1/72 Kopro Shenyang F-6

by Oliver Weston

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Hello All

Well here goes nothing, finally plucked up the courage to present a model to the ARC. Considering the incredible standard of models on this web site it makes my meagre tinkering look like they have been put together by a two year old and painted with a yard brush! Apologies in advance for the pic's I do not own a very good digital camera so there not brilliant but you get the drift. Still here is Kopro's (there made in the Czech Republic) rendition of the Chinese Shenyang F-6 fighter, the eagle eyed among you may spot an uncanny resemblance to a Mig 19. And you would be correct because the Shenyang is a Mig built under licence in China by Jiun Ji industries (hope I spelled that right?). Its mainly flown by the native Chinese airforce and the Pakistani Air Force (identified by the green and white roundels) of which this is an example. I must admit I quite like these Kopro kits as they tend to cover the more unusual eastern block aircraft and some associated manufacturers. The kit itself is fairly good, there is alot of filing and sanding to be done, because the sprue's seem to have alot of residual moulding flash left on them. My only gripe with this particular kit was the mouldings for the right wing were slightly bent and I was not able to rectify this when assembling. I chose to paint the aircraft in Humbrol colours as per the instructions with the top being 88 (matt deck green) and the bottom of the plane 127 (satin U.S. ghost grey), as opposed to a bare aluminium paint job for the other aircraft. The rest of the painting is pretty uninteresting with the usual matt blacks and gunmetal's for weapons and inlets etc. With the only unusual touch being the addition of an orange tail fin control surface for which I used 18 (orange gloss) which was near as damn it is to swearing. The decals are OK but not brilliant (you do get loads though) and have some rough edges to them and some break up on application which is really annoying (or is that my ham-fisted-ness?). There should also be the Pakistani crescent on the tailfin but the ones supplied in the kit were too big to fit on! So I am on the hunt for some smaller ones just to finish off. All in all quite an enjoyable kit, I also have a Mig 17PF and a Mig 21 Recon Variant in my build pile from the same manufacturer depending on what they turn out like you may se them here. Best Regards!

Oliver

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Photos and text © by Oliver Weston