Richie B Posted January 1, 2021 Share Posted January 1, 2021 Happy New Year everyone! Hope you've managed to find time in the festive period to move a few projects on. Well its been a while since the F-15E but next up is another twin-tailed, twin-engined fighter but this time from the other side of the Berlin wall. The chosen subject is the ICM 1/48 Mig-25 PD Foxbat, which looks a nice kit, much more accurate and with finer detail than the old Revell offering and a better prospect for an in-flight display than the flawed KittyHawk version. One of the main reasons for choosing this particular aircraft was that it is a monotone grey scheme and I wanted to practise the use of black-basing to make the colour scheme more interesting. Plus I really like the rugged lines of the Foxbat and I'm using it as a technique trial before committing paint to a concurrent project of a 1/32 F-15B. The kits surface detail is very nice and crisp though the construction looks more complicated than usual. As usual, and nice though the kit is, I couldn't resist adding some extras which included: Eduard Big-Ed set Metallic Detail Exhausts (which are lovely but incredibly thin (and fragile!) Master Pitot Probe Aerobonus Mig-25 Pilot (as the kit doesn't come with one and it is in-flight!) As a starter I thought I'd add some of the PE detail as I need to get the intakes sorted early in the build. Some nice detail but the intake lips will need to be amended as they are in the down position which is fine for on the ground but not wheels up. Whilst the strips on the intake braces add some nice relief I found that they made the intake harder to fit and ended up removing half of them. The cockpit PE fits well though whether you'll see all this detail when the canopy is closed is another matter! I've drilled holes where the instruments are to allow then to be backlit. More eventually! 10 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted January 17, 2021 Author Share Posted January 17, 2021 Progress, well some at least. Continuing with the traditional cockpit first methodology I've painted all the relevant bits with the interior Turquoise beloved of Russian aviation cockpits of that era. It seems to be not an easy colour to find in a single paint solution and many mix to get the right shade. I was no exception and used a rather green Turquoise from Mig Ammo mixed with one of their darker blue shades. Importantly, it wasn't a million miles off from the Eduard cockpit coloured PE which I thought I'd try. My original intent was to paint it all as I'm not a great fan of very detailed but usually flat PE. However, the cockpit is quite small and with the lid closed the 2D effect will not be that noticeable. The aim is for the cockpit to be busily distracting enough to miss any shortcomings. I had to and some of the nice kit detail off but to be fair I don't think I'd I have made the paint job any better than Eduard - lots of switches in these old russian jets! Once painted, the coloured PE was added with additional details such as the throttle stripes added for interest. Additional PE parts were then added and a light weathering wash given to break up the colour scheme. A hole was drilled in the rear bulkhead for any cockpit wiring and work also began on he Aerobonus pilot in his orange pressure suit. Although nicely detailed the pilots arms and hands were in the wrong place for the control stick and the throttle so I need to do such surgery to cut the arms into pieces at the joints and use thin wire to join them so I could reposition the arms to the right place. Once satisfied I then slightly glued and added filler to fill in the gaps. I also worked on the IP for which the kit detail was sanded off and Eduard pieces used. I like the fact that Eduard uses acetate to print the dials as you can back-light these unlike PE. My intent on the lighting is to add 2 red floodlights and back-light the instruments in red as well. As I'd drilled out the instrument faces earlier it was slightly harder to align and glue all the layers together but the end result is quite nice. Next up - getting the rest of the cockpit pieces in place including the pilot. 13 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exdraken Posted January 20, 2021 Share Posted January 20, 2021 Wow, great! Love the PE and cockpit!! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Serkan Sen Posted January 20, 2021 Share Posted January 20, 2021 Good progress so far. I will follow this build with great interest. Serkan 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted January 21, 2021 Author Share Posted January 21, 2021 Many thanks for the comments exdraken & Serkan, hopefully more updates soon! It's quite a nice kit, some fit issues but not unsurmountable, and very nice detail. Much better option than the KH effort I think. