Focke-Wulf Fw 190A-4 – 6./JG 1, Wolfgang Leonhardt, Holland 1942 1/48

Hobby Master 1/48 scale HA7423: Focke-Wulf Fw 190A-4 of6./JG 1, Luftwaffe, Woensdrecht, Holland, October 1942. Production run of only 500 models.

Length 7.25 inches Wingspan 8.5 inches

Fw-190A-4 5533 Yellow 6 was assigned to Oberleutnant Wolfgang Leonhardt, 6./JG 1. He scored his first victory, a Spitfire on June 19, 1942. Late in 1942 JG 1 became involved in the Defense of the Reich. On October 31, 1942 Yellow 6 was slightly damaged during a crash landing and was repaired. Leonhardt scored a second victory on December 6, 1942 and his third on December 13, 1942. On January 22, 1943 he scored 2 more victories but on February 4, 1943 he was shot down by a B-17.

In 1937 even though the Me-109 was a very capable fighter the Reichsluftfahrtministeriun (RLM) or Reich Air Ministry was worried that future foreign designs might surpass its performance so they called for submissions of designs. Kurt Tank won the competition with his radical use of an air-cooled radial engine that he dubbed the Fw-190 Würger (Butcher Bird). There were many skeptics who believed this new aircraft would surpass the performance of the Me-109. However when the Fw-190 entered combat in the summer of 1941 it already was Germany’s premiere piston-powered WWII fighter. Over 20,000 of all variants of the Fw-190 were built with 13,291 of these being of the 9 different “A” variants.