1/72 MiG-23 MLD

[Pirata]

Hi,

I'll be using the kitbash instructions from "Andrew D. the Jolly Rogers guy" as a guide. His build can be found here. The Soviets were (obviously) part of the Warsaw Pact, even though they wandered out of the theater of operations, so I presume I'm okay here.

I'll be using the Academy kit, Zvezda kit, Eduard PE, Pavla resin engine & Linden Hill decals.

Here's the real bird:

Call me crazy, but that center line tank looks bare metal to me. There will be plenty of time to figure that out though. I have a lot of work to do. I have a better image somewhere. I'll find it before I'm done.

Here it is in decal form:

A closeup:

After a ridiculously long night, I'm off to a good start with the cockpit and nose.

The instrument panel is a film that's behind the PE plate. The PE was hand brushed. The rest of the cockpit was shot.

Nose profile after some serious sanding:

From the top:

Ejector pins in the most convenient locations:

Then again, is there a convenient location for ejector pins?

Updates as they happen...

All comments are welcome.

Edited May 16, 2010 by Pirata

[HOLMES]

good start Pirata...I like the seats...your hand brushing is neat..

nice work

:D

[Pirata]

This was my first attempt to clean the ejector pins off. It wasn't pretty.

The left side went better and I've already puttied the right side.

Updates as they happen...

[Pirata]

@Holmes: Thank you! My next step will be to sand down the ejector pins and then resume detailing the cockpit. Then I'll start work on the coaming and HUD.

[Uncle Uncool]

:D Noooiiiceee...!!! A MiG-23 MLD; me likes, Pirata, bloke! :lol:

Say, is the radome on MLDs any different from the early M versions? I've got the ESCI 1/48 kit, which I intend to convert into the ML which defected to Israel on October the 11th, 1989. Biggest problem with the ESCI kit is the nose and the windshield. Anything else is doable, me thinks.

Incidentally; have ya got any ML 1/48 plans to share by chance, Pirata?

Awlright; me's gonna be followin' this build, mate; ya hear? So far, so awesome. Keep it up!

Unc²

P.S: "Conch" Republic...? ;) In the U.S? That's got to be Miami, right?

[Pirata]

Noooiiiceee...!!! A MiG-23 MLD; me likes, Pirata, bloke!

Say, is the radome on MLDs any different from the early M versions? I've got the ESCI 1/48 kit, which I intend to convert into the ML which defected to Israel on October the 11th, 1989.

Thanks! I'll try to make an interesting model. To answer your question, it's my understanding that the MLDs and the MLs both have the fatter radome for the more powerful radar, but you should confirm that with a Soviet aircraft expert, which I'm not. I'm learning about these things as I go along.

Incidentally; have ya got any ML 1/48 plans to share by chance, Pirata?

I wish I could help but my only references are the Squadron/Signal Book, an issue of World Airpower Journal from 1992 that focuses on the MiG-23 and whatever I can dig up online.

P.S: "Conch" Republic...? :blink: In the U.S? That's got to be Miami, right?

Actually, it's the Keys. Although, I'm in Miami. My cellphone is registered in the Keys. So, I'm a telecommuting citizen of the Conch Republic. :wacko:

If you get bored, here's an introduction to the lunacy that is life in South Florida: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conch_Republic

Edited May 18, 2010 by Pirata

[Pirata]

Time for an update.

The gunsight is provided by the Eduard photoetch sheet. There's a cable/pipe/thing that surrounds the gunsight. I tried to reproduce this with a piece of wire. Mine is a little anemic but I was concerned that if I made it too thick, the windscreen wouldn't fit. The trial fit shows it'll fit, but I need to mount the clear part yet.

The gunsight is painted. I've seen MiG-23 coamings in black & in cockpit green & black. I opted for the combo as it'll be the first in my inventory to have this combination. The green part of the hood is made from paper, impregnated with super glue. The lower part of the fuselage has been mounted to the nose section. I build models out of order from the instructions.

The cockpit received a wash and the ejector pins were sanded off of the boundary layer intake and it was given a shot of primer to make sure it's good. The radome/nose joint received a shot of primer to serve as a seam check. *Most* of it passed the test.

The nasty scratches I created from my first attempt to clean up the ejector pins, on the right side, are filled and fixed. The seat is off the Fujimi MiG-21, with the sides lopped off and Eduard PE replacing the sides of the seat.

All comments are welcome.

[dragan_mig31]

the cockpit looks nice.i can't wait to see more ;)

[pkrasna]

The detailing is exelent especialy on the HUD and control panel.

Primož

[Uncle Uncool]

If you get bored, here's an introduction to the lunacy that is life in South Florida: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conch_Republic

:lol: Hmph, very interesting piece of information. I didn't know about that; I really thought ya were just jokin.' Thanks.

I can't wait to see more :)

Uh-huh, me seconds this statement by the Dragan mate. If only this project had been in 1/48th scale...

Unc²

[Pirata]

Thanks for the comments!

I started work on the fuselage. Regarding the intakes, I plan to just paint the interior in flat black and close them up. I think the fan blades on the real bird are sufficiently recessed that you're not going to see anything.

It would seem that Mr. Academy is running low on plastic.. My solution is simple. I'm going to cheat and take the proper parts out of another kit.

Top is what I was going to use. Bottom is what I will use. It's not ideal either, but it's easier to fix.

Left side.

Right side.

