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Sukhoi Su-30SM Flanker-H (KH80171) 1:48 KittyHawk The Su-30 was a development of the Su-27 with two branches of development being carried out simultaneously, one manufacturer making export versions for China and other countries, while the Irkut Corporation that are based in Moscow handled the Russian airframes and those for other Allies, both under the over-arching banner of the Sukhoi name. The Russian variant is the SM, which is the subject of this kit. It has small canards for manoeuvrability, to which is added vectored thrust from the twin engines, which are capable of adjusting the angle of the exhausts up to 15o in half a second, giving it even more agility that is great for airshows as well as useful in dogfights. SM stands for “Serial Modernised”, which fortunately for us starts with the same letters in Russian too. A few vanilla Su-30s entered service, and over a hundred SM later joined them, becoming operational in 2018, although they did take part in the 2015 Russian intervention in Syria, performing some low-risk missions and more than a few low-intensity combat sorties according to Western intelligence. The SM is also flown by the Russian Knights that are often seen at airshows, so up until this year’s Covid-related show cancellations, a lot of airshow-goers will have seen them hanging in the sky on their exhausts. The SM is to be joined by the SM1 that has more powerful avionics and engines, standardising on the same power plants that are fitted to the Su-35 along with other aspects of its service and repair envelope to reduce costs while improving availability of both qualified technicians and therefore airframes. Delivery of these airframes should begin in 2021, with a further updated SM2 following along after a contract for a small number was signed in 2020. The Kit This is part of the new range of Su-27 and Su-30s that are arriving this year from Kitty Hawk. It turns up in KH’s usual sturdy top-opening box, and includes eight sprues and two fuselage halves in grey styrene, two sprues of clear plastic, a sheet of Photo-Etch (PE), a pair of exhaust nozzles in resin that are kept safe in a small plastic box. The decals and instruction booklet complete the package, with colour profiles on the inside cover and in the centre of the booklet. All the sprues are individually bagged, and there is a huge amount of detail moulded into this kit, with a pair of engines included, along with a detailed painting guide and access hatches to show them off, a very nice cockpit with lots of parts and decals for better detail, a full representation of the N011M Leopard phased-array radar and avionics black box in the forward fuselage. Construction begins conventionally with the cockpit, specifically the two RD-36 ejection seats, each made from eleven parts, PE belts for both crew members, plus their four-part rail and bulkhead assemblies. The inner facets of the side consoles are moulded into the dual cockpit tub, with the outer sections added separately, with the bulkheads, seats, control columns, main instrument panels and decals, rudder pedals, rear seat coaming, and the jack for the canopy installed at the rear. The preparation of the interior continues with the avionics ‘black box’ and the nose gear bay assemblies, plus two intake trunk sections that form the bulkhead in front of the engine faces, which are made next. The engine housing is made up from two halves, and inside is the front and rear fan with the rear bullet fairing surrounded by the afterburner ring, and the various external ancillaries taking up a further nineteen parts for each power plant. These are then dropped into their sponsons in the lower fuselage along with the aforementioned bulkheads and blanking plate to the sides, then two small brackets linking them together. The main gear bays are next to be put together, filled with good detail in just three parts, then they, the nose gear bay, radar box and cockpit are all fitted inside the lower fuselage, joined by the canards that slot into their sockets and are trapped in place by the top fuselage. Also trapped is the ‘beaver-tail’ or ‘stinger’ that extends the fuselage between the engines and has a number of important sensors and self-protection features inside. The top and bottom portions are joined over a representation of the braking para-pack, then seven PE parts representing the chaff and flare pods and two small blade antennae are glued into place in their recesses, with the resulting assembly trapped on pins inside the rear of the fuselage during their mating. Curiously isolated from the making of the rest of the cockpit, the HUD with separate glazing and push-button panel is made up, then set aside for a while as you make up the front sections of the twin engine nacelles. The main skin has ramps and louvered auxiliary intake fitted to the floor, then in the roof is another ramp, plus the lower half of the trunking. They can be set either closed or open to suit your needs, and of course there are two to make up. They are attached to the lower fuselage after adding the HUD and demisting hosing to the cockpit aperture, then after that the GSh-30-1 autocannon is glued into the recessed bay and covered by its door, with just the muzzle left visible. The nose is then tipped with an angled adapter panel that covers the avionics equipment made up earlier, and this can be posed open