Throughout its history Yugoslavia always had a pretty strong aviation
industry. Many different aircraft types were locally produced from licensed or
domestic plans. In addition, for every foreign produced aircraft that was used by
YAF, the local factories obtained license for general overhauling. The MiG planes
were among them and the overhauling was commercially done in Yugoslavia for some
friendly (Unaligned) countries. One of such customers was Iraq and in the late
'80s they send a number of MiG-21SMT and MiG-23ML aircraft to "Zmaj"
facility at Pleso near Zagreb. Some aircraft have passed through the
overhauling process in 1990, at the same time that the Iraqi Army invaded
Kuwait. Understandably, aircraft couldn't be returned to Iraqi Air
Force, so
they were incorporated into YAF and were used for test flights. In
1991, the
Civil War broke in Yugoslavia and Iraqi aircraft were transferred from
Zagreb to "Moma Stanojlovic" depot near Belgrade. After signing of
Dayton Peace Accord, Iraqi MiGs were written off from YAF inventory due to
downsizing in accordance with peace treaty.
Click on
images below to see larger images
|
|
|
|
I didn't believe
that MiG-21 in question was actually of SMT sub type because it didn't have that
enormous spine, but rather the spine of bis subtype. After contacting some people in
Serbia who actually worked close to the aircraft, I got the explanation: Before
aircraft were delivered to Iraq, the Soviets removed the big spine and replaced it
with the spine of bis subtype. Iraqi aircraft also had desert air conditioning
systems of Western origin installed....
Construction of my model started
with the cockpit, I used an excellent FM Models resin set and it was really
a big improvement compared to the spartan kit's cockpit. Wheel wells were detailed
with soldering and fuse wire and I also added brake lines to the landing
gear. I
also used a set of resin wheels which were not a big improvement from the
Academy kit wheels.
The model was painted with Tamiya
and Gunze acrylic paints and I've tried to keep the weathering to a minimum
because these aircraft were freshly painted which was a part of overhauling
process.
Click on
images below to see larger images
|
|
|
The decals are from Lift Here,
one
of the best quality decals out there. They are Serbian made decals, custom printed
by Propagteam in Czech Republic.
I hope you like my MiG.
Miroslav
Click on
images below to see larger images
|
|
|
|