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FFVS J-22A Swedish Fighter 1:48


Mike

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The decals arrived from Sven at Flying Colour Aerodecals! :yahoo: Super service and a really friendly, positive kind of guy ^_^

 

I got three sets:

Swedish Thick Numerals 1935-1963 (48010)

Swedish Thin Numerals 1936-62 Yellow (48007)

Swedish National Insignia (48-001a)

 

All in 1:48, but if you're a builder in the wee scale, they do 1:72 too :) 

 

decals.jpg

 

Now to get my decaling trousers on! :D

 

 

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Yikes! :shocked:  When I compared the two decals (kit & aftermarket), it was like looking at the old proverbial chalk & cheese.  Kit decals on the left, Flying Colors on the right:

 

decal-compare.jpg

 

The comparative largeness of the kit 9 is due to the lack of white underprinting (mentioned in the review), and the outer "bleed over" that seems to have been applied to all the yellow surfaces on this sheet.  Not only that, but the colours on the kit decals seem rather muted and drab compared to the FCA set.  They were certainly worth the money, and having now applied a couple, I can confirm that they also go down well.  They spend a while refusing to remove from the backing sheet, then when they go they slide off easily, don't curl up and are pretty easy to move around on your model.  A couple of applications of Mr Mark Softer later, and they're settling down into the panel lines they go over, which is nice ^_^

 

I think the kit decals are the one real weak spot of this kit, but I'm not going to lose too much sleep over that, as where else can you get such a good quality kit at this point in time? :shrug:

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Well that's the decals done! :)  They went down a treat, with very little effort and look lully!  Thanks again to Sven at FCA decals for the swift service and super quality :yes:

 

decals2.jpg

 

 

I'll leave those to set up and finish snuggling down into the panel lines, and get back to sprucing up the Regult.  I'll give the decals a protective coat of clear tomorrow, and carry on with the build :)

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Thanks chap - I went for a fairly muted example, as not every aircraft in the world has spent 20 years on spin cycle in amongst boulders ;) I'm looking forward to getting her done now, as the light at the end of the tunnel is starting to show.  Hope it's not a train :owww:

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Wow! I'm impressed. That looks absolutely fantastic! 

Now I want to see lots of pics of this one finished... 🙂 

 

I didn't know that Flying Colors had a website. I've been using Sten's (not Sven) decals for about 20 years or so... 

Thank you for the link. 

 

Regards 

Andreas 

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Oh :poop: Have I been calling him the wrong name? :blush: I hate doing that :doh:

 

I've been clear coating the decals and sanding them back to reduce the visible edges of the carrier film while I've not been posting here, and I think I'm about ready to put the panel wash on, so expect to see the results of that shortly :)

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Ok - STEN'S decals have been super, and the carrier film is now pretty well hidden, with a wash over the whole airframe, using a lighter one on the undersides.  Next set is to put a matt coat over everything and then add a bit of weather, paint up the prop and wheels, then... oh, what's that thing called again?  Emmmm... Oh yes.  Finish it off.  Is that the correct terminology? :hmmm:

 

wash.jpg

 

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Very nice Mike.

The decals sure make it pop and do look way better the the kit ones.
I've worked with those decals before and have found them a bit challenging to work with, being quite thick and hard to get to snuggle down.

But I haven't used Mr Mark Softer, maybe I have to get that a try.

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She's on her own 2 legs now, with the metal main gear and resin struts painted up... looks like I forgot to remove a bit of blutak at the top of one of the struts, so I must remember to do that.  The decals have been levelled off, and a coat of AKAN flat sprayed over it, and I'm waiting for the glue on the legs to harden up so I can put the wheels on and matt the whole assembly off.

 

paint6.jpg

 

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You're not gonna believe this, but I've only gone and finished a model! :shocked:  Ano, yeah! :frantic:

 

It's been a fiddly job getting it all squared away, and at the last minute I thought "What's the colour of the prop then?", so went on a frantic search of my refs and those online.  Most seem to have a black back to the prop, with a shiny front, but the black wraps around the front slightly.  There were also lots showing black/yellow/black blade tips, so off I went.  A bit gloss black laid down on the blades, and a dash of AMMO metal on the front did the trick, but my masking of the leading edges bled a bit, so I applied some 1.5mm black decal strip to cover that up.  Then I cut some thicker strip for the tips, and laid yellow stripes over that.  Roughly 2 minutes later, I found some actual pics of the airframe in question, and that pattern is reversed! :doh: Off came the still moist decals and I did the reverse, using thick yellow with black over the top.  I let those go off overnight and cut the excess off with the heel of my #11 scalpel to round them off.  Neat! ^_^

