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1/48 Su-33 Flanker. Finished 11/06


DaveJL

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Hello all,

 

A tentative second entry; Kinetic's rather good looking Su-33 Flanker D.

 

Kit:

 

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One of the great features of this kit; the side moulded missiles:

 

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Extras:

 

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Will be using a Quickboost seat, Master Pitot tube, J's work camouflage mask and a New Ware mask set. The kit decals are designed by CrossDelta and printed by Cartograf so they don't need changed.

 

Reference material:

 

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With 60-odd pages dedicated to the Su-33:

 

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Looks a great kit and I've read good reports on it. 

 

Dave

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The flanker is a really cool jet, and I’m not that much of a fan of Russian jets (some would say that I’m not a fan of jets, but it’s more that I just love propeller driven aircraft more!) 

 

something about the flanker and tomcat that just brings out the inner child though.

 

Rob

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Thanks chaps.

 

I finally made a start in an attempt to get it finished before the deadline. Cockpit was build up and painted. Great details in here. A thing to note - if fitting an aftermarket seat, you'll need to remove the lump in the cockpit floor. I of course forgot this and had to remove it post painting, hence the grey mess in the middle :lol: but thankfully the seat will cover that!

 

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Quickboost seat:

 

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Note that part E64 from the kit needs added to the rear of the seat:

 

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Missiles:

 

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The 2 R-73s (dark grey plastic) are spares from an AMK Mig-31 - the kit ones were lovely, with very small etch fins needing added,  but I decided to take the easy route with these to avoid the pain of the etch! I've noticed from numerous pictures in my reference book and online, that the inner most wing pylons are absent, with the R-27 missiles fitted to the centre wing pylons and the intake pylons (though the latter doesn't seem to be as common as a simple 2x R-73 and 2x R-27 fit to the wings)

 

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Added the airbrake the upper fuselage:

 

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I have to say the detail in this kit is excellent, very much like Great Wall Hobby. Instructions are a bit dodgy though!

 

More soon.

 

Dave

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36 minutes ago, exdraken said:

If somepne finishes this one in a month, it is you... :)

:thumbsup:

 

 

Thanks Werner, I'll try not to disappoint! 

34 minutes ago, Alan P said:

Great subject and yes, superb kit. Enjoy the build! 

Happy days, could do with a nice simple build :lol:

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50 minutes ago, exdraken said:

If someone finishes this one in a month, it is you... :)

He could probably make two in a whole month :lol:

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More done today. Firstly, landing gear wells were installed - lovely detail here and a good fit. Cockpit also popped in place:

 

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Now, what I suggest you do next is completely ignore the instructions and go from step 5 to step 17. Basically Kinetic have you assemble the entirety of the lower fuselage, landing gear included, before closing the fuselage halves up. I think that is somewhat daft so once the landing gear and cockpit had set, I closed up the fuselage:

 

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Went together fairly well, other than the tail cone - the part on the lower fuselage seemed a bit warped so will need a bit of a clean up - and a bit of extra persuasion was needed at the front around the cockpit to get a tight fit. Another thing I would advise is ignoring the way Kinetic have you assemble the intakes. I added parts F3, F4, F14, F15 and F13 to the intake trunks themselves, rather than add those parts to the fuselage and then have a bit of a jigsaw to fit the trunks around them.

 

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The etch details are nice, if a little on the thin side.

 

Wingtip ECM pods built up:

 

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The detail on the kit is lovely and not having any major issues so far but I have to say the instructions are very poor. You get the feeling that they were rushed. An extra bit of planning and small amount of time invested here would have made this kit that bit better For example, they show the centre line and intake pylons fitted from step 10 and 15 respectively, but no indication of what parts they are. Just as well as they aren't even included in the kit! Luckily the defunct innermost wing pylons will fit the intakes with the help of a pylon adaptor, which is included. The centre line pylons, although they will be empty, still need to be added. Should have something in the spares for here.

 

I also found a good walkaround of the -33, albeit in it's earlier paint scheme - Su-33 Walkaround

 

More soon.

 

Dave

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  • 2 weeks later...

Been slowly working away at this alongside the Lancaster, but now that's completed I should get a decent run at this before the GB deadline, work permitting. Most of the fuselage is now assembled. Generally, the fit was good, though I did have a bit of trouble with the intakes, requiring some filling and sanding. The tail cone also needed work, but this was down to part of the plastic being warped more so than anything else. There was a small gap around the nose too but a bit of Mr Surfacer sorted that.

 

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Added the ECM pods and pylon adapters to the wings, as well as building up the tail fins and horizontal stabilisers:

 

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Landing gear:

 

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The instructions made this step 10 times harder than it should have been! All the control surfaces ready to be fitted:

 

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Pylons and arrestor hook:

 

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The two missing centreline fuselage pylons will be created from two examples from an older kit (the painted ones above) that has been cannibalised. This kit also lacks the intake pylons, but these can be created by using the innermost wing pylons (which do not seem to be fitted to operational Su-33s) and some adapters that are also not mentioned in the instructions.

