SAAB Viggen - "Thor's Hammers" - Special Hobby - Quadruple Build

1
January 16, 2025
Three boxes - four kits. All are the same except for different decals and one additional sprue each containing parts for the specific differences between the variants.
2
February 20, 2025
The plan is to transform all this plastic into four pretty models.
3
January 15, 2025
Let's first start with washing the sprues to get rid of the nasty molding grease!
4
January 15, 2025
Some housekeeping is required. For the SF and the AJS versions, a sliver of plastic needs to be cut off from the dorsal fuel tank.
5
January 15, 2025
Because of the slight differences from now on, I will need to make sure not to mix up the parts for the different versions.
6
January 15, 2025
The opening for the auxiliary ram air turbine needs to be cut open. This extended together with the undercarriage (or during a power failure), so it should be open unless you plan to display the model in flight.
7
January 15, 2025
Not too hard if you are careful enough (and do not cut your thumb). Four times in a row gets a bit tedious though…
8
January 15, 2025
Here is the inside of the RAT generator to be inserted into the opening.
9
January 15, 2025
Part painted and glued in. The tiny generator itself with its propeller will be added at a much later step.
10
January 15, 2025
For the SF (photo recon) version, the instructions suggest that you cut open the fuselage for the side camera housing part to be inserted from the inside. That is a terrible idea, as it would be almost impossible to get the part nicely in place!
11
January 15, 2025
It is far better to drill a smaller hole for the lens, sand the camera housing to match the fuselage side and cement it in place from the outside! I used some dissolved putty to fair it in nicely.
12
January 15, 2025
Some holes need to be drilled for the weapon pylons to be attached later.
13
January 15, 2025
The SK (trainer) version was not equipped with weapon pylons, so different holes are to be drilled for some ventral air scoops instead. BTW, I know that the tape says SH, but it was before I changed my mind to build an AJS instead.
14
January 15, 2025
Nose gear bays added - make sure to have them oriented correctly! The wheel well should be facing forward. Also note that I added the transparency to the side camera housing.
15
January 15, 2025
All kits contain all cockpit tubs for all versions, so make sure to pick the right one for the right version!
16
January 15, 2025
Here are the main parts. The seats are quite simplified, and the side consoles are more or less just fictive but it all looks reasonable enough with the canopies closed.
17
January 15, 2025
This is what the cockpit will look like when assembled. Before painting and adding seatbelts, ejection seat arming handle and stuff, of course. I will not add the seats yet, but will do them separately. I will also add some additional levers for the landing gears, the AFK and the radar joystick on the left console.
18
January 15, 2025
Cockpit tub inserted into the fuselage from below.
19
January 15, 2025
Cockpit and dashboards hand painted using Tamiya acrylics. The green round instrument in the middle of the dashboard is the radar scope ("centralindikator"). Besides radar, it was also used for navigation to the preset waypoints. The JA version had more modern CRT-screens (provided in the kit).
20
January 28, 2025
The kit's simple ejection seats are brush painted using Tamiya and Vallejo acrylics, and seatbelts from Maestro Models are added - one down, four to go! I won't add the seats until it is time to put on the canopy.
21
January 16, 2025
Providing full intake ducts is a nice feature, but the parts contain some round ejector pin marks that need to be sanded off, otherwise they might interfere with the fit of the top and bottom fuselage halves later.
22
January 16, 2025
The intakes parts are metalized and then cemented while being clamped for a very tight fit.
23
January 16, 2025
For all versions except the JA (fighter), a round end piece is added.
24
January 16, 2025
Fuselage halves joined. Be warned - this join must be done with great precision, or you will encounter some nasty fit issues later!
25
January 16, 2025
The turbine face is added to the end of the intake - this part will only be visible if you use an endoscope inside the intake, so I didn't even bother painting it.
26
January 16, 2025
For the JA version, a larger ring is added to extend the fuselage. This ring is a bit tricky to get absolutely right so it doesn't cause a step.
27
January 16, 2025
