KIT #:	4616
PRICE:	$18.00 when new
DECALS:	Two options
REVIEWER:	Spiros Pendedekas
NOTES:

HISTORY

The origins of the idiosyncratic He-177 “Grief” can be traced in the mid 1930s, where Generalleutnant Walther Wever, a longtime advocate of strategic bombing, pressed the Luftwaffe to develop a dedicated long-range bomber for the role of attacking the Soviet Union's factories in the Ural Mountain area. This concept was received with significant skepticism amongst many senior officials within the Luftwaffe, so, by 1936, only two, rather uninspiring "Ural bomber" designs had emerged, the Dornier Do-19 and Junkers Ju89.

Wever continued to press for new designs for this role and the Reichsluftfahrtministerium (RLM) finally released a new specification, named “Bomber A”, calling for a significantly more advanced design with speeds higher than those of contemporary fighters, longer range and larger payloads. The specification was issued on June 3, 1936, the same day that Wever was killed in an air crash and the design losing its only politically powerful champion.

On 2 June 1937, Heinkel Flugzeugwerke received instructions to proceed with construction of a full-scale mock-up of its so-called Projekt 1041 Bomber A. To meet the required specifications, Siegfried Günter, Ernst Heinkel's chief designer, had to employ several mechanical and aerodynamic revolutionary features, in order to increase performance and decrease weight.
 
In order to decrease drag, it was decided to go with a twin engine design, which, due to the non-availability of such powered engines, was to be materialized by using paired DB-601 engines in tight nacelles. The resulting DB-606 powerplants proved in practice significantly problematic, their main issues (among many others) being their tendency to overheat and catch fire during flight.

The envisaged “Surface Evaporation Cooling” that used nacelle panels as cooling surfaces in order to minimize drag, proved also inadequate, resulting in using normal annular radiators within the nacelles which notably increased drag. Same saga with the envisaged three cockpit-controlled remote gun turrets, with the available technology proving insufficient to keep pace with the specific requirements, resulting in design modifications to accommodate larger and heavier manned positions, meaning weight increase as the fuselage had to receive structural strengthening in several locations. The wings’ strength would also prove inadequate in practice, resulting in costly and extensive strengthening, further increasing the aircraft's weight.

What was already a problematic situation was to become worse, as, by the end of 1937, Oberkommando der Luftwaffe dictated that the plane should be able to perform 60° dive bombing and safely pull out of the dive. This meant additional strengthening which had a deleterious effect on the aircraft’s weight. Heinkel said that this requirement would never be effectively performed by the plane and he was right, with the constant increases in the loaded weight imposing overstressing forces to the already overweight airframe.

The immense increase of the type’s weight during development meant that it would need equally strengthened (meaning bigger) main undercarriage that would have to fit in the crammed nacelles and adjacent wing areas where there was practically no room. Heinkel engineers had to resort to extremely complex twin-leg designs that would hang under the nacelle at a significant front caster angle and would individually retract at each side of the nacelle/wing area in an equally complex manner. Needless to say, the system was a maintenance nightmare, making even simple jobs like a tire change a time consuming  exercise.

The type’s operational history was largely affected by the aforementioned  technical difficulties. Not only it had to enter service not earlier than 1942, but also it was still far from operational, having to deal with significant problems, mainly with the engines and airframe strength. Those problems were never satisfactorily addressed till the end of the war, thus dooming the bomber, with its successful missions not being that many.

One of the special weapons the type carried was the Fritz X guided anti-ship glide bomb, the world's first precision guided weapon deployed in combat and the first to sink a ship in combat. While the weapon itself was lethal when used effectively, it seems that it was not so successful with the Grief, with reports stating that the aircraft had to "toss" the bomb slightly, climbing and then descending, to keep it in view ahead

The plane was tested with a number of experimental weapon loads as well. These included a pair of limited-traverse 30 mm MK 101 cannons or a 50mm or even a mammoth 75mm Bordkanone in the extreme front of a dramatically enlarged “Bola” ventral gondola, or 33 obliquely mounted 21 cm (8¼ in) caliber rocket mortar tubes. These configurations never seemed to have been used operationally.
 
