3D model
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A procedural model built in Blender from published dimensions, drawings and photographs, painted as T.2B-272 (c/n 163), a CASA 352L, the Spanish licence-built Junkers Ju 52/3m, built at Getafe in 1954, retired by the Spanish Air Force in 1972, bought by the RAF Museum in 1977 and shown at Cosford for decades in fictitious British Airways ‘G-AFAP’ colours, then acquired by the Kent Battle of Britain Museum Trust in 2022 and displayed outdoors at Hawkinge: ‘Tante Ju’, the three-engined, low-wing transport with corrugated metal skin, three ENMASA Beta radials (licence BMW 132s) in deep cowlings, the Junkers ‘double wing’ of separate flaps and ailerons hung behind the trailing edge, a square-section cabin with a row of side windows and a fixed tail-wheel undercarriage with bare oleo main legs, shown tail-down on its wheels in the fictitious 1940 ‘Operation Sea Lion’ scheme the museum painted in 2023: RLM 61, 62 and 63 splinter camouflage above, black undersides, yellow outer cowlings and lower nose, a light grey and yellow rudder, ‘1Z+LP’ of 6./KGzbV 1 with a red ‘L’ either side of the fuselage cross, crosses above and below the wings, a black swastika with a white edge on the fin and the KGzbV 1 badge on the nose (shape from a published Ju 52/3m three-view, with the cowlings, undercarriage, windows and aerials from photographs of T.2B-272; the camouflage boundaries are placed from photographs to within about 30 cm, and the museum’s tail support stands are left out). Drag to orbit, scroll or pinch to zoom · download .glb (1.5 MB)
Data plate
Specification
- First flight7 March 1932
- Built4,845
- Top speed165 mph
- Engine3 × ENMASA Beta B-4 nine-cylinder radials (licence-built BMW 132), 775 hp each
- Crew2–3
- Wingspan29.25 m
- Length18.9 m
- Height4.5 m
- In service1932–1982
- RoleThree-engined transport, airliner and bomber
- MakerJunkers (CASA under licence), Germany
- UK collections1
First flight, number built and top speed are for the whole family (Ju 52/3m & CASA 352L); engine, crew and dimensions are for the CASA 352L, T.2B-272 modelled here.
History
The Ju 52/3m
Junkers had built all-metal aircraft with corrugated duralumin skins since the F 13 of 1919, and Ernst Zindel’s Ju 52 followed the same recipe on a larger scale: a low-wing monoplane with a square-section cabin, a fixed tail-wheel undercarriage and the Junkers “double wing”, in which the flaps and ailerons ran along the whole span as a separate narrow aerofoil hung just behind and below the trailing edge. The first Ju 52 flew in October 1930 with a single engine, as a freighter. Junkers then gave it three, one in the nose and one on each wing, and the Ju 52/3m first flew in March 1932. It was strong, simple and forgiving, could use short grass fields, and could be fitted with floats or skis.
Lufthansa took it as its standard airliner, carrying 15 to 17 passengers, and airlines across Europe, South America, Africa and China bought it too; before the war British Airways Ltd flew it on its Scandinavian services. It was also the Luftwaffe’s first bomber. In the summer of 1936, at the start of the Spanish Civil War, Ju 52s ferried Franco’s Army of Africa from Morocco to Seville, and the Condor Legion bombed with them. In the Second World War the Ju 52, known to its crews as “Tante Ju” (Auntie Ju), carried paratroops into Norway, the Netherlands and Crete, towed gliders, dropped supplies and evacuated the wounded on every front. Hundreds were lost in the landings in the Netherlands in May 1940, on Crete in 1941 and in the failed attempt to supply the Sixth Army at Stalingrad in the winter of 1942–43.
Production went on after the war. In France, Amiot built about 400 as the AAC.1 Toucan, and in Spain Construcciones Aeronáuticas SA (CASA) built 170 as the CASA 352 and 352L, the 352L with ENMASA Beta engines, the Spanish licence-built BMW 132. The Spanish Air Force used them as transports and for training paratroops into the 1970s, and the Swiss Air Force flew its three Ju 52s until 1982. For a short time after the war British European Airways flew captured Ju 52s on routes from Northolt. In all, about 4,845 were built, and a few still fly.
This airframe
CASA 352L T.2B-272 “1Z+LP”
T.2B-272 (constructor’s number 163) was built by CASA at Getafe, near Madrid, in 1954 with three ENMASA Beta radials, and served with the Spanish Air Force until it was retired in 1972. The RAF Museum bought it in 1977 and it was flown to Britain in 1978. For many years it was displayed at Cosford painted to represent G-AFAP, one of the Ju 52s flown by British Airways Ltd before the war. The RAF Museum offered it for transfer in 2021, and in November 2022 it went to the Kent Battle of Britain Museum Trust at Hawkinge, where it was stripped and repainted outdoors in 2023 and is now displayed outside on its own wheels. The model shows it as it is displayed there, in made-up markings of a Ju 52 of 6./KGzbV 1 for the planned 1940 invasion of Britain, Operation Sea Lion: dark green, green and light grey splinter camouflage on the upper surfaces and fuselage sides, the pattern differing from side to side, black undersides, yellow outer cowlings and lower nose, a rudder light grey in front and yellow behind, the codes 1Z+LP with a red “L” either side of the fuselage cross, crosses above and below the wings, a black swastika with a white edge across the fin and rudder, and the KGzbV 1 badge on the nose. The cowlings, the bare oleo main legs and the aerials follow photographs of this aircraft; the camouflage boundaries are placed from photographs to within about 30 cm, and the pattern on top of the wings, only partly photographed, is shown in kind rather than traced. The museum’s support stands under the tail are left out.
Where to see one
In the gazetteer
The gazetteer records the Ju 52/3m in one UK collection. The airframe modelled here is marked.