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted January 23, 2021 Author Share Posted January 23, 2021 (edited) As this is in flight model I needed to add a pilot, so I used an Aerobonus figure as the kit does not have one and the Aerobonus also comes attached to a nice seat. This figure is wearing a soviet pressure suit which seemed appropriate for this aircraft. It was a bit (actually very!) fiddly to get the face mask correct as its acetate sandwiched between two layers of PE. However the effect looks quite good once attached. As I mentioned before the arms have been repositioned to fit but apart from that the seat went in without too much trouble. I added a placard on his kneeboard for a bit of detail though how much will actually be seen is debatable. For cockpit lighting I added two very small LEDs in the side panels and put a red LED behind the IP to lights the dials up. You can just see the wires trailing back in the image below. Before I can do any major assembly I now have to work out how the multi-part intakes can go together with minimal gaps. At least the dry fitting suggests that the tolerances are quite good i.e. tight. More eventually! Edited January 23, 2021 by Richie B 10 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted February 9, 2021 Author Share Posted February 9, 2021 A bit of work on the back end for a change. The exhausts are from Metallic Details and very nice they are too. The kit parts are not that bad but these are another step up and avoid the very tricky task of joining the three exhaust parts up seamlessly. The inner exhausts were given a green hue as seen on many photos and a hole drilled in the back-end for the acrylic rods to pass through. This will need reinforcing as the weight of the model will rest on these parts eventually. The fit on the kit parts is very good so no issue in that regard. The resin is incredibly fine on the exhaust petals so be careful - and yes one repair later! The inner rings were given the same greenish tinge with the outer rings given a couple of shades of Alclad and some tinging with Tamiya weathering colours. In case you were wondering, there is another resin part that fills in the gaps on the exhaust rings. These exhaust rings are pretty big, bigger than some 1/32 kit exhausts, so no wonder this aircraft was fast. More soon (ish)! 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted February 17, 2021 Author Share Posted February 17, 2021 Hi everybody, The build progresses with the intakes now assembled and the exhaust section added. The intake assembly looks quite complicated with several sections but they go together pleasing well. I'm not sure which is the best method/order of assembly as any slight mis-alignment will cost you in filling and repair work later. I decided to work front to back as I felt any errors were going to be less obvious at the back end. In the end I was still probably 1/2 mm out when I put the outside side wall on as it required a little filler on the inside of the right intake. There is some nice detailing inside the intakes which I nearly sanded off as I mistook it for just a rough finish initially! Not sure how much you can see when its all assembled though. One thing to note is that the instructions have you fit the front intake brace at the beginning of the assembly sequence, which I did. It then becomes very difficult to add the lower fuselage floor since the lip on this part now won't fit in the gap. I fixed this by sanding the step down until I could pry it in. Adding the brace after the lower fuselage is fixed may help. I also had to reshape the lower intake lips as these are fixed in the lowered position which is normal for low-speed or ground operations. As mine was in-flight (and presumably going very fast!) I had to carefully cut a slot and bend the intake up. I'll fill in the gap with plasti-card. I also started to close up the undercarriage doors. For the most part the fit of the doors was ok but the kit is clearly designed to be displayed gear down. Once the intakes were complete I added the exhaust section which needed a whole lot of additional support to make it strong enough to take the weight of the model. The 'pink' tubes are where the acrylic rods will pass and the rear fuselage brace has been reinforced along with the join to the rear exhausts to keep the structure steady. In addition, I've added the wiring for the exhaust LEDs and linked it to the cockpit lighting. I've checked all the components which are still working as once its closed up there is no going back! I've also added some of the remaining Eduard PE that goes on the aircraft skin though I am in two minds as to whether it adds 'artificial' detail as you end up sticking the PE onto the surface when in most cases it is smooth with the surface. I therefore end up not using a fair proportion of the PE as a lot is for the undercarriage which I don't need. Still, the replacement aerials look more to scale than the kit offerings. I think we're just about ready to start putting together the main assemblies! 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alan P Posted February 18, 2021 Share Posted February 18, 2021 This is great work so far, what you've done with the cockpit looks very realistic. Will be following your progress! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted February 19, 2021 Author Share Posted February 19, 2021 Many thanks Alan, I’m really liking the kit and looking forward to getting some paint down at some point! