1/72 Mig-21 MF, Slovak Air Force, Eduard+Aftermarket

[drake122]

Greetings,

I recently made this lovely 72nd scale Eduard Mig-21. It is a great kit, practically no filler needed, went together like a dream.

I purchased a lot of aftermarket for it as well - resin exhaust (Armycast) and engine (Eduard), resin pylons and UB-16 rocket pods, exterior and interior PE (all of these Eduard), metal pitot tube (Master), and Slovak Air Force specific decals (Airdesign).

This particular jet was manufactured in Moscow and first served in the Czechoslovak Air Force, and later in the Slovak Air Force until 2001 (maybe 2002?), when it was retired and placed in a museum. It has a rather unique color scheme that differs from all other Slovak jets of the same type, as it underwent maintenance at its home base instead of Dresden, where most of these jets normally went for servicing (as far as I know anyway). One of the control surfaces was also later replaced due to damage, and the spare part came from a Mig-21 painted in lighter brown shade,  so there is a visible difference between colors.

Like I mentioned, construction was really effortless, I only had minor issues with the Master metal pitot, as those small PE vanes are very fiddly. The resin rockets pods look much nicer than original kit parts.

Decals by Airdesign (a local Slovak manufacturer of decals and masks, as well as an e-shop) were great in that they are very very thin and require literally no decal solution to bend into recesses and panel lines. Downside is, they tear easily under stress. Carrier film is hardly visible as well. Opposite the new style Eduard decals (the "peel off kind"), they were great to work with. I had a bit of a problem with Airdesign stencils though, particularly the smallest serial number decals), because they are literally the same shade of blue on this jet than the backing paper. I simply couldn't see them, haha. So I used Eduard serial numbers (they have no. 9712 on their sheet, mine should be 9713, but in this scale, they are hardly readable anyway, they look the part good enough for me). 

Everything was brush painted using Vallejo and Ammo Mig acrylic paints and washes. I am not entirely satisfied with the dark brown/mahagony shade, as in this scale it is a bit too dark. I lightened it a bit and tried to produce a type of "shading" that can be done using a brush (sort of drybrushing/ blunt-brushing in essence). It destroys brushes, but the effect is worth it.

My original plan is to create a small diorama for this model, so I have in stash a boarding ladder, (LP models) FOD covers (Eduard), and a tow bar (Ciro models - a Czech brand) as well as another complete kit of a different model I want to include. This will take a bit more time though, and I feel like making a different aircraft in between as well. So maybe later this year, who knows...

I feel like I could provide better presentations if I invested in a airbrush/spray booth (and a proper camera), but for now I am content on trying to improve with a brush and see what I can achieve.

 

Anyway, thanks for looking.

 

 

 

 

Edited May 17, 2022 by drake122

[Memphis]

Good job! How much better does resin exhaust look than plastic?

[drake122]

On 5/19/2022 at 8:59 AM, Memphis said:

Good job! How much better does resin exhaust look than plastic?

Thank you.

The exhaust piece by Armycast is much better. The originial plastic part has very thich edges and also no internal ribbing detail. In theory, you can scratchbuild all of that, just by adding stretched sprue ribs and thinning down the edges and also you can add some rivet detail, but I just spent extra 5 euro and that spared me an evening of scratchbuilding in the end.

[Memphis]

This parts?

https://www.armycast.cz/gb/172-resin-sets/178-mig-21mf-tryska-vyroba-gorkij.html

[drake122]

7 hours ago, Memphis said:

This parts?

https://www.armycast.cz/gb/172-resin-sets/178-mig-21mf-tryska-vyroba-gorkij.html

Yes, altough the one linked is for the Gorkiy produced version, which was less widely used from what I know. 

[Memphis]

Thank you for information. 

[Thadeus]

I keep getting that same feeling with a lot of my models, a bit too dark paint. You might try ligting it a bit with white oils or some pastel rub. To make it look like a bit faded surface.

All in all, a very nice model.

[drake122]

On 6/9/2022 at 4:49 PM, Thadeus said:

I keep getting that same feeling with a lot of my models, a bit too dark paint. You might try ligting it a bit with white oils or some pastel rub. To make it look like a bit faded surface.

All in all, a very nice model.

Thank you. I in fact, have tamiya weathering powders and varioud oil paints I could use to do that. Working on other models at this time, but I might revisit this one later.

[Ryan Hothersall]

Nicely built. 

[drake122]

On 7/22/2022 at 11:04 AM, Ryan Hothersall said:

Nicely built. 

Thank you!