by adding two struts and a bracket, or closed by omitting these parts. At the rear the para-pack door is able to be posed open with pack showing, or closed using the same parts. The two upper access panels on the forward section of the engine bulges are dropped into the holes or left off to expose your hard work, with the central air-brake at the rear of the cockpit hump again able to be shown open or closed by using the ram that is included to prop the brake at the correct angle. A pair of sensors are then installed on the outer sides of the engine nacelles. This picture shows one nozzle with the flash removed to show off the internal detail The included resin exhaust nozzles have them angled down to depict maximum deflection in that direction, and these parts have a sheet of flash covering the open end that you should carefully cut from the part before washing and painting. Take care with cutting too close, and add back the steps on the interior of the petals with a sharp blade or file before you wash them to remove residual mould-release agent. They mount on a lug to ensure they are fitted the correct way, and are noticeably longer than the unused plastic exhausts on the sprues, which are marked Su-27. The wings have the usual tab and slot fit, and have separate front slats and flaps, two-part elevons and strakes just under the pivot-point. The landing gear struts are fairly complex on the real thing, and the detail has been replicated by using separate parts for the top, the oleo-scissors, brake assembly and ancillary brace, topped off with a two-part tyre that has the hubs moulded-in, and the two bay doors each having their own struts to hold them at the correct angle. The nose gear strut is similarly complex with separate top, three landing lights with clear lenses, additional details, and one large bay door that has a cylinder on the inside face, with a retraction jack set deep into the bay. The twin wheels are each single parts and are surrounded by a louvered mudguard at the rear. There are a large number of sensors in the Su-30SM, with many blade antennae around and under the nose, and aft onto the LERX and cockpit hump. The refuelling probe is also found on the port side of the nose, and that too can be posed open or closed, the latter requiring the aft section to be removed so that it sits semi-flush inside its receptacle. The radar gives you a choice of two flat sensors, which are both nicely detailed and fix to the bulkhead in the nose, to be covered with the radome and probe or not, depending on whether you are showing the nose tipped up for maintenance. The canopy is moulded as a single part and is very clear, but has a couple of very small sink-marks in the “b-pillar” vertical frame where there are contact point for the interior structure. As a result, the “glass” portion dips ever-so slightly as it approaches the frame, which will be difficult to do anything about without taking your life in your hands. It is small, so could well be ignored, and will be further obfuscated by the internal frame that is fitted from inside along with the rear section where the canopy attaches to the aircraft. A set of rear-view mirrors are also attached to the inside, which should look good with some Molotow liquid chrome applied to the mirror area. The windscreen part is separate and has two thin kinked PE strips added to the inside before fitting, which would be best attached with some clear acrylic gloss such as Klear. In front of the windscreen is the OLS-30 laser-optical locator system (think IRST with extras) in a bullet-shaped housing that has a clear lens and aerodynamic fairing so that it blends in with the windscreen. The airframe is completed by the twin fins with moulded-in rudders that have fairings added to the rear and a small insert fitted to the leading edge to complete the intake there. A pair of wingtip rails with tiny tip lights are added to the wings, with a dual-rail pylon included for under each wing. No weapons are included for a change, but if you have any of KH’s other Russian/Soviet kits, you’ve probably got plenty on hand already. Markings There are three decal options on the supplied sheet, which are protected by a ziplok bag and coated paper during transit and storage. From the box you can build one of the following: Russian Federation Air Force Red 24 Russian Navy Blue 45 Russian Knights Blue 31 Check your references for Blue 45, as it has an apparently monotone flag and code number that both seem to use the blue of the fuselage instead of a separate blue shade. This could of course be at a different point in the aircraft’s career, so don’t take my word for it. The decals are printed anonymously, and are in fair register, although my sample has a slight drift in the white, as well as a couple of blemishes in two of the larger Russian Knights decals, marring the red/white stripes and one of the sunbursts on the tail. Hopefully your copy will fair better from being on the slow boat, rather than the fast aircraft from China. Conclusion Another good-looking kit from Kitty Hawk that has lots of detail and some striking decal options straight from the box. There are a few minor issues with the decals, but nothing that can’t be fixed. Highly recommended. Review sample courtesy of and available soon from major hobby shops

In 2019 Zvezda is to release a 1/144th Irkut MS-21-300 (Yak-242) kit - ref. 7033 Source: Zvezda catalog 2019 V.P.