In common with most piston-engined German bombers, the type was grounded from summer 1944 due to the implementation of the Emergency Fighter Program as well as due to the Allied bombing of German fuel production facilities. All in all, 1169 examples were built.

Definitely imposing but ultimately a failure, the Grief was an ambitious, aggressive project, with its design requirements standing at a level higher than that of the available practical technology, with the subsequent requirement for dive bombing making sure that the plane would never have a chance of maturing and becoming effective.

A good number of us would argue that the mid 90s to mid-00s were amongst Revell’s best years, as the company came up with many nice new toolings of significant modeling subjects (focusing, among others, on German WWII, including less known types and even Luft46 examples), offered at very good prices. One of them certainly was their excellent 1/72 He-177 that hit the shelves in 2000 at an unbelievably low price (less than $20)

The specific copy was bought at around 2005 from a then flourishing/now sadly closed hobby shop in Athens and for a look at its contents you may read our Editor’s preview of the exact same kit, found at the ever growing MM archives.  

Due to the high number of parts and the seemingly complex (but, as it turned out, not complicated) construction, I performed the radical act of reading the very nice instructions, to figure out a master construction plan.

First thing I did was attaching the two rectangular side windows from the fuselage innards. There are two more small circular “vision” windows bilaterally of the “Bola” gondola that I did not attach, preferring to replicate them with clear glue at end stages.

I then put together the very detailed cockpit, which consisted of around 25 parts. Basic cockpit color was Hu32 Dark Gray (for the RLM66), while the instrument panels, console faces and control yoke were painted black, with their raised details dry-brushed with silver and a few “knobs” done by “pinning” red, white and yellow paint. The seat cushions were painted a “brown leather” shade and the seat belts were painted “linen”. Admittedly, the cockpit, a key element for the distinctive glazed-nosed Grief, is really nice (purists might consider, among possibly others, adding some wiring aft of the instrument panels) and will totally satisfy most of us out of the box.

The two fuselage halves were next joined, trapping, apart from the cockpit and its rear bulkhead, the port front-located ammunition tank, the gondola rear view transparency, the front bomb bay bulkhead, the rear wheel housing and the rear gunner’s bulkhead/seat 2-piece assembly (the latter painted per the front crew positions). The rear wheel was supposed to have been secured to its wheel housing before joining the fuselage halves, but, keeping pace with my lifetime habits that I would surely break it at some point, I elected not to attach it and try to twerk it in at end stages.

The tail gimbal-mounted MG151 gun was to be attached in a housing of circular cross section. As the top of this ring at some time broke off and forever disappeared, I had to scratch-build one using a leftover wing tank half of similar dimension.  

Onto the fuselage top, where the front cupola, the DF loop, the dorsal barbette and the rear MG131 base plates were attached to the fuselage.  Neither the barbette nor the MG131 guns were attached, as they were prone to break away, meaning they would be slipped-in in final stages. Having also decided to go for closed bomb bay doors and underside entry hatches, I attached all of them “shut”.

The wings were next assembled and attached, followed by the tail planes and the rudder. The engines were also assembled and glued to the wings, having beforehand their distinctive cooling fans painted gunmetal and their visible innards Hu31 (for the RLM02). The 2-piece chin intakes were attached at this time, as well, followed by the three Fritz-X pylons (not sure the plane ever carried the third central Fritz-X operationally, it nevertheless looked absolutely cool to my eye, so I went for it). The gazillion of very delicate underwing mass balances and actuating rods were left off, to be attached after the final sanding, right before painting.

This concluded basic assembly which was not as complicated as initially seemed. This was also due to my choice of going for closed bomb bay doors and entry hatches which made things easier. Fit was very good all over, needing nothing more than small amounts of filler at the “usual” places (like the fuselage joints and the wing roots). It was then time to  take the Grief to the paint shop!

I first gave all undersides, including gear doors, a coat of Hu65 Aircraft Blue. After masking it off, I gave the topsides a coat of Hu31 Slate Gray, followed by freehanding Hu91 Black Green, trying to somehow come close to the sort of patterns observed from seasonal photos of 4./KG 100 Griefs. A coat of Future prepared the bird for decaling.

