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MiG-15 144 scale M3 Mk.1 project


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Here is something very small that was built late last year. This is the first part of the planned M3 program. The M3 in this case is Minimal Micro Mig. And within this program this is the Mk.1 version.

Basically this is just to see what is included in the kit. How it builds and what to look out for, where are the pitfall of the kit.

 

I took the 144 th scale MiG-15 bis version (kit No. 7112) for this first trial build. It is a Minimal version, that is a pure out of box. OK, I did change two things on it but that was essential as the plastic parts were awfully out of scale. The kit itself is dated 2014, and as far as I can tell it is not any longer in the range of the producer. But who knows.

 

 

 

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The other aim of the project was to see how the Master turned brass gun barrels and pitot (Air Master Series No. AM-144-026) fit on the kit. Basic question was: is it humanly possible at all to fit these microscopic items???

To better show off the brass parts the idea was to have a homogenous grey paint scheme over all with only the brass parts remaining in natural metal colour. The brass parts are extremely small. Just in case I have put them into a soft drink cup and placed into an easy seal bad to avoid the loss of the parts. One has to be very careful with them! I used a black base when working with them to see them on the contrasting surface if they fell from the tweezers.

 

 

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The kit itself is minimalistic and it is obviously a spin-off, down-scale of the 72nd version by the company. It has everything but it is simple. It represents the Czech built version of the MiG-15 with many panel lines which are only on the locally produced versions. I was not going to change them, remove them this time. Maybe on the MMk.2 version will do this.

The kit is broken down straight forward, top and bottom parts. The top part (C3) has integral wings so there is no need for setting them at a correct angle. It is all done for you by the manufacturer. Vertical and horizontal surfaces, cockpit, engine exhaust and intake as well as undercarriage parts. As an extra the maker included three versions of external fuel tanks, some bombs and missile rails (for local Czech bomber version) and two versions of main gear wheels (early and late). The external tanks are spanning the whole carrier of the MiG-15, with the early 260 litre slipper tanks (B1, B23, B24) used in the first years of service. And then there are the more traditional 400 litre tanks, first the metal construction one (B25, B26) and the later year version from Bakelite (B2, B3).  For most it is a question of which ever they like, for those with more interest in authenticity the choice depends on the particular era that they want to show the kit in with appropriate marking version.

 

 

 

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Anyone interested in seeing the kit will be able in a weeks time at the annual Moson Show. It will be with me and later at the stand of Master on the ground floor of the school building. If all goes according to plans  Master should be at the same place as in the past two years, just to the left in the first room as we go into the school building.

 

Best regards

Gabor

Edited by ya-gabor
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Never built a 144 scale kit before. Have many of them in the stash, but there was always something else to do. Was never sure of the size and the amount of detail that one can get into it. Some of the older ones are fairly primitive. Remember that KP all those decades ago did a small version (I think it was around 144) to go with the 48th scale kit. It was just there in the box. Everyone was asking what the hell is it doing there, why, for what . . . I think it was a one or two piece kit and very basic (one can say primitive). I think it all started there.

Anyway this one is nicely engineered with lots of details incorporated taking inspiration from the 72nd scale example they did. The only problem is that with injection moulding there is only so much that you can go down in thickness of parts. One either accepts this or goes into mindless detailing. Mind you with 3M Mk. 2 version I do have some ideas. :))

 

This kit was really a trial to see how far one can get with this scale. More tomorrow on the build. 

 

Best regards

Gabor

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What I did not like in the kit:

 

*     The idea of fitting the nose gear B34 to the lower fuselage part C2 in the very first step of construction. It is a very fragile little item and there is a lot of work to be done after gluing the two fuselage parts together. There is a fear that it will be broken and then you are in deep trouble.

 

*     The two plastic parts which were replaced are the antennas. B21 is the big antenna next to the cockpit and the Baria IFF antenna B22. They are completely out of scale or to be more precise wrong scale thickness, but of course there is nothing more that one can do with injection moulding. It is purely by accident (no it is not) that I have an original piece of both of them, so it was easy to take measurements and make scratch antennas from metal. A hole was drilled for positioning each of them.

 

    The sink marks on the wings. As far as I know this has partly been corrected on later production version with rearranging the gates on the sprues to make for better plastic flow and cooling.

 

The sink marks needed some attention, they were far too visible. Super glue was used to fill them. Carefully sanded to shape to avoid damaging areas near them. This was the biggest task on the kit. But it all started earlier.

