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Thought I'd give the Revell Mig-29 kit a little "upgrade". My intent is to use the Zactomodel detail sets made for the Revell kit and use Trumpeter parts to supplement other details. There are some shape issues with the Revell kit that I try to overcome with sanding and Milliput. The Revell wheel wells are very inaccurate, so I replaced them with the much better looking Trumpeter wheel wells.

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Here's the Revell wheel well. Very simple detail and the shapes/curves are oversized.

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More to follow.

Patrick

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very fine work! are you going to use the front wheelwell from the trumpy kit too, the revell one has nothing in common with the real thing

i vacformed the wheelwell part on my build, that was a lot of work. your way is very convincing.

keep up the good work

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Neat work Patrick. It looks like the Trumpeter parts fit the Zactomodel/Revell parts really well. Thanks for blazing a trail on this conversion. Am I imagining it or can I see light through the plastic after you've finished sanding the kit fuselage parts? :blink:

I'll tag along with this build if I may as I've got a Fulcrum in the stash.

Cheers,

:cheers:

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Thanks for your comments. Here are some shots of the LERX shaping I did. The challenging part of the Revell kit is the oversized LERX beneath the cockpit. The vertical section below the canopy is not tall enough and the "shoulder" is too "thick". The excellent Zactomodel parts are made to fit the Revell kit without too much modification.

My approach is to compromise between modifying the Revell LERX areas while not destroying the areas that accept the Z-Man inserts. I have seen several builds where other modelers have taken clever measures to fix this.

First I made some plastic contour templates to try and match as close as possible to some 1/32 scale drawings. Of course I'm assuming the drawings are accurate and my scale-up process is acceptable. According to my drawings, there are eleven stations of cross section for the forward fuselage, I only needed 2 for checking my work.

Next begins the filing and sanding down the LERX area. If I matched the aft contour template exactly, I would have ground the plastic through and created a "hole", plus the Z-Man louvers would not have fit properly. Hence the compromise. As you can see from the photos, the contours are not an exact match, but much closer to the original Revell attempt. (I still need to file down the undersides of the LERX to help "station 11" contour fit better on the upper surface) There is also a piece of plastic strip on the upper edge of the canopy sill per the Z-Man instructions to help build up the side wall height. I cut mine in a long rectangular shape and mounted it at an incline instead of adding a wedge shape.

The light you see peeking through in the pics is where I took the plastic down to "very thin" without losing the integrity of it's strength. I'll have to be very careful when rescribing. I can always go back and reinforce with plastic card and some superglue, particularly where rescribed panel lines will be set.

All the destroyed gun and vent details will be scratch built and set back into place. One is done so far.

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I did end up using the Trumpy nose wheel well. Once again there is compromise with the kit bashing. Trumpy's Intake-to-Exhaust distance is shorter than the Z-man parts made for the Revell kit. After studying some photos and drawings, the leading edge of the intake roof is slightly ahead of the nose wheel well opening. I decided to keep the Revell actuator strut housing (forward portion) and use the Trumpy aft housing for the remainder. I mounted the Trumpy part slightly aft of the Revell position to keep the overall relationships somewhat closer to the real thing.

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This has been a lot of fun so far. Oh by the way, that Tamiya light sensitive putty makes for some quick work. I'm really starting to like this stuff. More to follow.

Patrick

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  • 8 months later...

It's been a while since I posted anything on this project. It happens when you have too many rods in the fire...including family, work, etc. Here is a few photos of my partially scratch-built cockpit that has some of the old CAM resin parts to complete. I copied the cockpit tub from some photos I saw on Chris' website a log time ago. Apparently the master pattern maker "fell off the earth" and the cockpit never materialized, so I made my own. The seat is quickboost. Once I put on a coat of Mr. Surfacer ith an airbrush, I can paint the cockpit and close up the fuselage.

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Now, this is an interesting project. Revell and trumpeter kits with Zactomans resin set....this is going to be expensive build, but none the less very interesting. So, I can't wait to see more of this cool build.Keep up the good work.

Mike

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  • 6 months later...

Time to update my progress. I have closed the fuselage and have started the preparations for wings, tails, and stabilators. The new parts really help this Revell kit start to look more like a Mig-29.

The revell kit has the wing stubs mount to the fuselage. I want a more rigid structure, so I fit a carbon fiber composite stub through the fuselage and cut slots in the wings. This should be a strong and lightweight "wingbox". I'll also move the wings slightly forward since the revell kit has them a little too far aft.

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More progress on the cockpit. Still needs some more painting detail.

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Here are the major components set in place. Just dry fitting at this stage. Lots of small adjustments and filling to make sure everything is squared up and aligned properly. As I look ahead, the proper tail/empenage relationship will be a challenge.

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Thanks for looking and your patience. More to follow.

Patrick

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  • 1 month later...

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