2021 seems to become the year of the 109 for me. As long as I can remember, it has been a favourite of mine, but for some reason I’ve built very few of them.
Even it the build results have been meagre, there is no lack of kits in the stash, not at all! Many years ago I did a FineMolds 109F-2 but the rest of the kits have just hung around in the stash (and there are even more than can be seen in the photo above…). The FineMolds kits are really nice and they are easy builds. Sadly, they are a bit difficult to obtain and they are also rather expensive for a small kit. Most of the ones in my stash were bought second hand or at reduced prices when I’ve happened to find one, some I even got as gifts from friends who can spot a good Magnus-present when they see one 
!
This build was mainly triggered by a sudden interest in Hans-Joachim Marseille so for the time being I will be concentrating on the top kit in the photo, leaving the others for a rainy (or possibly snowy…) day.
Not that common but in this case certainly logical - sand coloured plastic!
Oh well, I couldn’t stick to just one build. This one has been in my stash for a while (I think I bought it in Moson a few years ago directly from AZ), the two-seater is a fun variant! Looking high and low for a suitable subject to do, I found an Italian late-war machine that ticked all the right boxes. A minor let-down was that it was based on the G-6 while the kit is specified as being based on a G-4, going through the prolific amounts of plastic in the box I quickly found a pair of breech bulges instantly transforming the -4 in to a -6!
The kit! A full standard-109 with a spare sprue for the two-seater-specific parts. Note that there is no canopy for a single seater though so don’t buy this one if you want to do a single seater (can’t see why anyone would but now you have been warned )
I look forward to see how this one turns out, there are quite a lot of detail and loads of spares making it possible to do all kinds of 109 variants from the same basic sprues. It lacks the refinement of the FineMolds kits but I would say fairly good for being short runs.
And suddenly we’re a bit on the way!
If you haven’t seen me complain about it before, I would like to tell you that I don’t like photo etch. I can’t really handle it. It doesn’t turn out that well. I don’t enjoy it. And there is always super glue everywhere after my misadventures… I found these plastic belts by chance and decided to give them a try. OK, they don’t solve all my problems (I’m still slightly overweight and a bit slow on my road bike…) but they can be glued using ordinary plastic glue and if they were just a tiny bit thinner it would have been possible to drape them even better. As they are now they are at least a bit better than photo etch and they stay put after gluing, something that PE never does! They come in a bunch of variants from WWII era up to modern age jets and from several nations, with four sets of belts in each box. Try them, you might like them!
Quite tidy when in place if I may say so myself!
FineMolds kits are easy builds and from cracking the box to a complete 109 is a matter of hours really!
The two-seater! With a closed canopy and a dark grey cockpit there is no reason for doing the details to death, it is more important that it LOOKS detailed!
Recent research has shown that the main reason for Marseille’s victories was his use of a Quickboost-sight…
Magnus
! Adds some extra emphasis to the fact that smoking is unhealthy…