Planet Models FFVS J-22A Swedish Fighter 1:48

[Mike]

As soon as I'd finished reviewing this little resin gem from Planet Models, I couldn't resist the urge to build it, so I started preparing some parts for assembly, then painting.  I'm building it as a bit of a sanity/mojo build, as I've not done a tap of modelling for a couple of months at least, and I was starting to forget how.  I've not obsessed over detail too much, nor done much in the way of research.  I've just pottered on regardless   I got the cockpit base painted a couple of weeks ago, then had to take a break, but yesterday I took up my modelling tools again, and began detail painting of the 'pit, and some of the ancillaries such as the engine.  The cockpit when finished slided inside th fuselage, so nothing much is seen of the area behind the X-shaped cross-braces, so I didn't even bother painting them... which makes the cockpit look a bit shabby now.

 

 

 

Not my best work, but very little will be seen inside the fuselage, which suits me   Yesterday I decided to close up the fuselage, which is sometimes a pause for thought with a resin model.  I decided to use CA, as it gives an immediate bond that can be useful to work out the kinks of a potentially warped pair of fuselage parts.  As it happens, these were pretty good, with just a small gap/misalignment between front and rear parts of the upper seam.  I glued it in parts, using an old #11 blade to insert CA into the joints, starting with the top join forward of the canopy.  Then the rear fuselage and tail were glued, being sure to get things lined up where it matters.  The underside was done in the same manner, and before it was cured, I sanded any remaining gaps to choke up the small spaces with a mixture of resin dust and CA.  A line of CA was then added to the top, and again, sanded while still fresh to get it all merged together.  That all went surprisingly quickly, and a quick squirt of black primer showed just a few spots where there were flat-spots that needed rounding off.

 

 

 

 

 

The wings were just push-fitted at this point, although the fit was very good, needing just a slight fettle before I could glue them in place.  I had painted the two banks of pistons a generic metallic colour, and added the push-rods from short lengths of 0.5mm diameter styrene rod, which were painted black, then picked out in GW Chainmail along with the ring for contrast.  I've got some tinned copper florists' wire in various diameters, and used the 0.3mm stuff to simulate the wiring harness, which isn't included in the kit.  14 lengths for the front bank, and another 14 for the rear bank, which although they looked nice & shiny (too shiny), were dulled down with a bit of matt varnish.  I painted the bell-housing interior/exterior green as a best guess from some reference photos, and will pretty much leave it as is because so little will be seen that any weathering would probably go unseen

 

Elevators were added, and these again fitted neatly, with different sized tabs & slots to ensure you get them in the right 'ole.  I pushed the engine in place, and later had a quick go with the cowling on too, to give the full effect of the aircraft's shape (minus vacformed canopy at this stage).  Very Fw.190 indeed.

 

 

 

The white dot on the lip of the cowling is a piece of styrene rod glued into a solitary bubble that snuck through QC.  It would have been invisible in the factory, so we'll let them off   I'll be spraying a bit more black primer here & there to test seams & finishes, but at the moment there are a couple of pieces of clear acrylic sat in the notches I cut in the wing for the nav lights, as these were solid resin, so needed to go.  Once cured, I'll sand them back to profile and polish them back to clarity, although I think they're usually coloured lenses.  Tamiya clear red & green are already in the bulbs (a small drilled hole), so things should look ok with some more on the lens.

 

Can I keep momentum up?  Who knows, but I'm not starting anything else now until I have finished something.  I have a PV-1 with Owl nightfighter conversion set that's asking me to build it at the moment, but whatever else comes along in the meantime might prove shinier   I'm seriously tempted by the Fw.P.II that @petr@SpecialHobby kindly sent me too.  Bless him!

[Christer A]

As I got the privilage to sit in the cockpit of the sole remaining example, color me intrigued!

The kit looks very nice, and you haven't lost your painting skills!

[Crossofiron1971]

ooh, lovely work sir!

[Mike]

Thanks guys - I'm a bit rusty. It's surprising how inactivity in the modelling front can result in forgotten skills & so forth.  I feel like i'm having to relearn some of it

[Darby]

46 minutes ago, Mike said:

Thanks guys - I'm a bit rusty. It's surprising how inactivity in the modelling front can result in forgotten skills & so forth.  I feel like i'm having to relearn some of it

I sympathise with the re-learning stuff. I've just started in a role which I haven't done since 1997 in a place I haven't been at since 1989.

The build looks fine to me. Did Marivox do one of these once in '72? I'm sure I had one and canned it as it frustrated me.

[TonyTiger66]

That's looking very good Mike  

The wiring harness is a very nice detail touch.

