PZL-Mielec An-2TP "Colt" Hungarian Air Force "what if" 7615

The semi-fictitious Hungarian "Ancsa" (Hungarian pet form of Anna, the nickname the type is called by in our country) is being assembled simultaneously with her Polish sister. The internal details of the Trumpeter kit are basic compared to kits I have built recently, with no cabin interior at all (even no floor is included). 

Paints used are identical to the Polish example up to this point; painting of the seats is still terrible, although I can see a very slight improvement over that on the other one. 🙂 

Today's lesson in photography and modelling: wet paint and flashlight produce horrifying results on the picture. 🙂 

The fuselage has been assembled; unlike with the Polish plane, this time the fit is perfect, and no force is needed to keep the halves together during the drying of the glue. 

Wheels painted; paints used were H77 (tire black), plus H302 (central part) and H67 (outer part) for the rim. 

Engine painted; paints used were H8 for the central part and H76 for the cylinders. 

The two-tone camouflage has been "put on"; some little corrections are still needed, but that comes after the "final assembly" with the wings. 

Propeller painted, resting on the engine while drying. H8 was used for the bare metal parts at the hub, H56 for the blades themselves, and H329 for the tips. 

Some modifications had to be made regarding both the upper and lower side of the engine cowling. The air intake of the engine is too large in size, so I cut it down a bit (approximately half of its height); the attachment hole is also in the wrong place, as it would put the part somewhere in the middle of the cowling, but it's at the front on the real aircraft. The same goes for the oil radiator, but it has to be "pushed" a few millimetres rearwards (it's also to be noted that it's incorrect in its shape for an An-2, seems to be modeled after that of a Chinese Y-5, which should be no surprise). Strange that all boxarts of Trumpeter An-2 kits (at least the ones in this scale) show both parts in their correct places and with correct shapes. 

Engine compartment assembled. Some corrections in painting will be necessary; I guess I'll do it after this part is put together with the fuselage, just before painting the entire aircraft. 

Fuselage assembly completed (except the cockpit and some small parts). A bit more work was necessary on the nose section, with some fit problems on one hand (I had little success in solving them), and some shape issues on the other. The part that's intended to be the exhaust pipe was twice as thick as it should be, according to photos and drawings, so I had to cut it in half and do some sanding to achieve a shape that's at least remotely correct. 

I haven't thought that the installation of the horizontal stabilizers would be such a fiddly task. The fit in the roots is terrible, even after some cutting and sanding, and the holes for the struts are placed at different heights on the two sides of the rear fuselage. 

 

Decals applied on the fuselage; the inaccuracies of the kit became the most prominent when I applied the serial numbers, as it was impossible to put them opposite each other because of the incorrect placement of the small window on the starboard side. 

Numbers are from a HAD decal sheet, while insignia come from a Trumpeter MiG-29 Fulcrum kit. 

Cockpit windows installed. While the fit is surprisingly good (considering that it's made of three parts), the shape of the window frames leaves a lot to be desired (well, still does my canopy painting, too). 

After a quick fit test with the upper part of the upper wings, trouble ahead again. The rear of the wing part has a different (wider) cross-section than that of the fuselage at the same place. Took a bit of carving and sanding (with a sharp knife and rough sandpaper, respectively) to make it fit better (I mean, to make that ugly mismatch less prominent), but then along came another fault to be dealt with, specifically an enormous gap between the front of the wings and the cockpit's clear part. 

Going on with dry fit tests. The lower wings will also need some cutting, sanding and filling to conform to the fuselage, both on the front (entirely wrong cross-section) and at the rear (I guess it's just a bit too thick and wide there, so it's going to be a little easier work). 

That nice big gap repeats itself where the upper wing's lower part joins the fuselage from the side. Doesn't look promising, but I think it may be solved by cutting off the wing/fuselage attachment pins, and just "push" the whole upper wing forward as much as possible. The resulting gap at the rear will be easier to fill, I guess... 

After some sanding, the shape of the lower wings at the root is still far from perfect, but at least it fits the shape of the fuselage more closely. I'll do some refinement when the wings and the fuselage are assembled. 

After some breaks and a lot of thinking about how to do things, the upper wings have been assembled. There is an ugly gap between the flap and the fuselage, so I tried to fill it with some plastic (pieces of kit sprues have been used and carved to size and shape). Although not very realistic, I glued the flap to the wing root, as I thought the seven little joints (which, I think, are a bit oversized anyway) might not support the weight of the flap. Quite a few holes had to be drilled on both the upper and lower wing parts for the black thread used to imitate tension wires. 

Upper side of the upper wings painted. The gap behind the clear part was filled (more or less) with glue, and a piece of plastic (about a millimeter thick) was inserted to fill the huge "trench" at the rear of the wing/fuselage joint. 

Done with the upper side; the black stripe on the top was made by photocopying the HAD decal sheet, and using the stripe decal as a mask. Next are the national insignia to the upper wing... 

National insignia applied on the upper wings, with some minor corrections before, and matt finish (Revell spray colour, clear) afterwards. 

At last, after some work on the wing roots with a file, the lower wings are in their place. Some filling and sanding is still to be done, as the fit is terrible. 

Done with the painting on the underside. Landing lights have also been installed (with terrible fit, as one may see). 

Wing struts installed, and braces fixed in their final position; after the thread was stretched and cut to size, I fixed it with cyanoacrilate glue at the wing roots. Painting needs to be fixed in these places. Connecting rods have also been made from small pieces in my sparebox; they were fixed to the braces with cyanoacrilate glue. The landing light on the starboard side went missing while I was working on the wings, so I made one from the clear sprue of the kit. 

On most An-2s the rigging is of the same colour as the underside, so I painted the threads blue. 

Painting on the underside completed, with national insignia applied on the wings. 

Main landing gear struts and tail gear installed; the main gear parts look toy-like, promising a fiddly assembly at the same time at first glance, but they look surprisingly decent when assembled. The main wheels and some small parts are left, plus an overall matt finish. 

After the main gear wheels and door step installed, and a matt finish (with Revell spray colour) applied, no more work left on the underside. 

...and done. I didn't expect to spend almost eight months on such a small kit (with relatively few parts), and I couldn't overcome all of the kit's inaccuracies, but after all, I'm quite satisfied with the overall result (well, anyway, it resembles an An-2 from a distance, haha 🙂 ). 

 

The thread I used as rigging for the wings broke on the starboard wing while being stretched, so I had to improvise some kind of a solution.