Some filling and sanding is done to hide the join line - it's a bit annoying, but I still prefer this to the harsh vertical split of the old Heller kit.
28
January 16, 2025
Front fuselages done - let's do the nose cones next!
29
January 16, 2025
The camera nose of the SF version (photo recon) is the trickiest, as several transparent pieces need to be sandwiched deep between the nose cone halves. I cemented the windows onto the left half with Tamiya Extra Thin Cement, and when dry, cemented the two nose cone halves together. A bit tricky as the fit is not super great, but it works.
30
January 16, 2025
The ordinary nose cones are easy to assemble and only some polishing is needed to hide the join line.
31
January 16, 2025
I am not sure that weights are actually needed for this model, but I am rather safe than sorry.
32
January 16, 2025
For the SF version, I created a kind of "cradle" from a styrene strip to avoid the weights to obscure the camera windows.
33
January 16, 2025
Fishing weights cemented into the nose cones using generous amounts of acrylic glue.
34
January 16, 2025
Nose cones attached.
35
January 16, 2025
The jet intakes come next - they fit quite nicely and only some minor filling with liquid putty and polishing is needed to blend them in.
36
January 17, 2025
Lets begin with the tail section! The side air brakes on the Viggen were never left open on the ground unless for maintenance, so it's most accurate to display them closed.
37
January 17, 2025
They should really sit flush with the fuselage, which they on the model do not, so I filled the gaps with Tamiya White Putty, and then used a cotton swab moistened with Leveling Thinner to wipe off the excess. No sanding needed.
38
January 17, 2025
The same goes for the ventral air brakes although these could drop after a while during parking. However on the JA 37, they were permanently bolted shut, and the airbrake control switch on the throttle handle was instead rewired to be used as quick selector toggle for the weapons system.
39
January 17, 2025
This weird square shape and the indentation on the exhaust shroud does not exist on the real Viggen, where it is just a hardly noticeable inspection panel, so they need to be sanded off.
40
January 17, 2025
Fixed - the indentation is filled with putty and sanded smooth.
41
January 17, 2025
The reversor of the engine has three very prominent petals that can be extended into the jet stream to direct the force forward, thereby significantly shorting the roll-out distance - and even to taxi backwards if needed. The reversor petals of the model are represented as separate parts, which is a nice feature.
42
January 17, 2025
On the Viggen on the ground, the reversor was always fully open (the petals sitting flush with the inner walls of the exhaust shroud), unless the aircraft was parked, where the loss of fuel pressure made the topmost petal to drop down. This is the most correct way to represent the model without a pilot in the driver seat.
43
January 17, 2025
Insides of the rear parts of the exhaust is metalized and weathered slightly. I used AKI Xtreme Metal Gun Metal gray and 502 Abteliung oils.
44
January 17, 2025
Exhaust shrouds also metalized and I also tried to mimic the slight discoloration of the petal to its typical bluish-orange color, but it is not very visible in the photo.
45
January 17, 2025
Exhaust shroud carefully cemented to the right rear fuselage half. This is quite a tricky step as it is very easy to get cement on outside areas.
46
January 17, 2025
Assembling the rear part is also quite tricky, as the fit is not super great. Notice those two tiny triangles on the exhaust shroud - they are hardly visible on the real Viggen, so they can be sanded off.
47
January 17, 2025
I found it best to for now avoid cementing together the flat part that goes underneath the spine, in order to maintain some flexibility at the join to the front part of the fuselage. You may need to adjust the pieces slightly in a moment.
48
January 17, 2025
Dry fitting is crucial here. Make sure to know where you will add cement and where you shouldn't!
49
January 17, 2025
Front and back cemented together. If you have performed every previous step with perfect precision, the two parts should more or less snap together without gaps or steps. If not, you will need to do some fixing later.
50
January 17, 2025
The tail shroud however fits quite poorly, which requires a lot of work over a few days with filling and sanding for a perfectly seamless join. As I mentioned before, don't worry about those tiny molded triangles, they are not present on the real thing, so you can safely sand them off.
51
January 17, 2025