 

 

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First the cockpit and the adjacent air intake was assembled and painted. Nothing added here apart from a considerable lead weight in the nose to avoid tail sitting of the kit. I painted the interior in advance with the home mix of grey that I liked. The cockpit, the inner cockpit walls under the seal on the top fuselage half, the intake walls and the nose gear bay were painted. Obviously the intake will need further painting later on after fitting the top and bottom fuselage parts but at least most of it was ready and finished, the areas deep inside which would be difficult to reach after construction.

 

 

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Anyone interested in seeing the kit in person will be able in a weeks time at the annual Moson Show. It will be with me and later at the stand of Master on the ground floor of the school building. If all goes according to plans  Master should be at the same place as in the past two years, just left in the first room as we go into the school building.

 

Best regards

Gabor

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While all this was drying the tail assembly was completed with gluing the horizontal surfaces in place. Minimal amount of cleaning was needed on leading and trailing edges. The same goes for the wings too. The original plastic pitot was cut off and its place sanded and drilled in anticipation of the brass pitot.

 

 

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The wing fences are way too thick due to injection moulding technology constrains. But for this kit they were left as they are. A little extra was to drill the positions for gear-down indicators both on the wings and in front of the cockpit. Also the S-13 gun camera window was imitated with a drilled hole on the nose ring. It will take just a drop of paint to show its position. A little and simple extra but I feel it adds a lot to the overall view.

 

On the bottom surface the plastic gun barrels were cut off. Suitable drills were used make holes as recommended by Master. The gun housings (B5 and C4) were glued in place on bottom fuselage (C2). As with most of the kit parts the fit is excellent and the only filler required was the liquid cement itself. Perfectly hiding all the seams.

 

 

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Anyone interested in seeing the kit will be able next weekend on 27 th and 28 th April at the annual Moson Show. The “enormous” kit will be with me and later at the stand of Master on the ground floor of the school building. If all goes according to plans  Master should be at the same place as in the past two years, just left in the first room as we go into the school building.

 

Best regards

Gabor

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Szia Gábor,

Precise, defined job as usual, one can say this is what we expect from you. 

This tiny scale just makes things even more difficult when we talk about extra details.

I especially like the way how you have treated the sink marks on the upper side of the wings. I have already taken over your method and found its advantages (no further shrinking, the superglue is hard, hence you can make the engraving easier and more defined). 

It’s also a good idea that you have chosen the way that the airframe is uniformly grey, so that it makes the Master guns more outstanding and draws the attention to the superbly machined parts. I cannot even think how you could apply the antenna base, it is soooo tiny. The thing is not just microscopic but requires attention to the application of the glue limited only to a very small area at the bottom. I guess at least, most probably my skills would not be enough even to try it...

I was lucky to see your small MiG in my hands and I can tell, you made it a real little gem. Master could be very proud of it at Mosonshow.

See you there in less than a week.

 

Cheers,

Pali

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Hi Pali,

 

Thanks for the compliment and thanks for dropping in on this build. The advantage you have is that you already seen the end result back at the Szolonok competition.

 

This whole 144 scale kit is just an experiment to see where we can go down in scale. First just out of box and next we will see what else.  .  .  :coolio:  :coolio:  :coolio:

 

Yes, I look forward to Moson. It should be good fun! even if it is at the new place which is cold and sterile. It is missing the atmosphere the university venue had! 

 

 

More photos tomorrow. :))

 

 

Best regards

Gabor

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Since all the interior parts were pre-painted there was no other obstacle to gluing the fuselage parts together. Some care and proper alignment is needed here! Still the fit is not 100% and you will get a seam which is visible under a layer of paint on the front intake sides and in the area after the wing all the way back to the engine exhaust. To avoid this I used superglue in this area to give a strong bond but also to act as a filler. The liquid plastic cement used in other areas (wing roots) was perfect in giving adequate time for proper alignment. After it was set the front and back was glued with super glue. One more reason for not using liquid cement on front and back parts was the time factor and the eventual shrinking of the area where it was used. Did not want to wait weeks before it sets completely. In the wing root area this shrinking is not really visible and the bond is much stronger here, a true weld of the plastic parts together.

 

To make a perfect round shape to the fuselage sides and the tail area some more super glue was used. Sanded with wet and dry the result was perfect. Carefully applied superglue was used to get rid of the seam inside the intake and around the centre body. Sanding is a little tricky here but it is possible. 

 

Once again glue drying time was to get some other sub-assemblies ready for the kit. The main gear legs were cleaned, but the gear bay doors required some work. Once again it is the injection moulding technology and the thickness of the doors is way out. On the inside faces there are some very nice details but the edges are dreadfully thick.  All the doors were sanded down to give them a good and acceptable thickness but care was taken to watch and follow the original curvature. They are not completely flat on the outer side! After polishing they were ready for installation. The main gear bay doors were glued in place before painting but the nose gear doors were painted separately to be glued in place in the very last step.

