FINNISH FROGFOOT

[kitbasher]

And done (apart from the stores).  Photos at the weekend.

[NARSES2]

I've seen a sneak pic and she looks good 

[kitbasher]

Back from Mum's so first job - photograph, upload and post Frogfoot pics.

Colour scheme is adapted from the later Finnish MiG-21 colours.  A camouflaged Il-28 would have made a great template, but as far as I can tell all were left in natural metal whilst in Finnish service.  Spotted some very nice whif profiles of camo'd Finnish Il-28 elsewhere on the forum.

Markings came from an Academy MiG-21PF which I'd hoped to maybe pop off in French colours, but that didn't happen (hell, just getting this one done has been a race!), but now I'm wondering about a 'mirror world' where NATO has the Soviet stuff, WarPac has the western stuff and the RAF has two squadrons of Fishbeds at Gutersloh instead of Lightnings!  MiG-21PF with Firestreaks (natural metal finish, of course) in lieu of Lightning F.2s (the PFMs would be the F.2A equivalent).  Now, 92 Sqn with the blue fin or 19 Sqn with blue chequer boards?  Anyway, I digress.

Serials I thought would be easy (Modeldecal stock); wanted the serial to be in the 'SK' range, which would follow the finnish style of serialling.  Unfortunately the cupboard was bare in 12" letters, so the 'S' came from an old Airfix Viggen decal sheet, the '-30' from an old Matchbox Hawk kit, and in the absence of 'K's I had to make do with a 'U'.







Looks rather bare not tooled up but weaponry will follow in due course and I'll post shots of it when the stores have been added.

While I like the idea of building another Frogfoot (real world), I wouldn't fight a Maquette Frogfoot in a hurry!  It would have to be the Revell Frogfoot (http://www.modellversium.de/kit/artikel.php?id=3056), which looks far superior to the Zvezda kit (which I think was once boxed by Italeri), which looks like a refined version of the Maquette kit.  Or of course the Maquette kit is a poor copy of the Zvezda kit).

[NARSES2]

That's come out really well Dave 

[Dizzyfugu]

That's pretty! 

But -honestly - ANYTHING looks cool in Finnish colors and markings... 
Great idea and result, nevertheless. 

BTW: that Revell kit looks like a reboxing of the Tsukuda Hobby kit (which was released by Revell before in the markings of the pre-production aircrfat that appeared in Le Bourget, "301 Blue", and in Czech markings). While the kit goes together well it is utterly wrong, it is much too delicate and slender for a "real" Su-25.

A VERY good kit is the new ART Model offering; a bit pricey and contains resin parts, but it is the best Su-25 I have come across, and you get one- and two-seaters, IIRC there are three or even four Su-25 kits to chose from.

[kitbasher]

Thanks for the praise and the pointers concerning the ART Model kit. S*d's Law meant I found on the Hannants website after I'd posted the pictures! C'est la vie. 

[McGreig]

That looks excellent - definitely a "should have been" 

For what it's worth, the Maquette kit is a copy of the KP kit which, although old, was still the best SU-25 until the advent of the Art Model kits.