Let's start with those mighty wings! The top insert fits absolutely flawlessly. If done right, the seam becomes just like the rest of the panel lines.
52
January 17, 2025
The detailed main wheel well is inside the top wing surface. The main gear bay detail is nicely molded and does a good job representing the real thing's tidy arrangement of pipes and stuff.
53
January 17, 2025
The Viggen lowered its control surfaces (elevons) as the hydraulic pressure dropped upon engine shutdown, but the model does not support this out of the box. I contemplated if I should cut off the elevons and reposition them (or buy resin replacements), but in the end I felt a bit lazy and decided to keep the models intact. Mea culpa.
54
January 17, 2025
A teeny tiny nav light needs to be added to each wing - these are just microscopic, triangular shards of transparent plastic, so it is all quite nerve shredding - drop one on the floor and you will not find it until the heat death of the Universe. The JA had its nav lights on the wing tips instead, so the part should be sanded flush with the wing profile and painted opaque.
55
January 17, 2025
The JA version had an additional actuator on each wing, while the other versions had three actuators only - make sure to keep track of which version you are building.
56
January 17, 2025
Wings attached to the fuselage. I ended up with a tiny bit of gap at the wing roots, but these were easy to fill in with Tamiya White Putty and a quick sweep with a cotton bud moisted with Mr Color thinner. No sanding needed.
57
January 17, 2025
Tail fins added - the SK and the JA versions had a slightly larger fin (provided in the box). I might replace the pitot tubes with something a bit more sturdy at some time, as I figure they will be broken off at some point.
58
January 17, 2025
That almost concludes the main part of the assembly - now I need to spend a day or two time eliminating bad seams and rough areas and to attach a dozen tiny air scoops, antennas and stuff.
59
January 18, 2025
Canards attached to the fuselage - the flaps will be added later. The JA had two vortex generators on each canard while the other variants had only one, so again, make sure to use the right parts.
60
January 18, 2025
Centerline pylon cemented on - this could only use an extra fuel tank, no weapons. Make sure to check your references about which underbelly air scoops to use for the aircraft you are building! It’s a pity that no pods or missiles are provided in the kits - the Viggen looks a bit naked without anything on its pylons.
61
January 19, 2025
The JA was equipped with an M 75 AKAN - an Oerlikon revolver cannon firing 30 mm rounds - at the time the most powerful AA cannon available. This was not an option, but was permanently fixed under the fuselage. The other Viggen variants could not be equipped with this. I forgot to fill in the two round indentations for the underbelly beacons - the JA did not have those because they would have blown up when the cannon was fired. I fixed it later.
62
January 20, 2025
The leading edges of the inner underwing hardpoints are provided as separate parts. They are no bigger than a grain of rice, but I am amazed by the precision this little part is designed - it more or less just snaps in place without a gap. A tiniest droplet of cement is all it takes to fuse everything together. I wish all model kits would be like this.
63
January 23, 2025
Canard flaps cemented on at an angle of about 30 degrees as they were automatically extended together with the undercarriage.
64
February 9, 2025
Ejection seats finally added into the cockpit - a surprising amount of plastic needed to be removed from the bottom of the seats to make them fit low enough so that the canopy can be cemented in closed position.
65
January 26, 2025
It's time to decide on the ordnance! It's not easy, as there is only a number of clearly defined combinations of weapons and pods that can be used for the different Viggen variants and sub-variants. The pods in the photo are third party resin parts from Maestro Models and represent night camera and flash pods for the SF and an ECM jamming pod for the JA. I might also add chaff and jamming pods later, we'll just see what I can get hold of from my local model shop.
66
January 30, 2025
The IR flash windows in the flash pods are lined with pieces of kitchen foil before the transparent resin parts are cemented on. There were a couple of small bubbles and cavities in the resin that I filled with a combination of baking powder and superglue.
67
February 9, 2025
The flash pods are superglued onto the SF's fuselage already now, since the integrated pylons need a lot of work with CA-glue and putty to eliminate the nasty gaps between the pylons and the fuselage, and I figured that it would be too risky to do this after the painting.
