Super-detailed Italeri MiG-29A 1/72 (USSR 1980s)

[jrlx]

Hi all,

 

I will join this GB with Italeri's MiG-29A. I'll do a super-detailed build using Aires' resin cockpit, exhaust nozzles and air-brakes, Arma Hobby's resin nose and closed upper air intakes, and Master's brass pitot tube and static dischargers. I have already all the items, except the static dischargers, which should arrive next week.

 

I'll build a soviet machine from the 1980's as displayed in the Farnborough Air Show. I'll use the kit's decals.

 

Here's the box:

IMAG4776

 

The sprues:

IMAG4777

 

IMAG4778

 

The transparent parts, which look good enough, as I'll pose the canopy open:

IMAG4779

 

The decals, which don't come with many stencils:

IMAG4780

 

The resin cockpit, which also comes with a PE fret for the instrument panel and other details:

IMAG4781

 

The resin exhaust nozzles, which also come with a small PE fret for the flame holders:

IMAG4782

 

The resin air-brakes:

IMAG4783

 

The resin nose cone and closed upper air intakes:

IMAG4784

 

As I will display the aircraft in a parked position, with open canopy and air-brakes, should the main and upper intakes be all closed?

 

Finally, the brass pitot tube:

 

I will need some time to plan the build, especially regarding the insertion of the resin parts and the detailed painting of the cockpit, before I get back here with progress reports.

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Jaime

 

 

 

[FortyEighter]

I'll be interested to see how you manage all the extras in a smaller scale

[Hook]

5 hours ago, jrlx said:

As I will display the aircraft in a parked position, with open canopy and air-brakes, should the main and upper intakes be all closed?

 

Without the engine running, the upper louvre intakes will be closed and the main intakes would be open. The intake doors normally only drop down when the aircraft is under power. 

 

The new Zvezda tool comes with rather nice FOD guards for the main intakes. 

 

Nice collection of items, I'll pull up a chair for this one!

 

Cheers,

 

Andre 

[jrlx]

5 hours ago, FortyEighter said:

I'll be interested to see how you manage all the extras in a smaller scale

 

Hi FortyEighter, thanks for your interest. I've super-detailed other 1/72 models before, mainly with PE. The amount of resin in this one will be a challenge but also an opportunity to improve my modelling abilities.

 

5 hours ago, Hook said:

 

Without the engine running, the upper louvre intakes will be closed and the main intakes would be open. The intake doors normally only drop down when the aircraft is under power. 

 

The new Zvezda tool comes with rather nice FOD guards for the main intakes. 

 

Nice collection of items, I'll pull up a chair for this one!

 

Cheers,

 

Andre 

 

Hi Andre, thanks for the information. If I understood correctly, when the aircraft is parked and powered down the upper air intakes will be closed (hence the resin parts to replace this area of the kit) and the main intakes will be open with the main intake doors up? The main intake doors work automatically or can they be used as FOD guards as well?

 

I think the Italeri instructions have the main intake doors installed in the closed position. This is good because there's no intake trunking detail but if the intake doors would be up, I'll have to make the FOD guards or adapt the intake door parts for that purpose. In any case, the upper air intakes are moulded open and should be replaced by the resin parts to be accurate.

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

[Hook]

4 hours ago, jrlx said:

Hi Andre, thanks for the information. If I understood correctly, when the aircraft is parked and powered down the upper air intakes will be closed (hence the resin parts to replace this area of the kit) and the main intakes will be open with the main intake doors up? The main intake doors work automatically or can they be used as FOD guards as well?

 

Here's some info from Yefim Gordon's "Mikoyan MiG-29": 

 

"The FOD protection doors close automatically during engine starting when hydraulic pressure reaches nominal and open when the aircraft accelerates to 200km/h IAS during take-off. They close again when the airspeed drops below 200km/h, reopening after engine shutdown."

 

Never say never, but the most common config on inactive MiG-29's is as in my first reply. 
 

Quote

I think the Italeri instructions have the main intake doors installed in the closed position. This is good because there's no intake trunking detail but if the intake doors would be up, I'll have to make the FOD guards or adapt the intake door parts for that purpose. In any case, the upper air intakes are moulded open and should be replaced by the resin parts to be accurate.