Underside. There's a lot of filling & sanding to do. The lights were painted silver on the inside. They're clear on the outside.

With the intakes on, I can start notching the wings. I put styrene in the holes to help plug them up.

Test fit of the top.

From behind. I've filled in part of the slot that's meant for the Academy tail. I'll be using the Zvezda tail, which is shorter.

Top profile.

Last one. The seam along the top is not that bad but I have a lot of tight angles to sand around.

Now, I start puttying, sanding & fitting various parts. There's also a fair amount of scribing and riveting to be done.

All comments are welcome.

[Deacon]

I'm liking that a lot Pirata.

Well done mate.

Deacon

[Pirata]

Small update. Actually, these photos should have been included in the last update but, somehow, they never made it off the camera. I just found them.

I added stiffeners to the aft fuselage because it's going to require a lot of sanding & some scribing and there's nothing more annoying than doing all that work and then having the fuselage open up on me.

Test fit of the Pavla resin engine with the stiffeners.

With the top on. Look at that step! :unsure: I've got some serious sanding to do.

WARNING: the flame holder details on the Pavla resin engine are at the very end of the tube. I placed my razor saw as close to the plug as I could but the backing still ended up paper thin. Came close to ruining it... :o Notice the hole. It's not a big issue though. I do intend to add a piece of styrene to the back to eliminate the hole. Once painted, it shouldn't be noticeable. The resin 'crumbs' at the end of the tube have already been removed.

The nose mid-fuselage weights were from the spares box. They were originally a pair of counter-balances for a ceiling fan. They came with double-backed tape. The fuselage top has since been glued in place.

And the sanding & bodywork continues.

[Bonehammer73]

Hello, nice Flogger there!

I think you're better off shaving some mm from the mating surfaces of the rear fuselage, rather than trying to smooth the step from the outside. Just my 2 cents.

Also, re the auxiliary intakes, these were protected by plastic covers when the aircraft was parked.

[Pirata]

Hello, nice Flogger there!

I think you're better off shaving some mm from the mating surfaces of the rear fuselage, rather than trying to smooth the step from the outside. Just my 2 cents.

Also, re the auxiliary intakes, these were protected by plastic covers when the aircraft was parked.

Thank you for your suggestions! I did end up shaving some plastic from the inside, especially where the stiffeners were installed, and it's made the body work much easier! As for the auxiliary intake covers, I'm thinking of using those on my next MiG-23, which will be using the defective intakes shown above. For this model, I'm planning something different. Thank you for your input!

This update involves mostly bodywork...

The installation of the rudder off the Zvezda kit, sanded, scribed and primed for seam checks.

2/3 of the aircraft primed. The mating of the intakes to the fuselage is less than ideal, to put it nicely, and it needs more work.

Left wing, OOB. To serve as a 'before'. The wings were notched to allow me to slide them in after painting, a-la the Hasegawa F-14 & F-111 kits. Notice that this wing fractured but it's fixed now.

Right wing, sanded & polished. I scribed in the spoilers and added rivets. Probably not fully accurate as I l don't have any drawings but a huge improvement over the original kit. It will serve as my 'after'.

Side by side.

All comments are welcome.

[dragan_mig31]

the scribed wing looks great.love the riveting

[pollie]

Coming along nicely!

[cpoud117]

Great job so far !

[Pirata]

Thanks, guys!

The painting of the wings.

Both my Linden Hill MiG-23 decal sheet "Russian Swingers", and the Superscale sheet which has the same markings for this aircraft on it, recommend using FS 595 paints on the plane. However, the Superscale sheet has no schematic for how to paint the plane. The Linden Hill sheet only shows the left side. So, to determine how to paint the wings, I compared the camo scheme from the Zvezda kit to some photos off Airliners.net and then took my best guess. As for the paint, both the FS 595 paints and the Model Master Warsaw Pact colors looked too dark and would've required I add a fair amount of white for scale effect. So, I dipped into my vast supply of paint and picked out what looked like faded versions of the recommended paint.

The underwings were painted in Testors Model Master Flanker Pale Blue.

The left wing after it's first coat. Both upper wings were pre-shaded.

Left wing. The camera picked up a flaw in my riveting that I thought I'd fixed. It's not as noticeable in real life.

Right. The rivets do a disappearing act on the camera, but they're there. Not certain why the brown has so much glare. No flash used.

Paints used were:

RLM 62 Medium Green

U.S. Dark Green FS34079 (My first choice turned out too light.)

Skin Tone Tint Base Dark (That's the brown. It's a figure color.)

U.S. Tan Special (IDK what makes it so special.)

Updates as they happen.

All comments are welcome.

[Sebastijan]

The colours look really great! Can't wait to see the whole aircraft in camo!

[mig21gato]

Yes look so great,well is a nice colour combination.

[janman]

I too like the camo colours you've used! Should look very nice when finished.

[Pirata]

Thank you for your comments!

I had a problem with the upper left wing which left me having to repaint portions of the tan and the brown. Once repainted, I decided to blunder forth and finish the wings. After future, decals, wash and as an experiment, I went with a semi-gloss instead of a flat, these are the completed wings:

The problematic, upper left wing:

As a photography experiment, the above photos were all taken through a lighted, magnifying loop:

Hmm.... The loop picked up some silvering around the stencils that I'll have to address....

[cpoud117]

Great job so far !

[dragan_mig31]

the wings look great.what kind of wash is that?