1/48 Smer MiG-17F/Lim-6 bis

Gallery Article by Jamie McIntyre on Jan 30 2019

 

      

Back in April 2016, "TJ" posted this on his blog - http://elhangardetj.blogspot.com/2016/04/mig-17-afganos-en-color.html

Wow, Afghan Fresco C's in early markings including rudder stripes, what's not to love! Only one, in the middle of the rear row, appears to have a serial, and by zooming in, squinting and balancing current moon phase v's my footy team's position on the ladder I guesstimated it to be 981 25. Decals were made and printed a few months later (Dr Decal & Mr Hyde Acrylic Waterslide Laser Decal Paper through a Fuji Xerox Docuprint CP225W colour laser printer, over-coated with Microscale Liquid Decal Film) but there the project languished as life got in the way.

Click on images below to see larger images

Fast forward to now and a few days off work with the 4 year old Daughter in vacation care meant it was back on, and only took 4 days from woe to go. I REALLY enjoyed it, have missed the smells of Revell Contacta glue and Tamiya acrylics immensely! It wasn't a breeze by any means, an old Eastern European kit with iffy fit and the vaguest of instructions, Gunze flat coat drying chalky (fixed with Future), broken radio altimeter "T" aerials (replaced by ones from a PF/PFU kit in the stash), a port pitot tube that snapped off innumerable times (they are butt-joined, for future builds of this kit I will drill them in), the usual list goes on, but still I had a blast, the whole point of it all!

Overall colour is Tamiya XF-16 Flat Aluminium, with Heller 56 Silver highlighting access panels, fuel filler caps etc. All brush painted, and overcoated with Future (my first but definitely NOT last time doing so!) after decaling. The decals look a tad small once on, particularly the nose serials and rudder stripes, but overall I'm pretty happy with how she turned out.

Jamie McIntyre

Photos and text © by Jamie McIntyre