 

For the Italeri kit 'as is', a pilot figure is a must since it is configured as if the engines were running.

 

Like I said, the Zvezda has some very nice main intake FOD guards - it might be worth it asking around for a spare set. 

 

HTH,

 

Andre 

 

[Hook]

5 minutes ago, Hook said:

Never say never, but the most common config on inactive MiG-29's is as in my first reply. 

 

Like I said - never say never ! 

 

Cheers,

 

Andre 

 

 

[jrlx]

3 hours ago, Hook said:

 

Like I said - never say never ! 

 

Cheers,

 

Andre 

 

 

 

Thanks, Andre. I think I understood how it works and thanks for the pictures. I'll do it parked and powered down, so it'll have upper intakes closed and main intakes open but I'll think about scratch building some FOD covers myself as there's nothing to see inside the open intakes.

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

 

 

[trickyrich]

Welcome aboard Jamie and that's a nice little build you have planned there!

 

I like all the AM stuff you have to go on her, I'm trying to shoehorn an Aires cockpit into mine.....with some Wolfpack bits.

 

Well good luck with your build, looks like you're going to have some fun with it, look forward to seeing her in the gallery.

[jrlx]

On 29/07/2017 at 00:26, trickyrich said:

Welcome aboard Jamie and that's a nice little build you have planned there!

 

I like all the AM stuff you have to go on her, I'm trying to shoehorn an Aires cockpit into mine.....with some Wolfpack bits.

 

Well good luck with your build, looks like you're going to have some fun with it, look forward to seeing her in the gallery.

 

Hi Trickyrich! Thank you very much for the warm welcome

 

I've already done  some work on the cockpit area and I've managed to insert the resin cockpit into the fuselage, as well as open the side panels behind the seat to leave the avionics bays on display. I'll try to post a progress update this Monday.

 

Just to give a flavour of what I've already achieved, here are two pictures:

IMAG4812

 

IMAG4815

 

The next step is to cut the airbrake area in order to insert the resin airbrake parts but first I'll have to remove these from their resin blocks.

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

 

 

[jrlx]

Hi again,

 

As I said in the previous post, I've done some work already but I didn't manage to post it during the week. I also didn't manage to get back to the build during the week, so what's reported below is work done till last Sunday.

 

I started by removing the fuselage parts off the sprues:

IMAG4786

 

I did a quick test fit just to check alignment. The parts seem to fit well except near the nose, where some gaps are visible:

IMAG4787

 

IMAG4788

 

IMAG4789

 

I'll have to align the panel lines just behind the nose, and the kits's nose will be replaced by a resin part.

 

I'll use Aires resin cockpit to replace the kits' parts. Here is the resin cockpit base, side by side with the fuselage. It's highly detailed, as can be seen:

IMAG4790

 

More detailed views of the resin cockpit base. The avionics bays just behind the cockpit are also moulded in:

IMAG4791

 

IMAG4972

 

Next I had to remove some plastic from the top fuselage half. Here are the instructions of the resin cockpit, marking the areas to remove:

IMAG4797

 

I used a narrow nano-saw to cut the areas to be removed. Here's the start of the cutting of the area behind the pilot:

IMAG4793

 

This area was now completely removed:

IMAG4794

 

The resin cockpit base fits in well but the sides of the fuselage behind the pilot still need some cutting:

IMAG4795

 

The instrument panel cowling was removed next. Here it is side by side with the replacement resin part:

IMAG4806

 

The next step was adjusting the resin cockpit base to the sides of the fuselage and opening the avionics bays access panels. For this I used a few pictures as reference:

 

 

 

These pictures show clearly that a slot must be cut on the fuselage sides behind the pilot for fitting the indents on the resin cockpit sides:

IMAG4807

 

The PE fret that comes with the resin cockpit has side panels to cover the avionics bays:

IMAG4816

 

My intention was to cut the sides of the fuselage to display the avionics bays and cover them with the PE panels while the model was on the shelf. So, I started by marking the upper cut, using masking tape as a guide:

IMAG4808

 

Next, I used the PE panel parts to mark the rest of the cuts:

IMAG4809

 

After completely removing the plastic and inserting the resin cockpit base in place, this was the result on the port side:

IMAG4810

 

and on the starboard side:

IMAG4811

 

However, the size of the openings, as resulting from the markings around the PE panel parts, are too small to fully show the avionics bays and do not match the proportions of the open panels that can be seen in the reference pictures. So, I decided not to using the PE parts at all in the model, leaving the bays permanently open, and opening the panels a bit more, to the panel lines marked in the kit, in order to match the real proportions of the open bays.

