detail as the dragon one, while still beeing much cheaper (because of the size obviously, but still, the dragon kit is expensive even for 1/48), and easier to assemble with much more quality (no sinkmarks ,flash etc). Many modellers share this opinion as far as I have heard. The revell kit is also available and you shouldn have much problems finding it, while the dragon model can be very hard to find. The pm model kits are also easy to locate and even cheaper than the revell one,in fact a lot cheaper(3,99€) but they are also not detailed very good and only for the type of modeller who likes going beyond a straight out of the box construction. The revell kit combines the aspects of the other 2 producers into one perfect small kit, having the good detail of the dragon kit and combining it with the low price of the pm model kit , so it is in my opinion the kit you should go for, if you wanna have this aircraft in your collection. The kit is suitable also for beginners and I would highly recommend the kit.
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