68
January 31, 2025
Working a bit more on the underwing stuff - since no missiles are provided in the kits, they had to be sourced from elsewhere (from a scrapped Revell or Italeri Gripen kit, I think). I marked the RB 15's for the AJS with green stripes as "blind", inert training weapons, but the AA missiles (the AMRAAM's and the Sidewinders) for the JA are painted as live. Yes, yes, I know, we hardly ever flew with live ordnance, but let's have some fun!
69
February 10, 2025
For the JA and the AJS, the weapon pylons were sourced from various other kits and scratch made from styrene and added to the hardpoints.
70
February 10, 2025
A shoebox full of Swedish thunderbolts masked off and waiting for their primer coat.
71
February 14, 2025
Models primed with Badger Stynylrez primer and the panel lines (fist-handedly) pre-shaded. Most of the pre-shading was done with the JA, as I felt that I will need to break up the monochrome gray paintcoat. For the other three models only the undersides were pre-shaded - I guess nothing would be visible through the green splinter camo anyway.
72
February 16, 2025
Here is the paint set I intend to use for the splinter camo - Mr Paint from Slovakia. I am not too familiar with this brand, so I will need to do some experimenting first. It seems like a lovely paint - I am seriously contemplating to buy more of these instead of the Tamiyas I have been using for decades.
73
February 22, 2025
And here is the paint set for the gray JA version.
74
February 14, 2025
Ok, let's start! The undersides are sprayed with MRP-175 Swedish Army Blue-grey, the 0.4 mm nozzle of my H&S Infinity and no more than 10 PSI. The MRP is really thin, so I applied about 7-8 misted-on layers with ten seconds of drying time inbetween, gradually building up the coat until I got the coverage I was aiming for.
75
February 15, 2025
And now there are three of them: the AJS, SK and SF versions. So, where is the fourth one, I hear you wonder. Well, the JA, being a high altitude interceptor fighter, had a two-tone, air superiority gray camo instead of the green splinter camo.
76
February 22, 2025
For the JA, the underside was sprayed light gray. With this very light color, it took about 10 applications before I had a full coverage where the black pre-shading just barely shines through.
77
February 16, 2025
While the paint dries, I am testing out various ways to apply the camo with a discarded MiG-23 wing, and some spare masks (there are masks provided for both types of the Viggen’s fins on the Special Hobby mask set, so one can be used for tests). My idea is to paint the entire model with light green and cover all surfaces with the masks. Remove the dark green masks, paint the areas with dark green and reapply the dark green masks. Repeat with black and finally tan.
78
February 17, 2025
Looks splendid, but notice what happens if one of the masks is not placed back with absolute precision after painting a color zone - there will be a tiny gap between the zones where the base color shines through. I think I know how to solve this.
79
February 17, 2025
OK, back to the models! Underbelly carefully masked off with Tamiya masking tape. It is worth noting that the demarcation line under the intakes have a distinct curvature and not just a straight line.
80
February 19, 2025
The first coat of light green applied to the SK. The MRP paint is excellent - if the underlying primer coat is perfect, you will be rewarded with a beautiful, silky, semi-gloss surface. Let's now let the paint dry thorough and then starting the mother of all maskings!
81
February 19, 2025
Masks being meticulously applied to the entire model. I initially had some difficulties finding a good starting point, but I decided to start from the rear of the wing nearest to the fuselage, and work my way forward and outward. This is actually quite a relaxing work, but it also requires a great deal of precision, as tiny errors tend to become magnified as more individual pieces get placed next to each other.
82
February 21, 2025
The mask doesn't conform to the various scoops and fairings on the model, so holes were cut out for these and regular masking tape will be used to fill in the holes before painting.
83
February 22, 2025
This masking is actually quite relaxing, but super fiddly and hence very time consuming! Some areas still need to be fixed with ordinary masking tape to fully cover everything. As you can see, the tape from the rear canopy needs to be replaced as it was lifting up slightly.