 

After a bit more cutting, here's the final result on the port side:

IMAG4812

 

and on the starboard side:

IMAG4815

 

This is how the top fuselage half ended up after all the cutting around the cockpit area:

IMAG4817

 

IMAG4818

 

I still have some cutting to do: the air brakes area on the tail, the exhausts area, the nose and the upper air intakes. As I'll need to use the resin parts as guides for the cuttings, I'll have to remove them from the resin blocks first.

 

That's all for now. Thanks for looking.

 

Jaime

 

[Hook]

Nice progress! 

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

[jrlx]

4 hours ago, Hook said:

Nice progress! 

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

 

Thanks, Andre! I've progressed a bit more this week but only in sawing the resin parts off their moulding blocks.

 

Hopefully, I'll post an update after the weekend.

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

[Phantome]

With all the new options it's hard to imagine there was a day not too long ago that this was the best Fulcrum on the market in 1/72 scale. The fit is tricky (at best) and you'll have a lot of sanding and filling on your hands, so good luck!

[Hook]

10 hours ago, Phantome said:

With all the new options it's hard to imagine there was a day not too long ago that this was the best Fulcrum on the market in 1/72 scale. The fit is tricky (at best) and you'll have a lot of sanding and filling on your hands, so good luck!

 

Indeed. The worst part is the nose with the ungainly split - I plan on using a spare Trumpy cone (their 1/72nd MiG-29's come with two) on my next Italeri build. 

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

[FortyEighter]

Coming along nicely - I needn't have worried about you dealing with all the extras!

[jrlx]

On 8/15/2017 at 23:30, Phantome said:

With all the new options it's hard to imagine there was a day not too long ago that this was the best Fulcrum on the market in 1/72 scale. The fit is tricky (at best) and you'll have a lot of sanding and filling on your hands, so good luck!

Hi Phantome, thanks for your interest! I had this kit in the stash for about two years. It was bought before the new Trumpeter and Zvezda came out. Since there are so many AM bits for this kit, I decided to use it as a base for a superdetailing project. I've been sawing resin parts for the last two weeks but this part of the work is done now.

 

On 8/16/2017 at 10:00, Hook said:

 

Indeed. The worst part is the nose with the ungainly split - I plan on using a spare Trumpy cone (their 1/72nd MiG-29's come with two) on my next Italeri build. 

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

The nose of the kit has already been cut off and will be replaced by Attack Squadron's resin nose, which looks good in place. But the fit of the fuselage halves just behind the nose is problematic.

 

On 8/16/2017 at 17:22, FortyEighter said:

Coming along nicely - I needn't have worried about you dealing with all the extras!

Thanks! I'll post an update during this coming weekend to show all the resin parts already off their moulding blocks and the fuselage halves fully cut out for adding the resin parts.

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

[jrlx]

Hi again,

 

I finally got some time to post updates of the work done in the last two weeks. These will span a few posts, as there are a lot of pictures to show.

 

After cutting the upper fuselage to insert the resin cockpit and instrument panel cowling, I decided to cut all resin parts off their moulding blocks.

 

First, I took care of the air brake resin parts. Here we see the centre shaft, where the breaking parachute is housed, the bottom air brake part and the actuators:

IMAG4821

 

Here is the top air brake part:

IMAG4823

 

WARNING: resin dust is cancer inducing if breathed. So, I used gloves, a respirator mask and sawed the parts on a wet kitchen paper towel to keep the dust from disseminating all over the place.

