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There's a nice piece on the building of the Helldivers in the book "The Making of King Kong". Turns out there are no extant Helldivers around to use as a pattern. The Curtiss Company no longer exists, and what plans they had were thought to have been turned over to the Smithsonian. Well, the Helldiver plans were not in there. Turns out they were in the American National Archives.
Two "lifesize" models were made, and they were repainted over and over to look like more planes. Of course most of the shots were done with CGI. However, they tried to follow the plans to make these as realistic as possible. But modern materials were used- synthetic material for cotton for example.
Peter Jackson is an early aviation buff, and from what I've read, he now owns the Pfalz from the Blue Max. He's even had it repainted into the colors from that movie.
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