Build log | ICM 1:72 MiG-29 w/ HARM missiles

This is my first time using this many addons for a kit. Hope I can make them count!

Contents of the Eduard 3d printed seat. Looks really nice. The photoetch is a nice extra.

The comparison with the squat stock seat is almost laughable. My camera loves making things yellow for some reason.

The instrument panel is hilariously incorrect, but looks believable enough from a distance. I'm keeping it.

The resin seat is taller than the old one and the cockpit won't close like this (although I am planning to have it displayed with an open canopy). Lots of cutting is required.

I ended up having to replace the entire floor.

Shimmed the middle console thing a bit to make it touch the ground. Not accurate either but will do the job.

With the wall installed. It's certainly an upgrade.

I had to cut down the resin cockpit wall and rail to make it fit.

Looks pretty decent when installed into the cockpit.

Lots of support to saw off

It's kind of a shame all this detail gets hidden inside!

Desk after a night of sanding and sawing. Appropriate protection was used against the resin dust.

Built out the sides of the cockpit wall so it more or less properly closes off the back.

Dry fitting, lots of dry fitting.

I played with building a tiny hud but i didnt like how it looked. Scrapped it.

canopy installed

Entire cockpit so far. I shortened the stick a little because it seemed way too tall. All that's left to do now is to add a throttle.

in the prototype, the seats headrest protrudes above the breaker box in the canopy but this is not the case in this kit. I've done enough on the cockpit, not fixing it.

Assembled and painted the seat

And the cockpit too. I'm not super happy with it.

The seat is not glued yet, so I can take it out.

Might paint the cockpit again. I also want to put some detail on the walls.

Didn't trust the plane to not tip. Added a small amount of lead

Gluing the fuselage was an ordeal because it doesn't fit very well.

The tailplanes don't fit in the provided slots at all. quite some sanding is required.

Better look at the tailplane slots. in the middle some weird bump marks are marked in pencil. I've since sanded them away.

A sink mark was fixed with some Mr. Surfacer 500. I have a new favourite tool. This stuff is amazing!

Taped the entire thing together. It looks like a mig 29.

I've decided to do something silly and I will rivet the entire model as an experiment.

The gun exhaust has to go. It's horribly misrepresented compared to the real plane.

I drilled out the hole and added two really thin pieces of plasticard that I sanded down to be thinner.

Perpdicular I then attached another piece that I made two slots in so the pieces slot together....

And that's more or less done. Looks much better although a bit messy because I'm always impatient. This picture shows off well what I've been working on. I'm also scribing a bunch with various degrees of success. It's not the easiest job!

In the meantime I've glued the wings on. They fit badly. Putty is required. Here on the top I've used Mr. Surfacer to fill the gaps. The chaff/flare launchers will be on top of the seamline although this is just a meager compensation since I've already peeked and saw these don't fit too well either....