The Gotha has a special niche in the WWI air war, both for the terror it struck in the hearts of Londoners (totally out of proportion to the damage they did compared to the carnage in the trenches) and for foreshadowing the modern air war to come. They were slow (87 mph), carried a limited bomb load, and were ultimately driven from the London skies. But they forced the British to withdraw a significant number of fighters for home defense.

The Gotha has a particularly brutal look, with its massive wing-span (78 feet, or six-and-a-half feet at 1/12th scale), blunt nose, huge engines and the 8-wheeled landing gear like the extended talons of a diving bird of prey that I chose for the Arizona Models GVb version I built. Apart from building the damn thing, how was I going to portray it on this webpage? I had done a backgroundpicture for the AerodromeRC Fokker DVII that I had done previously, but that was only a 36" wingspan. This was something else. But Jaime of Arizona Models has the machinery for printing blueprints, he liked what I had done with the DVII, and he graciously offered to print up some large artwork (28" x 52") if I supplied him the files. That and a large brownish-green shag rug and I was in business. The trick then was visualize the shots carefully, work different lightings, and then carefully crop in PhotoShop, using the program to work the backgrounds when they didn't extend far enough or were wrongly lit. (For the record, I made no photographic alteration of the plane itself other than adjusting lighting.) I have deliberately gone for a dark look to convey the proper look of menace.

For the batch below, I took an aerial shot of old London, with flames added, laid it flat, and then took a sky picture to prop up behind London. By carefully working the perspective and camera angles, it came out fairly well. For some shots, I used a strong spotlight to show the Gotha caught in the spotlights of the defenders below.

As I contemplated actually starting the kit, looking at the blueprints and the pile of sticks and pondering how I was going to build this six-and-a-half foot wingspan monster on the pathetic little desk I work on, I frankly gave up in despair. But my wife Rose knew, like in Casablanca, that if I didn't do it, I'd regret it forever. The 12th picture is not Ingrid Bergman, nor is it the notorious British spy Mata Foxy, but rather Rose herself in a rare captured photo.

One problem building the Gotha is that the number of actual pictures is small, and lacks full blueprints. In addition, many details are poorly depicted, as the German high command did not have the best interests of future modelers in mind (vicious Huns!). On the Arizona Models plans themselves, it states that the features shown depict actual Gotha features, but not all from the same Gotha. The kit took over a year to complete, and innumerable flesh wounds. The final pic is of my heroic assistant Trixie, without whose and Rose's support this plane could not have been built.

A few words on technique. The engine nacelle is made of thin brass. I created the top of the engine and cylinders first. Then I built a "boat" with a slot to take the engine, making sure the height between the bottom of the boat and the top of the cylinders was correct, On the boat I built a crude frame slightly shy of the correct size, and to that I attached the brass panel by panel. It would have been easier to carve the whole thing out of wood, but when you bend and work the brass, it creases and crinkles, giving it a beaten look you just can't get with wood.

For the landing gear, I used a technique I had first used on the Aerodrome Fokker D7. There were four complex gear for each front and back wheel pair -- and they had to match! I took brass tubing, each one one size larger than the last, and glued them into a solid piece, with the innermost tube only large enough for a small wire. Then I could cut the brass into segments based on exact measurements, insert the wire. Thus I was able to bend them exactly with ease. I connected the cross pieces with thread, and smeared CA glue all over it, and it was more solid than welding, and my hands were crippled for only a short time.