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted February 22, 2021 Author Share Posted February 22, 2021 In a rare moment of calm I accelerated the build quite rapidly (for me) and glued most of the major components together. I sprayed the inside of the canopy the same Turquoise colour as the cockpit and sealed it in place before adding the Eduard mask to the outside this time. The next set of pictures provide an overview of where the fit required a bit of filler. In general it goes together really well and certainly looks the part but occasionally the fit is beautifully engineered but just slightly out! The intake top covers sat a little too proud so they needed a bit of fine sanding on the inside to sit flush. The front fuselage join to the main body wasn't too bad and certainly better than a lot other kits. The underside required a bit more work on the undercarriage doors as they are designed to be shown gear down. Also I moved the lower intake inlets into a closed position so that needed some work to blend back in. The lower wing section attachment to the upper part is just weird. It doesn't follow any particular panel line that I can see and there is some subsequent work to fill in any gaps to avoid any signs of that weirdness remaining. The rear fuselage section join also requires some thinning where the pieces overlap or one part will sit quite proud. The base of the fins need some filling and I found the flaps were a little too far away from the fuselage so added some plasti-card to make them wider. The brake housing was not a great fit and required some sanding and filling to make it flush. The wing joints although not too bad still benefitted from a line of filler to smooth out any gaps. Also, the notch section where it meets the fuselage was too big so again more plasti-card was used to make that feature much smaller. Finally, I added some detail by scratch building the Aileron actuator which sits quite proud of the wing, and re-scribed the associated hinge area as its stepped the wrong way round. You might think that this is a filler queen but in reality most of the small gaps were quickly filled with water based putty and smoothed off which a wet cotton bud. It didn't take too long at all and by checking the fit of the parts first (sanding down where necessary) the job was much quicker and tidier than most of my other projects. Next up is the addition of colour! Well grey anyway. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted April 3, 2021 Author Share Posted April 3, 2021 So I thought I'd experiment with some black basing. Not used the technique before but I've seen some great results using it,. I used Ultimate black primer which went down well then started adding random colour spots and streaks. I had two aims in mind, the first was to introduce colour variation which I hoped would show up under the MRP paints I was going to use and provide that often suggested undertone of colour even on monotone schemes. The second aim was to introduce tonal variation so that even if the colour didn't work, the light/dark shading would! Some variations I kept to panels others I over-sprayed whole areas just to mix it up a bit. There was little reasoning behind the choice of undertone colours other than to perhaps go dirtier underneath ie light brown on top, darker underneath. I used a mix of greys and browns and did contemplate other colours i.e. blue but in the end wasn't brave enough. maybe next time depending on how this one goes! I also emphasised where I thought there would be natural accumulations of dirt i.e. tight spaces, exhaust areas, to add to the tones expected there. The back end i sprayed gloss black to help the metallics shine. I'm going to replace the static dischargers as the kit ones look oversized. Pictures I've seen of Mig-25s always looked like they'd been left out to suffer the consequences of Siberian weather so panel shading was in. Time to start beating up on the large fuel tank, not sure if they are actually natural metal but the contrast looks good so I'm going with it! Now to see whether any of this actually survives overspray by the main colour! 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted September 11, 2021 Author Share Posted September 11, 2021 Sooo..... a little longer thank anticipated but finally some progress! Managed to find some time to add the main Traffic Grey (MRP) and the metallic shades (ALCLAD). Thankfully MRP paints spray quite thinly if you're careful and allow the underlying shades to show through. Once the main colours were down and the odd spot corrected (poor masking on my part) I sprayed some thinned down X22 to give it a gloss finish. Not sure why but I always seem to have to buff it up when its dried to get a better finish, maybe I need to thin it out even further? In case you're wondering I've removed the static dischargers before they removed themselves! Will replace with some more robust metal ones. I think the underlying shading has worked well and especially the black basing. I suspect that the MRP paint would look too light if sprayed on a lighter primer of raw plastic. You can see the right hand gear door (where the battery is stored) was painted without primer (an omission on my part I think) and looks a different lighter shade of