Zvezda Yak-130 Mitten 1/72 scale
Discussion
It’s been a while since I did a build thread, so thought I’d share my latest project.
I’ve not built a zvezda kit before and I’m quite impressed with certain aspects, but not so much with others.
As you’d expect given the scale it’s a small kit. There are four sprues moulder in red styrene (I’d have preferred a more neutral colour, but there you go) and one in clear.
The two smaller sprues are identical and carry armaments and ejection seats.
One clear sprue for the canopy, lights etc. It’s nice and clear with no visible seams.
Decals seem fine. Everything is in register. I will only know for sure when it’s time to apply them.
A full colour painting guide is a nice touch too.
Instructions (using the term loosely) consists of a single A3 photocopied sheet (double sided for the win) crudely folded in half.
All moulding is nice and crisp with zero flash. There are some very fine panel lines, that are probably very scale, but likely to get lost under even a very fine layer of paint. The red styrene means more than one layer will be required.
The instructions aren’t very clear at all and require reading through several times to understand the assembly process.
Overall it seems like a very nice kit.
I’ve not built a zvezda kit before and I’m quite impressed with certain aspects, but not so much with others.
As you’d expect given the scale it’s a small kit. There are four sprues moulder in red styrene (I’d have preferred a more neutral colour, but there you go) and one in clear.
The two smaller sprues are identical and carry armaments and ejection seats.
One clear sprue for the canopy, lights etc. It’s nice and clear with no visible seams.
Decals seem fine. Everything is in register. I will only know for sure when it’s time to apply them.
A full colour painting guide is a nice touch too.
Instructions (using the term loosely) consists of a single A3 photocopied sheet (double sided for the win) crudely folded in half.
All moulding is nice and crisp with zero flash. There are some very fine panel lines, that are probably very scale, but likely to get lost under even a very fine layer of paint. The red styrene means more than one layer will be required.
The instructions aren’t very clear at all and require reading through several times to understand the assembly process.
Overall it seems like a very nice kit.
When it’s finished, nobody will be bothered about crappy instructions - the quality of the mouldings is all that really matters. It’s surprising how many coats of airbrushed paint it takes to obscure panel lines. The Tamiya Zero I’m building at the moment has some of the finest panel lines I’ve seen, and has had at least 6 coats, including primer, paint and Klear, and they should still take a wash. The issue is with decals - they can obscure them pretty quickly, making a wash pretty much impossible over them.
I’d decant some Tamiya fine surface primer into the airbrush; it’ll cover the red plastic pretty effectively.
I’d decant some Tamiya fine surface primer into the airbrush; it’ll cover the red plastic pretty effectively.
Some progress has occurred.
So far so good. The part count is fairly high for such a tiny aircraft, so it’s all a bit fiddly.
The engineering seems OK with most parts going together easily enough.
It’s a bit of a strange build as it’s almost two kits; back half and front half. I’m trying to do so paintin as I go along as it would be impossible to mask when complete.
So far so good. The part count is fairly high for such a tiny aircraft, so it’s all a bit fiddly.
The engineering seems OK with most parts going together easily enough.
It’s a bit of a strange build as it’s almost two kits; back half and front half. I’m trying to do so paintin as I go along as it would be impossible to mask when complete.
A bit more progress tonight. It’s always nice to slave over getting something right only to more or less completely obscure it when you close up the fuselage.
I actually really like how complex it is. My favourite part is being able to see the turbines down the intakes. It’s a very nicely realised feature. The engineering is pretty neat too.
It’s not quite perfection (as always) but I’m happy thus far.
I actually really like how complex it is. My favourite part is being able to see the turbines down the intakes. It’s a very nicely realised feature. The engineering is pretty neat too.
It’s not quite perfection (as always) but I’m happy thus far.
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