 

The mini-saw shown in the first photo was used to cut the moulding block off. Here is the centre shaft in detail:

IMAG4824

 

and the three main parts of the air brake side by side. As can be seen, there's a lot of detail in the parts:

IMAG4825

 

This is how the air brake looks like when closed:

IMAG4826

 

Next, I moved to the upper air intakes that will replace the open grilles just behind the cockpit on the top fuselage halves. Here are the resin parts on their blocks, near the mini-saw that was used:

IMAG4827

 

These were easy enough to cut:

IMAG4828

 

The nose will also be replaced by the resin nose that comes together with the upper air intakes:

IMAG4829

 

This one was also easy enough to cut off the moulding block:

IMAG4830

 

The next step was taking care of the resin exhausts, which are made up of four parts each (plus a PE flame holder). First, I took care of the compressors. Here one of them is still on the moulding block, while the other (on the left) is already cut off the block:

IMAG4831

 

Both ready:

IMAG4832

 

This was followed by the inner petals of the exhausts. Here one is already cut off the block:

IMAG4833

 

and here, both ready:

IMAG4834

 

These are the outer petals of the exhausts, with the one on the left already off the block:

IMAG4835

 

Here they are both off the blocks:

IMAG4836

 

The final parts are the sections between the compressors and the outer petals. Here we see one already cut off the block and the other still on the block:

IMAG4837

 

Here they are ready:

IMAG4838

 

I think this is enough for one post. Sorry for the boring step by step pictures but they may be useful for someone doing a similar build.

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Jaime

 

[jrlx]

Continuing with the updates, the next step was cutting the moulding block off the cockpit base. This is needed because the block interferes with the top of the nose wheel well moulded on the bottom fuselage half, preventing a good fit of the fuselage halves.

 

Here is the cockpit base, still on its moulding block, and the mini-saw used to cut the block off:

IMAG4839

 

The block was cut off in small sections:

IMAG4840

 

I managed to partially remove the floor under the seat location, so I left a bit of moulding block on to avoid further damage:

IMAG4841

 

Here's another view of the damage:

IMAG4842

 

I thought I could repair this by glueing a piece of plastic sheet under the hole but, as will be seen further down, this may not be necessary, as the seat completely covers the hole.

 

So, here is the seat on its moulding block:

IMAG4843

 

It was relatively easy to cut off:

IMAG4844

 

I also filed the top of the nose wheel well, in order to better fit the cockpit base and the top fuselage half:

IMAG4845

 

Here's a test fit, after all the sanding and filing. As can be seen, the seat completely covers the hole I did on the cockpit base. Anyway, I may end up applying a thin piece of plastic sheet to cover the hole, as it's not a big deal to do:

IMAG4846

 

Continuing with cockpit resin parts, I also sawed the control column off the moulding block, as shown in the before and after pictures below:

IMAG4847

 

IMAG4848

 

As can be seen, the handle on the top of the control column is missing in the pictures but it is not lost. It's safely stored in the plastic package where the parts came in, and will be glued in place in due time.

 

The instrument panel cowling was also cut off the moulding block. It will need some plastic sheet around the edges in order to hold to the fuselage top:

IMAG4849

 

There's also a small resin part to be installed on one of the sides of the cowling. Here it is on the moulding block:

IMAG4850

 

It was impossible not to break the small curved thingy of this part while sawing the moulding block and excess resin:

IMAG4851

 

The inner side walls of the cockpit are represented by two resin parts, that must also be cut off the moulding blocks:

IMAG4852

 

After removing the excess resin with a nº 11 blade, here are the two parts:

IMAG4853

 

The last resin cockpit parts are these small rods, to be installed on the top sides of the ejection seat:

IMAG4854

 

As only two are needed, I only cut two off the moulding block:

IMAG4855

 

This is all for this post. Again, sorry about the boring nature of this phase of the work.

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

 

 

 

[helium]

That's truely amazing what you are doing there, Jaime! Both the modeling and the documentation! 

I will keep watching with great interest...

[jrlx]

2 hours ago, helium said:

That's truely amazing what you are doing there, Jaime! Both the modeling and the documentation! 

I will keep watching with great interest...

Hi helium, thank you very much for the extremely kind words

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

[jrlx]

Another post of work done till last week.

 

Having taken care of the cockpit resin parts, I moved to the upper air intakes. As discussed in a post above, when the aircraft is powered down the upper air intakes close and the main air intakes open. The Italeri kit has the upper air intakes open. Since I want to display the aircraft powered down, I bought Attack Squadron's replacement upper air intakes.