Komentarzy

70 15 January, 18:11

Nicolas
👀

1 15 January, 19:17

Cuajete
Very interesting project to start the year 👍
Good start!

1 15 January, 19:40

Kenneth
Följer…

1 15 January, 20:05

Harry Eder
Very promising start! 👍

1 15 January, 20:15

Robert Podkoński
Quadruple build? Ambitious! Watching with pleasure!

1 15 January, 20:48

Łukasz Gliński
Oh man, 4*Viggen 😮

1 15 January, 21:21

Patrick Hagelstein
Very cool! I'll join in! 🍿

1 15 January, 21:23

J35J
Massive project! I'm in!👍🏻

1 15 January, 22:38

Spanjaard
4 Viggens? print row, please!

1 15 January, 22:49

Guido
Taking a seat as well. 👍🏻

1 15 January, 23:49

DerMattes
Watching 👍

1 16 January, 07:38

Michael Kohl
Me too. Already learned to better open up the RAT turbine at my Viggen. A step I lazily omitted.

2 16 January, 08:33

Daniel Mysak
Nice start👍! ...will follow your progress.

1 16 January, 14:57

Mid Franconian
😎 Following!

1 16 January, 18:05

Thomas Kolb
Main assermbly done on all four models, but now I have a few days to spend sanding and filling unwanted seams and crude areas. A bit tedious, but that's what you get when you choose to build four nearly identical models at the same time.

17 January, 14:23

Łukasz Gliński
That escalates damn quickly! 👍

2 17 January, 16:03

Robert Podkoński
Impressive progress indeed

2 17 January, 17:11

Mirko Römer
Oh my... Good luck, Thomas! 🙂
I own two of them and was thinking of a double build but rejected the idea. Thanks for the encouragement!

1 17 January, 18:26

S M
Very ambitious project and well explained steps! Following indeed! 😄👍

1 17 January, 19:17

Cuajete
Good progress! 👍

2 17 January, 19:27

Mr D
Great project 👍
Was there much difference between the kits ?

1 17 January, 19:29

Patrick Hagelstein
Wow! That's a quick build! 😳 I can only dream to build ONE kit that fast, let alone four at once!

1 17 January, 19:29

Thomas Kolb
Mr D, no, they are pretty much the same. Most of the parts for all versions are provided in every kit. But there are some subtle differences that need attention, like the extension of the fuselage for the fighter version.

1 17 January, 22:05

Thomas Kolb
Patrick, haha, I am a pretty fast builder, but I am extremely slow when it comes to painting. That's where my projects usually come to a crawl.

3 17 January, 22:07

Juergen Klinglhuber
watching with interest - I love SAAB aircraft anyhow, but 4 of them in one project --great!!

1 18 January, 10:31

Skyhiker
This is more interesting than I thought it would be. The subtle difference between them are pretty cool.

2 20 January, 10:53

Thomas Kolb
With only a few minutes of modeling here and there this week, it's quite a slow progress, but I am still inching closer to the finished assembly.

30 January, 20:16

Cuajete
Veryt nice wapons and pods 👍

1 1 February, 19:19

Dave Flitton
Excellent work. Can't wait for the finished product!

2 10 February, 22:16

Cuajete
I agree with Dave 👍

1 11 February, 18:52

★ Starfish ★
Really looking forward to the paint jobs! Great work so far!

2 11 February, 19:59

Clement
What a glorious project!

1 11 February, 20:27

Thomas Kolb
Primer coat applied, a few filling errors need to be fixed. Time is unfortunately very difficult to find because of work, so the project moves very slowly for a while.

12 February, 08:46

Cristian A
Following along

1 13 February, 14:52

Thomas Kolb
Undersides sprayed blue-gray with Mr Paint. Now let's wait a day for the paint to dry and then it's time to start working on the splinter camo. With my current speed, I expect to be finished by midsummer.

14 February, 14:15

Patrick Hagelstein
Oh yes, once you get used to MRP, you'll never want another paint brand anymore! I love their colors, pigmentation and general ease of use. And, as a bonus, their sheen is perfect for adding decals directly on top.

2 14 February, 15:36

Cristian A
Nice work Thomas, keep it going!

1 15 February, 20:16

Finn
Following

1 17 February, 07:18

Thomas Kolb
I am trying to find a way to avoid tiny gaps between the splinter camo color zones. I think I have figured it out - before spraying a color zone, also remove the masks for all adjacent surfaces not yet painted. Thereby a slight spray overlap is created, so even if the mask is then replaced with a tiny bit of offset, it should not be visible. Special Hobby writes something like that in the mask description, but it's written in a very obscure way.