 

I recently succumbed to a long denied weakness for Swedish aircraft models. Christer helped me by advising that Mr. Paint produce exactly the right two main colours for these aircraft (and the SAAB B 17 I want to build). I haven't been able to try them yet, but they look good .

 

Your tips on using the CA and resin dust to subtly fill are duly noted .

 

It looks very close to the primer and colour coats stage, very close indeed .

 

Best regards

TonyT

[Mike]

Just as primer looks close (there is some on it, but that's beside the point), I've been looking at the cockpit & canopy join.  There's a roughly pyramid part in the back of the 'pit, which I think hides the roll-over frame behind the pilot's head.  PM have supplied it as a smooth sided and hard-edged piece, but the remaining example has it covered with a canvas material, so out came the Dremel to give it a more organic texture, adding in some creases and sags, but most importantly, softening those edges.  That went well, but the primer will show it up better once I've applied it.  I've also separated the canopy parts just for the hell of it, using a blob of Blutak inside to give it some rigidity while I slowly slice away using multiple passes with a new #11 blade.  There's a frame missing from the master at the front of the aft section, so I'll decide whether to apply some primer layers, a small piece of aluminium tape, or something else to add that back.

 

I'll update with some pics later once the primer & maybe topcoat of the roll-over bag are done.  Next up is fettling the coaming so that it, the clear resin armoured glass panel, the gunsight and the windscreen all fit without issue.  It's quite close under there, and I've already shortened the clear resin part a little.  I also need to add a small hood on the gunsight to make it accurate compared to the pictures I have.  I'll have to be careful with height though, as there isn't much room in there.

[Mike]

After 3 months of inactivity on this one, I picked up the baton again this afternoon, digging it out from under the detritus of papers, bits of models, chunks of electronics etc., to find that the cockpit had been shaken loose by the weight on top, so I had to re-glue that, refit the instrument panel, which had come off its base in the pit, and then thin the coaming a bit more so that it fitted better within the aperture.  With that done I spot painted the surrounds, painted the canvas cover on the roll-over frame, glued that in place, and started doing the final fettling of the canopy parts so that they could be attached.  I'd already cut the vacform canopy into three parts (knowing there was a spare in the box), so I adjusted the frames on the rear section first, taped it in place, and secured the rear with some CA with black pigment added.  Then I messed with the windscreen, tacked that in place with the black CA (this stuff dries quickly, so becomes unusable - be prepared to mix several batches), and then filled in round the edges, wiping the excess away with a cotton bud along the line of the join.  With the rear dry, I took off the tape and filled in the sides using the same method.

 

The remaining glue was sanded off (first fix - will prime after masking & check), and that's where we're at.  I'm determined to try to finish this by New Year, so we shall see how that works out on the 31st Dec, eh?

 

 

Excuse the dust on the airframe - I was checking the finish, so had a go at the surface with a sanding stick.

 

[Mike]

Had a little per ardua catastrophe with this one t'other day.  I'd bought a 12v Li-ion battery off eBay for my big Star Destroyer, and it turned up discharging 8.xv instead, so I got a refund on it.  It was perched on a shelf, and decided that it felt like a short flight, ending up on the floor.  No biggie I thought, as it was going in the bin eventually anyway.  Little did I know that it had used my J-22 as a springboard on the way, with the following results:

 

 

Fortunately it's a clean break along the seamlines, so I can just re-glue the parts, but there has been some chipping of the paint, so I'll need to do a respray of the undersides, which I was vacillating over, as I felt that it was too light, and when lightened for the colour modulating, it would have ended up way too light.  Problem solved now, as it'll need redoing, so I'll just add a bit of black to tone it down for the base coat   Getting the glue out first though

[Mike]

Spoke too soon - the rear canopy join has split, and the windscreen is loose too.  Superglue to the rescue though

[wyverns4]

Crack-on Mike, you can do it! 

 

One of my favourite Swedish aircraft. So which markings are you going to apply, (between Crimbo and New Years?).

 

Christian, exiled to africa

 

 

[Mike]

Divna worry pet - all the breakages are just setting up now, and it looks like I have minimal making good to do.  I've chipped off the paint from the scuffed panels, and will redo those too.  Then I can set about darkening that base colour.  I'm pretty sure it's the right "colour", but too light a shade.  The instructions tell you to do it light blue/grey, but all the pics I have seen don't have a blue tint, and conform to the more grey grey from the period.  If any of you have seen the airframe in the flesh (pics can be a poor guide), I'd be interested to hear what you think

[wyverns4]

Great to hear, petal!

 

When I saw the airframe in Linkoping, (two .. over the o), I thought the undersurafce was a slightly darker, more intense version of RLM 65.

 

HTH.

 

Christian, exiled to africa

[Rudolf_Filip]

On 2017-08-08 at 6:47 PM, Christer A said:

As I got the privilage to sit in the cockpit of the sole remaining example, color me intrigued!

