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1/72 Italeri SR-71 Blackbird


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More progress...

Must say,with this one,my patience was on the edge. I strongly advise to think twice before decide to go with PE vent plates.

It was really PITA, because first you need to cut the holes,try to make it perfect as you can,so PE parts fits ok.

In reality, no matter how you think you did great job, when you actually glue the PE plates,you become aware how you got wrong.

You need to place it right,bend it right,glue precisly so you don't fill grilles with glue,etc.

Anyway,after few hours,and ruined skinny stick (because you sand PE,glue and plastic) , I somehow did it.

It looks worse than actually is,there are no gaps,but glue. It seems pretty smooth on touch.

But,how it actually looks,we will see one day,when I put a coat of primer.

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Woody fantastic job blending those grills and vents. I am not big on 1/72 scale, but do you happen to know if they makes those for the Testors 1/48 scale Blackbird? Either way, your making this thing look more beautiful every update, keep it up!

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Start to make changes on tertiary doors. When parked,no hydraulics,so bottom tertiary doors are closed (gravity) :)

To achive that,I need to cut the original part and add doors.

0kfIwot.jpg

At the moment it looks like this. Still need to scribe it,so doors will be represented instead of flat surface.

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Finnaly I closed top and bottom halfs. Only rear segment. What a nightmare :)

No matter how I tried to dry fitting it, the fit is horrible. I will say it again, this SR-71 kits are rubbish. We really need some new tooled kit.

But, as from start of the build, I need to correct it. Lots of work in front of me,to fill the gaps, sand it, again rescribe and rerivet it. Should be fun :)

In pictures doesn't look so bad,but believe me, in reality is horrible :)

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bqYp1wt.jpg

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Here you can see working on filling the gaps.

I do it by inserting styrene rolls and styrene filler (styrene pieces mixed with Tamiya Extra Thin).

Then lots of sanding. At this stage is pretty ok,but as you can see,more work needs to be done to achive seamless area, and also,repairs to ruined scribed details and rivets.

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About PE vents...

On the kit this vents looks bad, poor molding and filled.

So, Eduard provides ,among else, PE plates to upgrade the look of the kit. But, Eduard PE are bigger,so you need to completly remove

plastic,and with lot of effort try to make the holes the same dimensions as PE parts.

In reality,this is a nightmare. Becuase you also need to bend it,and make all fit.

If your question was,are some sort of support under the PE plates ,to put it on,answer is no. They are holding just with sides.

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About PE vents...

On the kit this vents looks bad, poor molding and filled.

So, Eduard provides ,among else, PE plates to upgrade the look of the kit. But, Eduard PE are bigger,so you need to completly remove

plastic,and with lot of effort try to make the holes the same dimensions as PE parts.

In reality,this is a nightmare. Becuase you also need to bend it,and make all fit.

If your question was,are some sort of support under the PE plates ,to put it on,answer is no. They are holding just with sides.

This is the deal with most p/e 'surface' items (vents, grills, etc.) -Eduard et al supply an object that their instructions apparently would have you shape around the target panel curvature, then attach on top of the plastic. Have a look at a photo of a Hornet (for example), and these things are more often than not flush with the surrounding area -duhhh! :blink: To deal with this effectively, you need to do what you did here and rebate the p/e bit into the surface. And get it the same shape! What fun.

Now, AMUR Reaver (with whom I have no connection) have a much better approach for most subjects, and provide the entire panel with the vents incorporated -I hate to think how much plastic you would have to remove to achieve this with the SR-71, and you'd likely end up with a model that was mostly brass, but it would still be preferable to all that faff!!!

I really hope Eduard and others will consider adopting this solution in all scales; it may make their products a bit more expensive but the reduced work and extra *WOW* factor would surely be worth it...?

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PE work will always be fiddly,but IMHO vents are the worse case scenario.

As you suggested,I will also love more if the whole panel was provided,it be easier that way.

But, with SR-71,apsolutly everything you do is complicated :) Seam lines,rivets,gaps,fit issues,reshaping,etc. If you want relativly accurate model,you need to mentaly be

prepared to lots of work,lots of issues,and need to have tons of patience.

Looking at some other builds, when people have new tooled model,lots of resin,accurate bluprints, I feel like I stuck in 19th century with my build :)

It will never look good as Kinetic SU-33 ,because I don't have CAD lines and rivets, shape ,etc. I need all of that done by hand.

But,I hope in the end,if everything goes well, I will be proud of it,because of ammount of work involved.

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I believe this project will be absolutely stunning!!! The Italeri kit is probably the least inaccurate of a rather uninspiring lot in this scale; sadly mine was cannibalised for various black plastic 'shapes' (don't ask!) because every time I looked in the box it made me sad...

If only I had the spheres to tackle the thing at the level you're doing, erm, well, quite honestly it wouldn't be a fraction as good! (I still have the Academy 'History' boxing someplace -maybe one sunny day!)

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So much work,but really not much to show you.

Spend lots of time to blend those vents more, so again sanding,repair lines,rivets... I think I done all rivets 10 times,again and again :)/>

And still more to come.

But,let me show you few things I'm working on.

First,end of the plane , as you can see,when I cut those elevons,stuck with large gaps. So I need to fill this. Used plastic plates and styrene filler.

This is ok for now,but still need to do cosmetic work on this,and redo panel lines and rivets. (did I mention reriveting hundred times) :)/>

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And just to mention, I also did that fuel dump at the end. Will insert 2 plates inside later.

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This ugly things are back exhaust,hope will hide it inside soon :)/>

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This perspective show you how it acctually looks. Did some painting and I think it's simular to real thing.

Used Radome Tan with white,and then playing with pigments. Rotor was painted with AK Interactive Pale Burnt Metal,and weathered with Tamiya pigment sets, blue,oil stains,titanium...

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Closer look (ignore front edge,it will not be visible)

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Now, some tricky subject.

As I will do this model with canopy closed (it looks better that way) , I will not bother with cockpit,simply because you will not be able

to see anything throug those tiny 1/72 windows. I'm not one of ''but I will know it's inside'' guys, for me that's completly waist of time and energy.

It's just my opinion and way I think,so please don't take much of it,you who share different point of view.

So, I did just basic interior, using Edurad PE (whole cockpit is PE), and some scratch building on it,and on seats. Btw,Eduard set is not painted,just bare brass.

This is just dry fitted ,or to be correct,just thrown inside :)/> , still need to do wash and small details.

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Edited by Woody_
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Stunning work so far!

Until this (and some googling yesterday) I did not realize how off the current SR-71 kits are. For instance, I really thought the Hase kit is the best of the bunch, while it really isn't. And they all are ancient with raised panel lines!

Anyway, will be following this closely.

Great work with the PE vents. Always pain in the butt. The cockpit looks sweet too.

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Cockpit is closed now.

Cut the masking tape for windows,and tried to fit glass,what a nightmare.

Nothing fits, so lots of reparations,sanding...

First stage finnish,still lot of work to make this descent.

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Also,did my own glass plates for TEOC ,because kit ones are wrong shape. And you can see 2 more went plates,from Eduard PE.

ufZ014e.jpg

Work in progress with TEOC, shaped front,painted (first stage) and added mirrors.

FYzlBQy.jpg

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Thank you for the kind words.

Just a small update, exhaust,my interpretation of it.

Used Model Master Exhaust and Titanium,then brown pigments,and little Mr Color Dark Iron.

Still need to do a little corrections,but overall,that's it.

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Edited by Woody_
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