It Ain't heavy it fits in my Opel. | Armorama™

From Modeller Mumu Zheng's fantastic take on the recovery of a Bf-109 G6 using the ever-reliable Opel Blitz 3-ton 4x2 truck. During the years preceding World War II Opel was Germany's largest truck producer. As part of the Nazi economy and the German re-armament efforts the authorities ordered the construction of the Opelwerk Brandenburg facilities in 1935, and through 1944 more than 130,000 Blitz trucks and chassis were produced.


This is partial text from the full article (usually with photos) at https://armorama.com/news/it-ain-t-heavy-it-fits-in-my-opel
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Overall, this looks great. Very nice attention to details and I like the way he disconnected the wings.

One issue I see though. How would the wings be loaded with the big parts against the rear of the bed? They could not be slipped into the wooden frame from the rear due to the larger part being forward. The way they are now, the whole wooden cradle, with wings installed, would have to be lifted into the truck bed by a crane. I think it would be more realistic to have the wings and wooden cradle turned around (180 degrees) in the bed. That way the wings could be slid in from the rear.

Turning the wings around could possibly put too much weight behind the rear axle.
Redesign the cradle or have the top cross members removable

Good point. I hadn’t thought about the weight.

Also, how does the tail wheel of the plane attach to the bed of the truck? If it is allowed to swing as the truck turns, it would strike the wings, potentially damaging them. If fixed and not allowed to swing, turning would be very difficult.

Bottom line, real-world physics is a bitch.

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Amen, Brother
The Nemesis of many a model builder …

No tight turns …
Maybe it could work on an airfield with long sweeping curves and big open spaces.
For regular roads I would suggest a one axle dolly towed by the Blitz.
This would also take a few pounds off the load bed.
Maybe re-purpose one of the Sd.Anh 51 used for light flak like the 20 mm?
It comes with gear to raise the load and everything.

image
This trailer has way more payload capacity than required for that tail wheel
BUT
it should be readily available on or near an airfield.

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I found something similar, though the wings are somewhere else:

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I managed to find a page from a real manual, telling this is the way to tow the plane:
image

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No tight turns :smiley:

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That is for sure… The ropes to the landing gear are missing with the model…

I get the impression from that diagram that the rudder and tailplanes have been removed from the tail.
If the rudder has been taken off there will be less stuff sticking out behind the tail wheel pivot, i.e. facing towards the truck cab. With the tailplanes and rudder gone the tail of the aircraft will need less space to swing when the truck turns around a corner.
The fixture for the tail wheel would be somewhere halfway between the tail gate and the center of the Opels rear axle. Maybe slightly closer to the tail gate.

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You are right… They might be very well positioned behind the plane in their own cradle…

It would be interesting to see how it actually worked in real life. Definitely no tight turns.

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I found the full manual:
On pages 181 to 184
The tail plane:

The tail wheel:

This way of transporting was used to bring the plane from the factory to the nearest railwaystation if no railway connection was available. A person should be positioned in the bed of the truck to keep an eye out and if the distance to the railway was more substantial, the wheels should be changed for special transport wheels.

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as someone who is in the logistics trade i thought the wings were loaded correctly. at least someone has found images in a training manual to back this up.

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My pleasure… The only remark which I am not sure of with the model (apart from the aforementioned ropes) is the length of the bed: this should be 5 m. according to the manual.

The bed on the 3-ton Opel Blitz is 3.5 meters long, i.e. too short by 1.5 m

This causes the wing tips to stick out waaayyy too far behind the tail gate and since the
tail wheel is on the load bed it is too far “inboard” on the wings which severely restricts
the turning ability of the combination.
Compare the model photos with the diagrams

Plus, the prop should not be on. This dio is a mixture of situations: if the plane had an accident, it would not be transported like this with the elaborate crating of the wings.
But more like this:
image
image
https://falkeeins.blogspot.com/2014/04/
But if it would be transported to a railway station/junction, the propellor would not be on…

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To Golikell: GREAT reference that should silence the nay sayers. And GREAT work here!

As to turning radius; is it possible you have located the pivot block for the tail wheel too far forward in the Blitz bed? Seems like it should be on the very rear edge of the bed.

Regards

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Thanks Michael… I like to dig in to these things… I figure that one does not make up those setups and that some reference must be somewhere to be found…
The builder did use some artistic license, however. That is fine, of course, but this leads to these kind of discussions… Which is very educative btw. :slight_smile:

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