I combined the kit decals, in order to go for a supposed 6N+HK bird. I did not go with the kit-proposed 6N+HM coding, as that bird was documented carrying a different camo (basically different shade of base color and hard demarcation lines) from the one I went for. This means that my markings are likely wrong (fictitious at best). The 24yo decals detached easily from their backing paper, but I experienced some silvering, mostly in the darker colored areas, which can be attributed partly to the age of them and partly to the usual operator error.  A coat of Future sealed them.

The main landing gear was assembled and attached at the correct caster angle (the side view provided by Revell was most helpful here), followed by the dragged doors and the main wheels. The tail wheel strut was twerked in, followed by the rear wheel and the distinctive doors. All landing gear legs, struts, bays and door innards were painted Hu31, wheel rims were painted black and tires were painted a very dark gray. Oleos were highlighted with a fine tip silver pen. All wheels were filed to look weighted and I could not resist adding simplified brake lines, made from black stretched sprue. All in all, attaching the complex looking landing gear was a much less uneventful experience than initially feared, with the bird proudly and securely standing on its feet.

The four flame dumper exhausts were painted Testors Burned Metal and attached in position. The dorsal barbette and the top MG131 turret (sans its transparency) were assembled and slipped in position (for which they had to have their bottom securing lugs filed off, in order to be able slip in. The rear gimbal-mounted MG151 gun was also assembled and glued in its circular housing, followed by the gondola rear mounted MG131, which was carefully slipped in and secured with white glue. All guns were painted gunmetal, their housing innards were painted RLM66, while the rest were painted per the surrounding fuselage color.

The three pairs of sway braces were painted gunmetal and attached to the pylons, followed by the three Fritz-X bombs (each a 10-piece affair), where I discovered that I had to split the front sway braces open at an angle of almost 180 degrees, in order for the bombs to sit properly. The Fritz-Xs were painted with the same underside color (with RLM02 being another and, perhaps, more interesting option) with their tiny quadruple exhausts black.

Time for some weathering, consisting of a black wash allover to accentuate the nice engraved detailing and to also give areas like the landing gear and hinges a used, oily look. Dark brown and black dry pastels were used to simulate dirt, grime and even exhaust stains, with a final satin coat giving the bird its final hue.

All transparencies had their well defined framing hand painted and attached in position. That was a lot of framing and, unless you are, like Yours Truly, a die hard hand-painting transparencies modeler, I strongly advise you to acquire a set of masks that will make the tedious frame painting job way easier…

The nose glazed transparency is in particular a three piece affair, where the top part was first attached, followed by the front section which had to have its MG81 gun and ammo feeder installed beforehand. Finally, the bottom section was attached, carefully slipped in position after having the MG151 gun glued to the fuselage floor.

Overall fit of the transparencies was satisfactory, with the nose one needing some judicious trimming, in order to fit well. I used small amounts of white glue to fair all tiny gaps, also using it to replicate the gondola side mounted small circular windows.

The props were assembled and slipped in position. They had black spinners and RLM70 blades, which I slightly chipped at their leading edges by silver dry-brushing. The various underside antennas were attached and painted per the fuselage color, as was the top located mast. I ran thin stretched sprue from the fin to the mast, following the pattern shown in the instructions, to represent the aerial wire. Finally, tiny blobs of red and green clear paint represented the wingtip lights, before calling the Imposing Grief done! 

This is a first-class kit of the iconic Grief: general shape looks spot-on, molding is nice and crisp, panel lines are finely engraved and at the correct places, overall detail is more than satisfying at all areas, transparencies are good, instructions are nice and clear and decals are sharply printed (though, understandably, aged in my case).

True, this is not a shake and bake kit, mostly due to the high number of parts, deeming it unsuitable for beginners. However, the seemingly complex but in the end not really complicated construction, aided by the overall good fit, means that even an average modeler can take his time and tackle it successfully.

It is really hard to believe that this is already (2024) a quarter of a century old mold and even harder to believe that it was offered at an almost ridiculously low price back then. The kit is periodically reissued by Revell, with the last reboxing in 2018 and is still offered at logical prices.

While the He-177 might not have been a very successful bomber, few will disagree that it is imposing, almost futuristic as a sight, let alone as a model. If you are not a beginner and fancy taking your time to build a very nice Grief even out of the box, this kit is for you.  

Happy Modeling!