Fw 190 D-9 "Blue 12" WNr. 500570 of II./JG 6 surrendered to elements of the U.S. 10th Photo Reconnaissance Group at Fürth, near Nürnberg on 8 May 1945
" ..This one is finally off my bench after a few months of work, my rendition of the 'famous' “blue 12” which surrendered at Fürth in May 1945. I used the Hasegawa 1/32 Dora -9 with Quickboost cowling, spinner and prop, Quinta studio cockpit interior, Hgw seatbelts, eduard brassin flaps, 1 Man Army stencil masks. Some small bits I took some artistic license, but I’ll get into that later...".
"..there are plenty of pics of this aircraft that are available, as well as a few that come with the Eaglecals decal set. However I’m less impressed with the Eaglecals set as I intended to only use the serial number, the “E9”, and the “12”. However for some reason, the “1” is smaller than the “2” in the 12. It makes no sense why they’ve done that as every photo I’ve seen of the thing doesn’t show this. Hence I made my own mask for that by painstakingly drawing and cutting it out of paper, tracing onto masking sheet and cutting that out. To make things worse I botched its placement on first go and had to use the mask 3 times…"
"..The colours of blue 12? Experts on the subject lean towards the top of the wings being 77/81, or 76/81, however in my honest opinion that may have well been the case for later Mimetall machines. My theory is that early ones such as 570 here had the standard grey wings, which were then painted 81 on the underside, either by factory or at unit level until Mimetall found their “groove” and painted the whole thing in 81 etc. My source for this theory being machine 581 (only a few airframes from blue 12) clearly having the grey tops, but notice landing gear doors being that dark colour still indicating to me RLM 81, which can clearly be seen also on the famous colour photo of blue 12.."
Thanks to Casey for his superb model images!