X-Wing Fighter: T65 MPC

[ismaelg]

Hello,

My sister got me this for Christmas.  It is the reissued MPC snap-tite Star Wars X-Wing Fighter.



The kit is very basic. Almost crude. Not really suited for superdetailing.  For that I have the much better but smaller scale (1/72) Bandai X-Wing kit. I also have the old MPC 1/43 X-Wing kit which is bigger, but been AMT we know it is a turd of a kit.  I plan to eventually build the Bandai kit as Luke's ship: Red 5. 
But back to this one:  This kit is even simpler than the B-Wing I did last year from the same series.  Everybody builds this as Luke's Red 5 (included decals).  I want to do something different. I'll build it pretty much box stock but will try to replicate the Red Squadron Leader, Red One, piloted by Garven Dreis.  This character was played in the movie by actor Drewe Henley, who died in 2016 but appeared posthumously again as Red Leader in the movie Rogue One by using archived footage and audio from 1977.

I started by removing the snap locator pins on the engine parts for a more precise fit. Glued together. Each engine has 3 parts.
  

Engines, intakes and cannons are staring to get together.  This is one of those rare occasion where assembly is done prior to painting.

I'll do my best to keep it simple and box stock. Nothing serious. Just for fun.

 

Thanks,
Ismael

[southwestforests]

1 hour ago, ismaelg said:

Just for fun.

Just for fun is, oddly enough, fun! 😁

[ismaelg]

Hello,

 

Repeat with me: BOX STOCK...   B O X   S T O C K 

So, the laser cannon's arcs in the kit are wrong.  They should be vertically oriented, not horizontally.  A glaring error. But not that hard to correct. Just cut and rotate 90 degrees. In the process, I cut and added a sleeve ring just for fun.  Drilled a small hole to pin them for proper alignment.
 

 

 

Thanks,

Ismael

[ismaelg]

Hello,

OK,  I can explain.  This may look like I blew up R2-D2's head and machined a new R5-series astromech head...

And that is exactly what I did 🙂

Thanks,
Ismael

Edited January 15, 2023 by ismaelg

[ST0RM]

Nice classic project! 
The updates and fixes will be a great touch. 

-Jeff

[Ikon]

Nice bit of corrections going one. That new astromech head looks pretty good.

[ismaelg]

Hello,

  And this one is DONE!

First of all, I'm very happy because as of February 20th, I have finished the same number of models I did in the whole year 2022!  This is my third completion of the year. 

This was really a fun project, not a serious one. Not sure if I may have gone a bit overboard with the weathering but in the movie it was really filthy when it was destroyed by none other than Darth Vader himself in his Tie Advance X1 (My first completion of this year).
There is no such thing as an "accurate" model of a Star Wars space ship as the movies themselves relied of models way back before CGI. But they had multiples and those were not consistent.  It drove me nuts finding error after error in the movie as I was analyzing it. But you are not supposed to stop it and analyze frame by frame back and forth. Still, the Battle of Yavin is for me the best scene in the history of films BAR NONE.

  Anyways, This was a re-issued MPC 1/63 X-Wing. A pretty crude model even in its day that was intended more for play than for display.
I converted this from Luke's ship (Red 5) to Squadron Leader (Red 1).  The insignia in the wings reflect the change (1 stripe instead of 5) and the R2-D2 was blown away... ehh I mean replaced by a machined and scratchbuilt R5 astromech unit. The weathering is as per Red Leader at the moment of his demise.

 

Special mention to Andrew D. the Jolly Rogers guy who did a magnificent fully detailed 1/48 build of this same ship.  His work inspired me to complete this and was actually used as reference.

First, the pic having fun with Photoshop, then the others.










































And I can't resist been myself so I did this:

Hope you like it. 
What do you think?
 
Now back to more serious projects.

Thanks,
Ismael

[Ikon]

Congrats on the third completion! You've tied for me now in the last three or five years. And it is looking good. Nice job.