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1/72 Su-27 SM Flanker, Zvezda


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Greetings,

 

I have recently completed another jet long in the making. It is a Su-27 SM Flanker by Zvezda, finished in one of the marking options provided by the kit. Now, I understand we currently have a very difficult situation and conflict ongoing in regards to Russia, so if anyone finds this post offensive I will remove it. This is in no way intended to show any sort of support for what Russia is doing, I started the kit several months ago and obviously had no idea of what is to come. 

 

I used a dedicated Master pitot tube, pieces from several PE sets (Microdisign, Eduard and Metallic Details), ResKit nozzles. I also had a set of Aires resin wheels available, but to my surprise, the original kits parts were more detailed, haha.

The kit itself is very accurate shape wise, but wheel bay detail in particular is rather poor. Also, several small antenae and aerials, etc. were missing, so I scratchbuilt those, along with some wiring, brake lines and plumbing in the wheel bays to make them look more busy - I used reference pictures as a guide. Furthermore, panel line detail is very shallow, so I had to deepen it everywhere. Dropped control surfaces on the wings and made actuators for the flap-drop mechanism, as these "struts" are rather prominent on pictures.

In the cockpit, I added some wiring, de-fogging mechanisms and small hinges that lock the canopy in place. Also added a detonation cord? (a small "line" that goes from the back of the seat to the canopy, whatever it is meant to be). Again,  these details are very visible on pictures and the kit (and all the PE upgrade sets!) lack them. Also had to replace the hydraulic arm that lifts the canopy with brass rod as I broke the kit piece. Sadly, there was an ugly scuff on the windshield in my kit, I polished that out best I could. Oh well...

I have to say, the PE detail sets are very inaccurate and some parts don't fit at all. Particularly, the Microdisign instrument panel, is very good looking, but way too large to fit the kit. And yes, it was a PE set specifically advertised for Zvezda. On the other hand, all colored cockpit PE parts from Eduard seem to have the wrong color that does not match standard Sukhoi interior color by MRP, Vallejo or other manufacturers. So I used a custom mix color that approximately matches Eduard and is not too far away from the intended color. The instruction sheets for PE also show placements for various PE grilles and vents on the bottom surface, these seem to be present on other Su-27 family variants, but not specifically on the Su-27 SM, so I didn't use them. I also saw no reason to replace the gun port area as it seemed detailed enough OOB for me.

Painting was done with Vallejo, AMMO Mig and AKAN acrylics using custom mixed colors mostly. AMMO Mig Sky line blue is particularly close to the lighter blue shade though. The darker blue is AKAN, but I don't remember the exact number, I apologize. The engine area was particularly difficult to paint as Flankers have a variety of metallic shades there. I used Tamiya Weather Master sets to imitate the bluish and copper-like burnt metal shades on the exhaust petals and the insides of nozzles. Hopefully my next attempt to plaint Flanker exhaust will be more accurate, there is still  a lot to learn there for me.

The decals provided in the kit are very good quality, strong and very thing, but the decal instructions provided for Red 04 are completely off. Stencil data placement seemed like completely fictional and stencil color seems to be wrong for this particular machine also. Revell also reboxed the same Zvezda kit and added their own decal sheet, but Revell decals are very thick and some seemed overscale to me. I used the fake canopy for the bottom nose area by Revell, as the Zvezda one was wrong shape. Needed plenty of decal solution to blend that one in. Many of the stencils and from left-over decals I had and just "look the part". Main decals (red stars, RF numbers, etc.) are really nice though.

Even though this is supposedly a showbird, I weathered it, as from photos it seemed like Russian jets are generally not kept very clean.

A nice touch within the boxing are chocks and ladder. There is pilot figures as well, but I couldn't be bothered to use them.

 

Some pictures below. Anyway, thanks for looking.

 

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