Dornier Do-17Z-1 - the German bomber

In 1932 the German company "Dornier" prepared a scout-bomber project. Officially it was presented as a high-speed communications and mail plane due to the camouflage of the armament production. In the place where the bomb chamber was supposed to be installed, a kind of passenger cabin was installed, access to which required good athletic training and flexibility. Due to its very thin fuselage, the aircraft was nicknamed the "flying pencil". When Hitler's party won the parliamentary elections and restrictions on the production of armaments were no longer respected, work on this plane accelerated greatly. The first Do-17s were ready in the winter of 1936/1937 and in 1937 one squadron was sent to Spain as part of the Legion "Condor". These were reconnaissance planes, and later bombers were also sent. They operated almost with impunity, because the republican fighters were too slow, only the Soviet I-16s, received later, gave some mercy to the performance of these bombers. The Do-17 became the main sensation at the International Military Aircraft Show, held in Zurich in July 1937 and attracted the most interest from all the bombers, that participated in the exhibition. In 1938 based on the Spanish experience, a new cockpit was built for the plane, from which the firing angles were improved and the armament was strengthened. In mass production this version is designated Do-17Z. In the September 1939 campaign in Poland the Germans used about 540 Do-17 reconnaissance and bomber versions of Dornier Do-17 planes. Due to the high speed and in Poland, the Do-17 operated almost without resistance. In 1940 the production of the Do-17Z was replaced by a new aircraft - the Do-217. The Do-17 participated in the French campaign, the invasion of Norway, the Battle of Britain and the Balkan campaign. The model, which can be assembled from the publication, depicts a Do-17Z-1 of the 1st Squadron, 1st Group of the 76th Bomber Regiment, based at Beauvais-Tille Airfield in France in September 1940. .

A large, complex, well designed and richly detailed model for intermediate to advanced modelers. Well detailed cockpit equipment, engines, chassis and its niches, armament, exterior details. The control plates are only separated from the main plates, double-sided printing is used, where necessary, the color stock is minimal (and only green), but they can be "combined" from the gluing areas of the other side of the details. Even a version without cockpit equipment, with an opaque cockpit hood, included chassis, simplified engine layouts will be too difficult for less experienced modelers.