 

 

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Fuel tanks were constructed, glued, sanded and polished. The after location pin was cut off and its location drilled. A longer stretched sprue was glued into the hole. This acts as a support/hold during painting, otherwise it is not easy to hold on to the tanks in the painting process.

 

 

With fuselage parts finished it was time for final construction before paint was to splash on this microscopic fuselage. The nose gear was attached at this point. It is not easy to add it at this stage but after several dry runs it was possible. Main gear legs were also glued into position together with doors.

Only the canopy needed some masking. Right back in the days when this kit was released originally there was a suitable paint mask included in the kit. But I only had the “minimal” basic version of the kit in a plastic bag which did not have the masks. So the tedious work of cutting and adjusting masking tape started. It took some time but in the end it all came out well.

 

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Anyone interested in seeing the kit will be able next weekend on 27th and 28th April at the annual Moson Show. The “enormous” kit will be with me and later at the stand of Master on the ground floor of the school building. If all goes according to plans  Master should be at the same place as in the past two years, just left in the first room as we go into the school building.

 

 

More soon. There is a light at the end of the tunnel!  :rolleyes:

 

 

Best regards

Gabor

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As promissed here is a little update on the paint job.

 

Fuel tanks, nose gear doors and wheels were prepared for painting separately. Much easier this way and the end result is better. 

 

My grey colour was sprayed on. As it was in this “natural grey” form the kit did not look too good. Simple, it is too small and its “body” disappeared in the grey paint. Just a grey blob. As a matter of fact any colour would have done the same. Little, very subtle panelling was used with slightly darker grey to give the kit back some depth.   

 

 

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Hope that my hand  gives a clue to the size of the kit. :rolleyes:  Panel lines are still too much for my taste. A final cote of my grey paint after all the missing bits are glued in place will tone back the panel lines to the level that I was looking for.

 

 

Apart from the two scratched antennas and that small intake the only alterations to the kit were some surface details. OK I am sure some will ask for a full riveting, pre-shading, post-shading, weathering, colour modulation, filtering and whatever fancy names some like to through in. No, this kit is not about this. I only added few prominent fast openers like on the big engine service panels on both sides after the cockpit and symmetrically on the bottom surface. Also drilled with 0.15 mm bits the four opening of the signal rocket launcher on the right side of the fuselage in the back.

 

FbrZRhm.jpg 

 

Anyone interested in seeing the kit will be able to do so at the coming weekend on 27 th and 28 th April at the annual Moson Show. The “enormous” kit will be with me and later at the stand of Master on the ground floor of the school building. It is confirmed that Master is in the same place as in the past two years, just right in the first room as we go into the school building, Room No. 1.

 

Best regards

Gabor

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Sorry for the late post, but the day was spent in building a custom case for the Micro Mig. OK here are some of the last steps as well some finished kit photos. OK, it is not a usual finish to this Grey kit but it served its purpose on the way.

 

Gun barrels glued in place as well as the pitot. One additional microscopic part provided in the Master set is the insulator/antenna base ring on the right side of the fuselage next to the cockpit. Now this is small!!! Extremely small!!!

 

 

 

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Mr. Master, himself a modeller knows too well how hungry the carpet monster can be after a long diet so he provided two examples of the insulators as well as two each of the 23 mm guns. Speaking of the guns the brass representation of the 37 mm gun muzzle is nothing short of sensational. Master managed to reproduce in 144 th scale the true shape with all the openings on it. Actually few years back when he produced the 32 nd and 48 th scale version of the gun muzzle I was saying to him that the 72 nd scale is on the very edge of manufacturing capabilities. We did joke at the time that next will be the impossible 144. I would now say: Never say never.

 

 

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Anyone interested in seeing the kit will be able to do so this weekend, just 2 more days to the annual Moson Show. The “enormous” kit will be with me and later at the stand of Master on the ground floor of the school building. It is confirmed that Master is in the same place as in the past two years, just right in the first room as we go into the school building, Room No. 1.

 

Best regards

Gabor

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Hi Giovanni,

 

Thanks for dropping in and following the build. Thanks for the comment! 

 

If you are at Moson Show this weekend I can show it to you in real life. :))

I know many Italian modellers come to Moson every year.

 

Best regards

Gabor

Edited by ya-gabor
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  • ya-gabor changed the title to MiG-15 144 scale M3 Mk.1 project

Here are some more views of the kit and a little comparison to show its size. It is of course purely by accident (no it is not) that I had original MiG-15 gun barrels. They were cut into rings and the kit is displayed on top of these rings, both the 23mm and 37mm barrel.