 

Speaking of which, the instructions are so poor Kinetic decided to re-do them and make them available online, which is very helpful as you can now see where the parts are actually meant to go! :lol: There's also painting and decalling instructions, something which is pretty much absent on the original instructions:

 

Revised Su-33 instructions

 

Will hopefully get the wings fitted and any tidying up that needs done soon.

 

Dave

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More done and we're nearly ready to start the painting process. I popped on the wings today, which are an excellent fit, along with the control surfaces. Pylons on the fuselage also added and a few areas tidied up:

 

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Exhausts built up: 

 

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Interiors were sprayed a mixture of Tamiya Gun Metal and Metallic grey, then detailed with some weathering pigments.

 

Hoping to give the model the once over tomorrow and then spray the coming area then add and mask off the canopy.

 

More soon.

 

Dave

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Windshield fitted today and masked up. Need a bead of Mr Surfacer around the IRST. Also popped on the canopy, ready to spray the frame:

 

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To show how big the Flanker really is, here is a comparison with a 1/48 Spitfire:

 

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Amazing how far aviation had progressed from the 1940s up until the introduction of the Flanker! Hoping to get a lick of primer on tomorrow. Expecting it to show a few blemishes around the intakes but hopefully nothing too drastic.

 

More soon.

 

Dave

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9 minutes ago, Parabat said:

That last shot puts it in perspective - great build so far, really impressive.

Thanks mate. The -33 certainly seems a lot beefier than other Flankers too, probably due to the enlarged wing area.

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Canopy framing sprayed and she's now off for primer:

 

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Once that's done, and provided there's no extra cleaning up that needs done, there's a good few panels etc that need sprayed various colours, including the metallic areas around the exhausts. That's one thing about Flankers, there's lots of painting to do!

 

More soon.

 

Dave

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More done over the last few days. Lots of masking and painting various panels. First up was a pre-shade of the airframe, then I sprayed white around the nose, ECM pods and various other areas across the model. Then it was various shades of metallic for the exhaust areas:

 

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Lots of areas to mask up before the camouflage goes on. Luckily the New Ware set has the majority of the more fiddly areas covered. I did make up the white areas on the tail fins, along with the metallic plates on the horizontal stabilisers:

 

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I then focused on the sub assemblies. Missiles first - sprayed, glossed and weathered:

 

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Landing gear, assembled and given a panel wash:

 

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Exhausts - dry brushed some metallic and blue staining, panel wash and semi gloss coat:

 

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Quickboost ejection seat:

 

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Wing launchers and arrestor hook (some decals to be added to the latter). Both given a wash with Flory dark dirt:

 

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Some of the MRP paints used thus far:

 

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Hoping to start the main painting by the weekend.

 

Dave

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So the last few days have seen a lot of masking, painting, more masking, repainting, more painting and removing masks. Was quite an effort! The J's Work masks are nice but I'd advise you to run a scalpel around the edges of each mask as they don't split from the backing sheet the easiest, some leaving 'frayed' edges if you will.

 

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Dark blue on first, masked, then the grey, which I thought was odd but hey ho, more masking, then finally the lighter blue. A few areas of overspray were cleaned after the initial layer of masks were removed. Another 30 minutes of masking removal and we have this:

 

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As always the MRP colours went on like a dream. It is quite a complex camouflage scheme with lots of areas needing detailed so here's how I went about it (for what it's worth :lol:)

 

1. Base colour of dark blue, then mask.

2. Grey all over, then mask upper surfaces and demarcation lines for fuselage.

3. Light blue

4. Remove all masking

5. Tidy up and areas of over spray if required

6. Mask off areas around landing gear bays and spray

7. Mask off specific areas eg cannon plating etc and spray.

8. All masks off.

 

Of course all the white bits and the exhaust areas were painted and masked prior to this. Anyway, I won't be able to get this finished for the GB deadline but will hopefully get the decals on tomorrow.

 

Dave

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10 hours ago, exdraken said:

Very nice @DaveJL

As the group build runs another week! You might manage!!

 

Thanks Werner, didn't realise there had been an extension to the deadline! 

 

I gave the model a gloss coat last night, another first thing this morning and left to cure for a few hours before adding the decals, which went on perfectly. Once dry, I sealed them in with another gloss coat before adding the pylons, tail fins and arrestor hook once it had cured:

 

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Happy with how it's looking so far.

 

More soon.

 

Dave

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colors and decals look spot on!

nearly too perferct! ;)

 

yeah, the deadline extension was announced  last week... hopefully alowing my build to progress enough as well :)

 

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