MIKRO 72 1/72 -- RWD-5 BIS

Aircraft History:

Originally intended as workshops for the Warsaw Technical University, the facilities were leased to three aircraft designers who’s initials were RWD. Their fifth design prototype SP-AGJ flew in 1931 and having won the National Tournament for Touring Aeroplanes, was put into production. In all twenty tandem seat aircraft were built and one, SP-AJU modified to a single seater with extra fuel capacity for record breaking. This it did. Starting on 27^th April 1933 from Warsaw Poland and arriving in Rio de Janeiro Brazil on 24^th June 1933, a distance of nearly 18000 km.! This epic voyage included a non stop flight of 20 ½ hours from St.Louis Senegal to Maceio Brazil across the South Atlantic on 7^th May 1933. Not surprisingly SP-AJU is the lightest aircraft to have flown the South Atlantic! It was piloted by Capt. Stanslaw J Skarzynski who was born on 1^st May 1899 and lost his life piloting a Wellington bomber off the Dutch coast after a bombing raid on Bremen on 25^th June 1942. He is buried at Terschelling Holland. The RWD 5 was powered by a 115hp Hermies IIB engine and had a span of 10.5m and length of 7.2m. The RWD 5 bis SP-AJU was powered by a 130hp Gipsy Major.

Preamble:

Civil light aircraft are in short supply in 1/72 scale. For instance Airfix really only made one, the Cherokee Arrow II. I suppose that it was for this reason that many years ago I bought this Polish made kit of an obscure Polish light aircraft, certainly it wasn’t for the box or box art! I came across it after a clear out and after reading about it’s achievements, realised what a remarkable and historic little machine it was. Although more powerful, it is only the size of a Piper Cub! Both it and Capt. Skarzynski deserve to be better known. At first glance, probably because of the engine and cowling, it looks British, certainly not American or German and not ugly enough to be French!

The Kit:

Anyway, the kit consists of twenty eight parts including alternative side windows, optional exhausts and decals for three markings for two aircraft. The instructions are quite adequate with a history in German, Polish, French and rather quaint English.

Construction:

One has to decide between a two seat RWD 5 or single seat RWD 5bis right from step one. Either the second seat (26) or the extra fuel tank (4 & 5) can be fitted to the floor (1). Part of the fuselage must be cut away to accommodate the two seater side windows (27 & 28). The interior is basic but adequate and although a bit vague as to it’s position, is not difficult to figure out. Normally I use only white glue or Kristal Kleer on transparencies but, in this case, the windows go a long way towards connecting the fuselage to the wing so I used polystyrene cement to make sure that nothing embarrassing happened during flight! If you like your prop to rotate you will have to do some extra work as there is no provision for it to do so. The only modification that I made was to trim off the “pips” that are supposed to represent the exhaust pipes. I drilled them out and added pipes from electrical wire insulation. All parts fit well except the undercarriage (16) that needs a bit of work and all fitting holes require reaming. The RWD 5 uses the long exhausts (29 & 30) that covers the “pips”.

Decals:

The decals that are well printed need trimming as they have large areas of carrier film. They are quite glossy and don’t seem to react to decal setting solution. The options are for the RWD 5bis SB-AJU or in it’s original RWD 5 form, both being all over silver dope or SP –ARP in red and silver.

Conclusion:

The Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Aircraft V12 p.2779 covers this aircraft and, surprisingly, quite a few references can be found on the internet including an account of the record breaking flight and a biography of Capt. Skarzynski. If you collect historical aircraft, this one deserves a place in your collection.

RHS / 70

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