The kit looks very nice, and you haven't lost your painting skills!

Hmmm... What kind of idiot would let you up in that beautiful aircraft?  

[Rudolf_Filip]

Mike, your build looks great! 

I lost all interest in my own buildthread when Photobucket took away all my pictures...

 

The cockpit looks just perfect! 

I would know since I work on the thing... 

 

Andreas

[Christer A]

21 hours ago, Rudolf_Filip said:

The cockpit looks just perfect! 

I would know since I work on the thing... 

 

Andreas

And you even let me sit in it 

Thanks for the tour Andreas!

[Mike]

After much faffing of late, I've finally managed to get a bit of paint on the ole J-22 over the last couple of days, and finished off the noodling of the colour modulation this avo.  I've got to unmask the lower edges to check for bleed-through and paint peeling (I'm on tenterhooks as it's a resin kit), but here are a few shots straight from the paint booth:

 

 

 

 

 

I've tried to go for a used but not overly abused look, and once the clear gloss is on, it should look a little less chalky, but hopefully retain some of the hue changes.  I used a darkened shade of the base colour (a very close Finnish colour) with the original colour and a slightly lightened hue over the top of that.  Wish me luck in pulling all that tape off

[Mike]

... And the good news is that the tape came off pretty easy, just peeling a tiny fleck off the wing leading edge. There were a couple of small oversprays around the complex curve between wings & cowling, but as I'd put a barrier coat of Aqua Gloss over the grey, a light rub with a microbrush dipped in thinners, then a swab with a cotton bud sorted them out in short order. I need to do a little detail painting of the flying surfaces, and then I can install the engine and cowling permanently.

[wyverns4]

 

Christian, exiled to africa

[Mike]

That was pretty much my reaction too, after a sigh of relief

[Mike]

I got a coat of gloss on last night, mainly to stop the paint from being damaged by handling, but also in preparation for decaling, and this morning I popped the engine in, and added the cowling, using CA, as it's a resin kit.  I have to keep reminding myself of that, as it went together so well

 

 

I have just remembers I had an issue with the decals for this review sample, as the yellow 9 decals appeared not to have had their white backing printed beforehand, so the yellow number will end up a bit transparent.  I should have thought of this sooner, but is there anywhere I can get a replacement from?  @petr@SpecialHobby did promise to make me a new one, but as he's probably very busy, I'd rather not impinge upon his good nature, and sort it myself.  You can see the issue in the pics below:

 

 

I might also get some Swedish Crowns too, as I do like a nice Swedish model, and some of those Hobby Boss kits have terrible renditions of the Crown.   The 9 is 9.5mm tall by 3mm wide.

[Mike]

I've taken the plunge and ordered some Flying Colours Aero decals from here, so I'll have to hope they can get them to me nice & quickly.  I'll pop the smaller aircraft specific decals on in the meantime, but it could mean a delay in completion.  Such is life   I've got plenty of other projects and site related stuff to be cracking on with TBH

[72modeler]

Mike,

 

Very neat build of a pretty obscure little fighter! It looks to me like a Boomerang that rear-ended an FM2 Wildcat. Can't wait to see the finished project. I have the Marivox 1/72 kit, but so far haven't worked up the nerve to start it- you build has inspired me to try...now I've got to try and find it, as it's not in its original box- I'm betting nobody else has that same problem, right?

Mike

 

Couldn't resist this link- Alley oop!

 

http://cdn-live.warthunder.com/uploads/1b/a24dd2c6c6d940efffb0d267c4a163450c1751_mq/ffvs+j+22+jaeger-schweden+(9).jpg.5161142.jpg

 

...or this one!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKugDUX64Ks

 

 

Edited January 7, 2018 by 72modeler
added additional link

[Mike]

2 minutes ago, 72modeler said:

I'm betting nobody else has that same problem, right?

 

http://cdn-live.warthunder.com/uploads/1b/a24dd2c6c6d940efffb0d267c4a163450c1751_mq/ffvs+j+22+jaeger-schweden+(9).jpg.5161142.jpg

Nooooo.... I never lose any of my kits, or their constituent parts

 

Funnily enough, I spotted that pic today when I was looking for the correct orientation of the little red decal at the mouth of the wing-root intakes, and thought "I'm glad they modelled it in the landed configuration".

[Mike]

I got the decals on (those that I'm using), and although they're a bit reticent to come off the decal paper, a bit prone to folding over and stretching/tearing, when you get them down, they're really nice & thin. 

 

 

There's not an awful lot I can do now until the national markings and numerals arrive, but until then I'm going to crack on with my old Macross Regult pod build that stalled ages ago.