Modeling Tips

Had a rather good day today, went shopping this afternoon and got a few model kits. Thought I’d give my 2 cents here as to some good tips for aspiring modelers out there. Also got AFM’s March issue in the mail (had to back-order it, was deployed supporting Enduring Freedom in March and wanted to read the J-10 article).

Anyway, on to the models. Picked up a 1:720 scale Italeri model of the Admiral Kuznetsov and a 1:72 Italeri model of the Su-34. The Kuznetsov is a great model, and ships of this scale are a good place for beginners to start as there aren’t very many pieces and they are relatively easy to assemble and paint. The Su-34 is suprisingly detailed, and comes with realtively accurate weapons (I’ll address this more later) in the form of 2 R-73, 2 R-77, 3 KAB-500 LGBs, and 2 Kh-31’s. Paid $20 US for each kit, not a bad price.

On to the building process. The most important thing I have found to building a model kit is a good set of sprue cutters. Testor’s makes a great pair for under $15 US. They are MUCH more effective at removing parts from the trees than wire cutters or scissors, and the Testor’s pair gets a nice close, clean cut, meaning there is far less excess material to trim off (I use a Testor’s hobby knife for that).

Something else that is important, especially if you are going for detail and accuracy, is a good set of paints to work with. Most model kits give you suggestions as to what colors to use. Some brands, such as Model Master, go even further. I walked out of the store today with three bottles of aircraft-specific paint; Flanker Light Blue, Flanker Dark Blue, and Flanker Grey, all for the camo scheme of the Su-27 family (and Su-34 Bort #43). Paint can also be used instead of the pain-in-the-ass decals model kits come with. With a little bit of masking tape to mark off the right area, and a very fine tipped brush, you can get the same effect but in a way that can last a lot longer. I will be using this method to do all of the deck detailing on the Kuznetsov, rather than applying thin, 6 and 7 inch long decals.

Another tip: paint parts before you remove them from the trees. Especially small ones. It may be better to put the actual camoflage scheme on an aircraft once it is mostly assembled, this will help hide seams where parts were joined that do not actually appear on the aircraft. For moving parts such as the Su-34’s canards or gear doors, however, paint them on the tree.

Before you assemble or paint a model check it for accuracy. Having 3 books that deal with just the FLANKER family, I will go through and check all the details and paint schemes before I get to work. Same with the Kuznetsov; the instructions were wrong with regards to the actual deck colors for example.

Aircraft weapons can be a big problem. Some model kits provide half-assed, inaccurate weapons to hang under the wings (fortunately not the case with the Su-34 kit). Others do not fill out all the pylons. And sometimes you just may want a different weapons fit than is included in the box (wouldn’t mind some R-27’s myself). VERY easy fix: Hasegawa offers 1:72 scale aircraft weapon kits, I picked up the US AAMs kit today for $6 US. Came with 4 AIM-9B, 4 AIM-9D, 4 AIM-9E, 4 AIM-9J, 8 AIM-9M, 6 AIM-54, 4 AIM-7E, 4 AIM-120A (snip the wings with sprue cutters and you have AIM-120C’s!), 4 AIM-4D, 4 AIM-4F/G (Falcon missiles are notoriously inaccurate in model kits!), 2 SUU-20 pods, 2 GPU-5/A pods, and 2 each Navy and USAF AIM-9 dual rails for F-4’s. There is a PGM kit, an ASM kit, a Russian AAM kit, a Russian ASM kit, and a NATO weapons kit also available in 1:72 scale. These kits come with decals and paint instructions for very accurate weapons for aircraft models. Highly recommended.

ANYway, there you have it. I’ll post more tips as I come across them in the building process, and pictures of the finished product if I ever get a scanner }>

If anyone has any other questions, feel free to ask. And if the Webmaster wants to lock this to the top, I can add more insights on a regular basis and this can be used as a modeling help thread.

SOC

“Peace through kinetic solutions”