 

In this picture we can see the replacement air intake side by side with the top fuselage half:

IMAG4856

 

The air intake on the fuselage must be completely removed so that the resin replacement can be inserted in its place. However, since the resin part's dimensions are slightly different from the area defined by the panel lines around the open air intakes, I had to proceed carefully. First, I removed the intermediate open grilles with a micro-saw:

IMAG4857

 

Next, I removed the remaining grilles on both ends of the opening and, then, using a nº 11 blade, slowly enlarged the opening until the resin part fit:

IMAG4858

 

The resulting opening is this:

IMAG4860

 

The same procedure was repeated on the starboard side. First, the open grills were removed using a micro-saw:

IMAG4861

 

and, next, the opening was enlarged with a nº 11 blade until the resin part fit snugly. The resulting opening is this:

IMAG4862

 

Finally, here are both resin parts in place:

IMAG4863

 

Only a bit of filler around the edges will be needed.

 

Next, I cut the kits nose in order to fit the replacement resin nose in place. First, I cut the nose from the upper fuselage half:

IMAG4864

 

and from the lower fuselage half as well:

IMAG4865

 

As is, the plastic around the cut is too thick and the resin nose doesn't fit in:

IMAG4866

 

The plastic around the cut was thinned until the nose fit in place. Here is a comparison of the thinned section of the fuselage halves (left) with the original thickness on the remains of the kit's nose (right):

IMAG4869

 

After this thinning procedure, the resin nose fit very well. However, there are some fit problems between the fuselage halves just behind the nose:

IMAG4868

 

That's all for now. Thanks for looking.

 

Jaime

[Cookenbacher]

Wonderful work on getting all the resin to fit Jaime!

[jrlx]

7 minutes ago, Cookenbacher said:

Wonderful work on getting all the resin to fit Jaime!

Hi Cookie! Thanks for your interest and kind words!

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

[jrlx]

Hi again,

 

I'm still updating the thread with work done till last week.

 

The next step was to work on the air brake area, between the exhausts, to replace the kit's plastic by the highly detailed Aires resin air brake.

 

I started by placing the inner shaft of the air brake on the top fuselage, to determine were the cuts should be made to the plastic. As can be seen, there's a difference in length between the kit's rendering of the air brake and the resin part:

IMAG4870

 

Once the correct position for the resin part was determined, I marked the cuts with an nº 11 blade:

IMAG4871

 

Then I used a micro-saw to cut the plastic. Here the area is almost cut off the fuselage:

IMAG4872

 

Finally it was completely cut off the fuselage:

IMAG4873

 

Some additional plastic carving with a nº 11 blade was needed until a good fit of the resin part was achieved:

IMAG4874

 

I placed the top part of the air brake over the centre shaft, just to see how it fit (I intend to display the air brake fully open in my model):

IMAG4875

 

Next, I carved away the the relief representations of the top air brake part actuators:

IMAG4876

 

After sanding and polishing and a bit of panel lines re-scribing, the top fuselage half looks good enough. It was fit to the bottom fuselage half and used as a guide for the cut of the air brake in the bottom fuselage half:

IMAG4877

 

The following pictures show a few steps of the cut, until the bottom part of the air brake was completely cut away:

IMAG4878

 

IMAG4879

 

IMAG4880

 

Now with the two fuselage halves fit together, I tested again the fit of the resin air brake centre shaft. As shown in the following two pictures, it seems to fit well:

IMAG4881

 

IMAG4882

 

To finish with this area, I removed the relief-moulded air brake actuators on the lower fuselage half. After sanding and polishing, this was the result. Should look good under a coat of primer:

IMAG4883

 

The test fit of the lower air brake part over the centre shaft looks good:

IMAG4884

 

The next step was taking care of the exhaust area. According to the resin exhaust's instructions, the end of the fuselage where the exhaust are glued on should be sanded down:

IMAG4885

 

This was not easy to do, since there's no obvious deviation from a 90º angle on the ends of the kit part. I just sanded these areas enough so that the larger end of the resin part was under the exhaust covers that are moulded on the end of the top fuselage half:

IMAG4887

 

This is the bottom view:

IMAG4886

 

This concludes the preparatory work related to the resin parts.

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Jaime

 

 

 

 

[Antoine]

Highly interesting, Jaime, thanks.

I've plans to do this myself with the same kit one of these days.

Maybe a double/comparison build, together with a Trumpeter -29.