grey. Will overspray or use a filter later to correct. Other than that I'm very impressed with MRP lacquer paints and they are now my go to colours. The large metal area at the rear of the aircraft was done using several shades of Alclad over a gloss black primer. I used photo references to try and get the colour pattern right then ad-libbed some smoke and exhaust manifold to add interest. Finally, the large AA-6 Acrid missiles are also coming together. As they are really quite big (larger than 1/32 Sparrow's!) I thought I'd try and add some paint variation to the whit as they are never that plain in reality. Probably time for some decaling! (eventually) 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZHOU Kun Posted September 12, 2021 Share Posted September 12, 2021 Very brilliant build! I like it! The Russian air-to-air missiles really takes a lot of time to paint, and you did a fine job！ 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted September 13, 2021 Author Share Posted September 13, 2021 Many thanks ZHOU Kun, they are almost more of a challenge to paint than the aircraft itself! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted November 20, 2021 Author Share Posted November 20, 2021 Getting there..... slowly! After a couple of Tamiya gloss coats (should probably have put another 1 or 2!) it was decal time. I used a mix of Begemot stencils and the kit decals. The stencils were finer detail than the kit ones but otherwise both sets performed fine. After a bit of decal softener and some sealing gloss coats the decals have started to add a bit of life to the Mig. The Red stars might be a bit bright compared to the paint job so will have to see what I can do to tone them down. The Begemot decal set includes some additional pylon and weapons details that aren't in the kit set, which is nice. Next up - washes! 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted December 16, 2021 Author Share Posted December 16, 2021 Next up was some panel line washes to add a bit of contrast and detail. I used 4 colours from the Mig Ammo washes. Very dark for recesses where the control surfaces are, brown for underside and heavily worked areas and a variety of light and medium grey panel lines for variety on the remaining surfaces I used more of the darker colours at the rear where dirt tended to accumulate and left more of the colour on the surface to provide a tint to the underlying paint. It's quite a fun stage as you can experiment then wipe off and start again if you want. I also added a dark wash to the AA-6 missiles which helped bring them to life and a touch of exhaust wash at the back end Will need to seal all this all in before adding some variations using oils. Finally starting to get there! 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dstream Posted December 18, 2021 Share Posted December 18, 2021 Hi Richie, I find you are doing a spectacular work on painting this aircraft. Your treatment of the surfaces look so realistic for this brutish type. Keep on posting, Dan. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deano353 Posted December 18, 2021 Share Posted December 18, 2021 That is looking awesome can't wait to see the final result! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted December 19, 2021 Author Share Posted December 19, 2021 Many thanks Dan & Deano, hope to get some more headway over Xmas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Serkan Sen Posted December 19, 2021 Share Posted December 19, 2021 She looks fantastic with spectacular weathering. Also the detailed work on missiles is amazing. Serkan 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted March 21, 2022 Author Share Posted March 21, 2022 Just a quick update as I am plowing on with the weathering and nearly finished. I'm using a selection of panel washes (mainly brown) on the tail and dirtier lower sections with some lighter grey highlights on the top surfaces. I'll add some Mig oilbrusher spots and fuel/hydraulic staining to add a bit of tonal variety but there's already quite a lot going on. I'm pretty sure the Mig-25s were not pristine so hopefully a little artistic licence will be acceptable! I'm also making a custom base to show her off in-flight out of sprayed MDF and adding a Soviet era Red star. Sorry there's not more photo's this time round but I'm keen to get her over the finish line. Nearly there! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted March 31, 2022 Author Share Posted March 31, 2022 And slightly (actually a lot) later than planned, she's finally done! The missiles and fuel tank are removable as is the model from the base if required. In case you were wondering if the lights still work... I really liked ICM's rendition of the Foxbat, it is nicely detailed goes together relatively well and certainly looks the part. I'll put some more pictures on the Ready for Inspection site soon. Thanks for staying with me on this one! 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richie B Posted April 1, 2022 Author Share Posted April 1, 2022 Ready for Inspection pictures at the following link: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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