The Battlin' Bricks Junkers Ju 52 Model

The Battlin' Bricks Junkers Ju 52 Model

Jul 16, 2023

The Junkers Ju 52 model was one of my earliest Battlin' Bricks designs. I'm not big into German aircraft, but when you are making wargame pieces, it doesn't work if you only build one side's units.

The Ju-52's tapered wings were an interesting challenge and one day I found a solution with hinge plates and this model was born. I think my first paint scheme was a 1930s transport version (see the render below), and later I came up with the military markings for the version for sale at Omaha Bricks.
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Maybe two decades ago I checked out The Saga of Iron Annie by Martin Caiden who was a masterful storyteller, even if his stories weren't always accurate, and it was a fun read about the venerable German transport and in particular, a warbird in the US that he helped operate.

After Iron Annie flew with Caiden, it was later operated by Lufthansa in markings similar to those depicted below.

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The Ju 52 also featured heavily in story of the aerial invasion of Crete called Ten Days to Destiny that I also read back in the day. Sadly, in that book it was clear that British and Commonwealth forces did not know just how thinly stretched the attacking German airborne forces were, and failed to realize that they had the numbers and supply to continue to continue defending the island. Despite this, a number of Ju 52s were lost and German airborne forces never fully recovered to the point where they were useful for the rest of the war.

The Ju 52 served essentially everywhere the Luftwaffe flew throughout the Second World War and soldiered on until the end despite being outclassed by Allied transport aircraft and rendered extremely vulnerable to allied fighters, which shot down large numbers of Ju 52s, such as the even known as the "Palm Sunday Massacre" during Operation Flax organized by Gen. Doolittle. To read more about that event, click here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Flax

Let us know what you think of the model.

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