 

Wheels, bay covers, guns and pitot were all painted up and added with CA, and I then started adding some mild wear to the paint finish with some of the base colour, unadulterated this time, which came out slightly lighter than the main shade.  The pics accentuate this a bit, but it's actually quite subtle.  I also did a dark grey dabble on the wing tread area, the sills and everywhere else that I could think off, just to break up the lines a little.

 

When I removed the masking from the canopy, there had been some fogging due to the repairs I'd made with CA when the battery dropped on it.  I used IPA on a micro-brush to get the worst of it off, then restored the clarity with a brush-coat of Klear inside the screen, which seems to have sorted it to about 90%.  After that I fitted the little scratch-augmented gunsight, and found a pic that shows a couple of struts holding the canopy to the right angle.  I glued the canopy in first, then added some strips of 0.25 x 0.5mm styrene that had been cut to length and angled at one end, then painted grey.  These give it a little more believability, rather than the canopy hovering in space :)

 

The general state of the J-22s in service was usually pretty good other than a bit of wear-and-tear, so I added a bit of Tamiya smoke trailing back from the exhaust, which you can barely see, plus some dribbles and streaks from the various filler caps.  This subjectr appeared with some interesting strips of a dark colour under its wing on the port side, which has been partially reproduced on the painting instructions, although the shape has been simplified.  Using the pic as reference, and assuming that it was a repair that had been taped and doped (maybe?), I used the suggested red to spray some thin strips of white decal film, which I laid down as per the pic.  Hopefully they're somewhere near accurate, but if not, I tried :shrug: I put clear port & starboard wingtip lights in using some clear styrene earlier in the build, which I'd added little drilled out bulbs to, but it seems that the lights usually have coloured lenses, so I splashed a bit of Tamiya clear of the relevant colour over them, leaving them still a little translucent.  That's about it... here's a taster pic, and I'll shove the rest up in RFI shortly.

 

ffvs_j-22a_1.jpg

 

It's been a thoroughly enjoyable build, with the fit and detail very good for a resin kit.  The few drawbacks were mostly down to the decals and to a small extent the slightly vague instructions.  That said, I did enjoy the process of finding the missing bits out, so all's well that ends well.  My first completed model in well over a year... let's hope 2018 gets a few more from me to save me submitting a zero return in the yearbook this year too :blush: RFI thread is here.

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That looks great Mike, congratulations on becoming a modeller again.

I wasn't aware of this aircraft before you posted this build and there is a certain something that I can't quite pin down, that I like about it.

If I wasn't such a resinphobe I might be temped myself.

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2 hours ago, Gorby said:

If I wasn't such a resinphobe I might be temped myself.

If you're not allergic to CA (and some people really are), a good resin kit like those from Planet Model is a great way to start.  Always check the subject though, as older kits are usually less easy than modern ones no matter which company you're talking about. :)

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3 hours ago, woody37 said:

Lovely finish Mike.

 

im allergic to CA, building the Paragon stuff was a nightmare at the assembly stage.

Cheers Nelly - do you wear a respirator? :owww:

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13 hours ago, woody37 said:

  No, really need to get one. Must be better than streaming eyes and nose!

 

Far better!  Make it so - they're relatively cheap, and less bulky than 100s of boxes of tissues ;)

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Yeah - there are grades and types of filter, and you want to go for the ones that will filter organic vapours, which IIRC are brown in colour.  If you can get one that also filters out dust, you're laughing :)  They call those combination filters.  You pretty much choose your mask, then choose the filters to go in it - go to any Safety Wear seller, or somewhere like Toolstation - they'll be pretty cheap and delivery is free is you spend more than £10 ;)

 

You might want to consider one with integral goggles if it's affecting your eyes... sure you'll look like Darth vader, but you'll be safe & happy inside ^_^

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It was annoying me that I hadn't got a canopy latch for the J-22, so when I found that bit on the PE fret, I pulled it off, made a blob of CA on the end as a handle, then dipped it in white, then red, attached it to the canopy with CA, and painted it green.  It's now in the cabinet, so it's definitely done :)

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