 

 

 

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For the older readers here is the kit on one of those music carriers. For the younger readers, it is a Cassette Tape that was used to record and play all the good music that we wanted to listen. Well I still use them (along with my LP’s) since many music that I loved is only available this way. Hope this is not against the law in our digital world! After decades (25-45 years) of recording the tapes are still as good as when I made the recording.

 

 

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But of course a comparison with a current coin is more understandable to many.

 

 

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After this kit was done one can ask what is next? Well a Mk.2 version of the M3 project (Minimal Micro Mig) should be coming this year. There are some ideas for it but time will tell. Here is a small glimpse of what could be in store. This is the other single seat kit that I had.

 

 

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The only problem is that the actual kit is no longer in production and I have no idea when (if at all) it will be made again. It was introduced in 2014 so one could not say it is age old. I am sure they have some reason for this.

So I will have to hunt for any 144 scale MiG-15 kits still around somewhere to be able to make other versions  in my M3 project.

 

 

A last look at the kit.

 

 

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Anyone interested in seeing the kit will be able to do so this weekend, just 1 more days to the annual Moson Show. The “enormous” M3 Mk.1 kit will be with me and later at the stand of Master on the ground floor of the school building. It is confirmed that Master is in the same place as in the past two years, just right in the first room as we go into the school building, Room No. 1.

 

 

Best regards

Gabor

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Hi Gábor,

 

Nice job! Two more sleeps and I can see it again in real...

Really curious what more you’ll do with the Mk2 and Mk3 sisters. I could see some “missing plastic” on the Mk2 fuselage. Always wonder how you can make those precise cut outs... 

Please make a silver one and a camouflaged one in Hungarian colours. 

 

See you on Saturday!

Pali

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I have added to previous posts that I will show at Moson the kit to anyone who wants to see it. OK, but how would one know who I am, the one with the Micro Mig kit.

 

Well, as usual I will have on my back this bag with the Russian Remove Before Flight sign.

No, the bag is not small, it is the RBF sign which is fairly big!

 

 

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Actually the signs size was taken from my Lockheed C-2 seats original RBF sign. One can question the Russian language version. Yes. Well in this form there were no such RBF signs used on ejection seats, but in a different form yes. The Russian version was taken from the firing handle cover of the SK ejection seat. I copied the original Russian letters from the cover (as well as as the small mistakes on the letters they have made when producing the stencil), blown in up in size, cut the painting stencils, had the textile part sawn to exact size and specifications, masks were applied, rings added and so it is here. A bit different from standard RBF signs, but I like it.  

 

So tomorrow and on Sunday I hope to be able to show this MiG and maybe some other things too. If interested you will know who to find.

 

Best regards

Gabor

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Hi Gábor,

 

Congratulation, you have turned this tiny model to a real gem. I have to admit that it is small, very small...

Really can’t wait to see the Mk.2 and Mk.3 versions with all their precise goodies.

 

Cheers,

Pali

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Hi Pali,

 

I am glad that you liked the kit. It was fun to build and actually the “holder” almost took more time to make than the kit. OK, not true, but building the kit was really fun!!! :))

 

Thanks for the interest in the kit to visitors at Moson show!

 

One of the questions was: When will I finish the kit????   :)))  It is finished and anyone interested will be able to have a look at it on Master stands in future shows, like at Telford.  

 

The Moson show was great but it involved a lot of work and lots of travel. With the alarm clock going off little after 4 AM each day, it was a “long” and tiring weekend (with some 650 km travel) so more on the Show and some of the “hostages” that I took later in the week.

 

Best regards

Gabor

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On 4/25/2019 at 12:33 AM, Giovanni said:

Well done Gabor!

 

Giovanni

 

Hi Giovanni,

 

We had at the show the biggest "invading" force from Italy with some 110 or so visitors. They were the largest foreign group at the show!!! Fantastic lively people with lots of excelllent and superb kits to show!

 

Best regards

Gabor

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On ‎4‎/‎28‎/‎2019 at 7:26 PM, ya-gabor said:

 

Hi Giovanni,

 

We had at the show the biggest "invading" force from Italy with some 110 or so visitors. They were the largest foreign group at the show!!! Fantastic lively people with lots of excelllent and superb kits to show!

 

Best regards

Gabor

 

Hi Gabor,

unfortunately I couldn't come.

But I won't miss the next edition.

 

Giovanni   

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Hi Giovanni,

 

Thanks for following my work!

Next time around hope to meet you at Moson.

As to the M3 project just today did some preparatory work on the Mk.2 version. I have received a great help from a friend and had a look at how it works.  :coolio: :coolio: :coolio:  It looks good, so should do some work on it soon. It should be fun!

 

But for the moment some bigger kits. :)))

 

Best regards

Gabor

 

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