17 February, 12:11

Martin Weinpold
Wow, looks good!

1 17 February, 12:59

Nicolas Lopez
Thanks for sharing, Thomas. Following.

1 17 February, 13:06

Łukasz Gliński
Ahhh, dat splinter! One&only!

1 17 February, 13:26

Frank Brzobohaty
Looks great just give the corporal in charge of painting a reprimand on his record and send the plane to the flight line......do you know how much it cost to paint aircraft, lol.

1 17 February, 13:55

Spanjaard
macro is a bitch for this kind of details... if you place the model in the display cabinet, can you see that microline with wrong color? i think you can not 😉

1 17 February, 14:01

Thomas Kolb
I have now started to add the masks to the models. It's quite a tricky task because I need to be extremely precise with the application - even the tiniest errors will be magnified as more mask segments are added, until things no longer add up. So it's a matter of constantly realigning the segments, which makes it all rather time consuming. BTW, I noticed that the pattern has a few minor errors, but I definitely won't lose any sleep over it.

1 19 February, 20:26

Cuajete
Thanks for your explain, Thomas. I thinked to would be more easy to apply 👍

1 19 February, 20:33

Spanjaard
this camo is one of the most complicated to achieve and the fact that you are doing it 4 models at once... my deepest respect!

2 19 February, 21:20

Łukasz Gliński
Your the master of splinter suspense! Dosing it bit by bit 😄

1 19 February, 21:28

Thomas Kolb
Cuajete, Spanjaard and Łukasz, thank you for your interest! I am certainly not doing any cliffhanging on purpose - I am actually this glacially slow in reality. I also try to avoid aggravating the wifey by disappearing in my modeling man-cave for hours.

2 19 February, 21:45

Łukasz Gliński
Good and fully understood strategy 😄
As our common colleague (the one, you share initials with 😛) used to say: "Happy wife? Happy life!"

1 19 February, 22:05

Juergen Klinglhuber
Watching with interest. You will master the splinter camo for sure 👍

1 20 February, 17:10

Thomas Kolb
I am still struggling with the masks, trying to making sure that they are applied exactly identical on all three models, which slows down the process a bit. Not that anybody except me would notice.

3 21 February, 10:59

Daniel Mysak
Nice progress, I'm looking forward to the splinter camouflage. On my AJ-37 I used vinyl masks from DM Models, it looks like the masks you are using are a bit easier to handle.

1 22 February, 12:12

Kenneth
I have always had the conspirational theory that the Danish air force had a secret department dedicated to making life miserable for modellers, with their odd fonts, colours and aircraft modifications. The splinter camouflage is clear evidence of a similar department in the Swedish air force.

3 22 February, 12:19

Thomas Kolb
Daniel, thank you! I am right now hoping that my end result will be at least in the general vicinity of your beautiful Viggen in flight!

22 February, 22:31

Thomas Kolb
Kenneth, haha, you may be right! Nothing in the Swedish Air Force is easy to model! I however think that this splinter camo is actually easier to do than the elusive flat bare metal surface of the old Soviet chimney pipe jets.

1 22 February, 22:32

Album info

In this project I will build no less than four Viggens at once: the JA (fighter), SF (photo recon), SK (trainer) and AJS (strike) versions. All except the JA in the Swedish "fields-and-meadows" splinter camouflage. That alone should prove tons of fun, so I will try to keep the project as simple as possible without adding too much aftermarket stuff except decals and some underwing goodies.

This is basically a recreation of my Viggen collection from when I was like 14 and built the Heller kits in a similar configuration.

Saab 37 Viggen - Quadruple Build - Special Hobby

83 zdjęć/zdjęcia

1:72

W trakcie

1:72 AJ-37/SK-37 Viggen (Special Hobby SH72411)

1:72 Pod KA / U22 (Maestro Models MMK7207)

14+

Wszystkie albumy

Wyświetl wszystkie albumy »