1/72 TAI Hurkus-A by Tan Model

[Despy]

Well,

I'm not really into 1/72 aircraft, nor in propellers but when a new company (at least to me) from my country announced a new model kit of a new Turkish aircraft, I couldn't help myself in buying and trying to build it.

Hürkuş (freebird) is named after the turkish aviation pioneer Vecihi Hürkuş. I don't know how many movies would have been shot about him if he was born in another side of the world. It is still an experimental airplane, this version will be used as a trainer and if the project will continue, another version (Hürkuş-C if I'm not wrong) will be a light fighter.

Anyway back to the model kit. This first post is a half review, half WIP.

1/72 TAI Hurkus-A by Tan Model

My hat off to Tan Model for choosing to produce this model kit and all people who gave permission to have this plane in model kit form. Maybe this sound a little strange but to have a permission is a serious issue in Turkey. I discovered this when I was looking for plans of Ada Class Turkish corvette (aka Milgem), I found in a turkish ship modellers forum that people were thinking to build Ada class corvettes from scratch and trying to draw a plan of this class (where two examples are already on the sea and you can see it in public places (as I did, when I was sea kayaking in the Bosphorus), so this is not a black project). It seems one of the contributor received a phone call telling that they can not produce or share any drawings of this corvette and by frustration in his post, I guess he received a real warning. So back to the topic:

It comes with a picture of the aircraft taken on Bosphorus showing the historical military school at the background

The back of the box features a colored illustration of the completed model, which is a nice touch. There are 2 white sprues and one transparent sprue. The instructions are presented in a booklet form with color illustrations.

The white plastic is good as qualitywise, it is rather different than the Airfix ones (which feels soft to me). OK, I'm not a pro but I think recessed details on the surface is a little overscaled/emphasized. This is a common problem in many model kits. I guess the kit producers had to choose between a realistic detail which will be very soft in this scale or an overscaled detail which will not get lost even after some layers of surface primers and paint. To my eyes the landing gears were all too big and thick for this scale too but take this with a grain of salt and wait for a more experienced builder to review this kit.

There are many flush parts that you'll need to touch (in this picture below, there shouldn't be any parts at sides of pilot seats, first I thought them being some detail to install the seats to the floor but no). Considering this is the first run (and not an old mold) the manufacturer should think about this for their future releases.

As a matter of fact, I really like cleaning the flush parts, I know it's strange but this is my favorite thing in model making (airbrushing being my least favorite)

And so far these are some parts after cleaning the flush etc.

I'll see with the fitting soon.

Then again, I support the manufacturer who decided to produce such kit. I congratulate them for choosing this rare aircraft, it is a bold decision to go with the first kit (for local -not so much existing- turkish market, I'd go with 1/48 F-16 SoloTürk, as there are no OOB possible Soloturk in this scale -if you set aside the disastrous Italeri Barak-, Revell have a 1/72 scale which seems good). The kit is surely not a Tamiya but I'm sure they don't have the means of Tamiya either and as a first model kit, from what I see so far, they rather made a good job (if not perfect).

And as a final note, I don't know those guys.

[Despy]

I am progressing and I can tell you it's not an easy build.

First I've made the cockpit tube. Unfortunately a pilot figure was not included in the kit. I'll make this kit in flying position, the movable ailerons etc. would help doing it, so I don't get the point of putting separate control surfaces but omitting a tiny pilot. Anyway a MiG-29 pilot was a donor. Painted as the test pilot.

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I opened the air inlet on both motor part and fuselage

First I joined the wings to the fuselage. The fit was not good, I had to cut the male joining part. Then I glued the cockpit to one of the halves

[Despy]

Then I've put the fuselage halves together. The fit was not very good.

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The cockpit cabin was slightly small, so a gap of 1-2 mm is present at lefthand side of the cabin

Here is the down side

And upside after the putty and basic sanding

This is a tiny plane

[Despy]

The progress is slower than I was aiming.

I drilled with Dremel the exhaust outlet part, strangely it was presented as filled in the kit. The questions remains: If the exhaust is presented filled, why to offer it on two parts?

Any way, both exhausts need filling for sink mark and there is an annoying difference between the two parts (they should have the same width and not tapered). I checked the reference pictures and the building instructions if I was doing something wrong.

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Installed the canopy which I already applied Future. And I've masked it.

On both wings, there were sink/shrinkage that have to be filled. I should confess that it does not come out as good as I wanted to be. I decided to continue that way.

Applied the surface primer. And all the surface errors, putty marks etc. came out like a day. So I sanded down those imperfection, applied again the primer, sanded again the errors.

I won't try to make it better. I'll continue with pre-shading and applying the white colour.

[AdrianMF]

Interesting model and certainly off the beaten track! It looks like it has a lot of short-run kit characteristics, but the way you have got it together looks good and the surface detail looks fine under the primer coat.

Regards,

Adrian

[caszerino]

Coming along well. Looking forward to more progress.

[Despy]

Some more progress.

I've applied the white paint and masked

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Than I was not happy, so sanded down some parts, applied paint again, so on...

I applied the black paint at nose part, and burnt iron at exhaust (with an aluminum ring around the exhaust-body joint)

And also the red paint around canopy. I'm not sure why it was not delivered as decal and I'm no sure if it will fit the red colour of decals

Some bleeding under the mask that I'll have to correct

Edited March 26, 2015 by Despy

[Can TARI]

Haven't built in this scale for almost 30 years and as a jet guy have never built anything that needs propellers to fly, but for me this subject is nice to follow. Good work so far...

[spiton]

beauty

[Fulcrum@]

yes, very nice... but where is it now ?

thanks !