Su-33 Sea Flanker

[johncrow]

I did cast the glued-and-sanded canopy I had and ended up with this:


 
 
I've had a little Mattel vacuum former for 10 years or so and have only used it once. I fired it up but I don't like the way you only get a vacuum when you pump the lever. The seal in the pump is good, but that pump is way too weak. I need more power. After 15 minutes, some duct tape, a toilet paper tube, a paper cup, some wire, and some tin snips, I came up with this:





Add a shop vac, and now that thing has vacuum. Pretty ugly, but it works.  I had 40 or 50 cut clear plastic sheets for this thing that I got years ago. I think they are a bit too thin for my needs, but I figured I could make them work. I went through every single sheet. It took me quite a few attempts- each time changing the positioning of the master, how high the master was etc. I got one single 'good' pull...with maybe two others as possibles.

 

I ordered a sheet of .020 in. PTEG and gave that a try...wow what a difference. My second try got a nearly perfect result. It still needs to be trimmed, but this is going to work I think.





Now to work out the IRST...

Thanks for stopping by,

jp

Edited August 23, 2016 by johncrow

[ROM]

hi john

 

I just found this thread.

And this just an amazing project.

Cant wait to see more.

 

Cheers

[johncrow]

Thanks for stopping by, ROM.

 

I hope to have a real update soon. I've still been working on the windscreen, and working on how to mate it to the fuselage. It's way more work than I envisioned. The nose piece I cast from the Su-30 kit is intended for that kit's pinched and strange-looking windscreen. Getting it all to fit with a (somewhat more) correct windscreen is proving problematic, but I think I have come up with a workable solution. 

 

Until next time,

 

jp

[ROM]

Hi john

 

You can have a look here:

http://forum.largescaleplanes.com/index.php?showtopic=44533&page=2

 

And see how I did my scratchbuilt flanker windscreen.

 

Cheers

 

Romain

[johncrow]

Funny thing Romain, I had actually bookmarked your (re)build and your idea with the bottle was my back up plan if my vac attempt failed! 

 

Plus your weathering was just fantastic....a lot I will try and use there.

 

Thanks,

 

jp

[johncrow]

Not much to show for the work I've managed to put in on this, but it was productive in that I now believe my plan is feasible. I cast the front half of the Trump windscreen in resin, and carved out the IRST portion. I then shaped it a bit to fit my vac windscreen. I'll be using the Aires dash. I also used a couple pieces of styrene sheet so that the nose actually meets the windscreen.  I taped it all together, and everything seems to more-or-less fit. Surprisingly, it comes close to matching the Trump canopy, though it does not exactly match up. As I'm going canopy up, the difference is not noticeable. 

 

 

 

 

I have yet to carve out a space for the IRST dome to fit. That will have to wait until I come up with a curved chisel of some sort. 

 

 

 

 

The Aires dash is not in this picture. I may tweak the positioning of the IRST just a bit.

 

As always, thanks for stopping by.

 

jp

Edited October 8, 2016 by johncrow

[Breaker]

Awesome work so far John, this'll be great to see in it's camouflage when you get to that point. Nice work building up from the standard -27 kit as well! 

[ClumsyDude]

This is bloody awesome stuff. Great work John, thanks for posting.

 

Jim

[johncrow]

Thanks, Breaker, Jim, I appreciate your stopping by. 

 

I've been making some progress here and there, a few more details on the nose gear, I've been working on the vents that go over the gun area, and I've glued on the radome and have begun puttying and sanding that joint. My taped mock-up led me to believe that that process was going to go a bit smoother....that's always how it seems to turn out though!  I got some Akan paint and have been looking forward to giving that a try...hopefully sooner rather than later!

 

Thanks,

 

jp

[Breaker]

Be careful with the AKAN paint, it's for one of the older paint schemes for the -33. Mr Paint and MiG both do a more up to date set, personally I'd be going for MRP over MiG but I can't stand water based paint so I'm biased slightly. 

[johncrow]

Thanks, Breaker, good to know.

 

 I actually was planning to do mine in the older paint scheme, so this should work out. I still plan (someday) to build the 48th kit, and this one I will do in the newer scheme, so I will be sure to check out those paint lines.

 

jp

[johncrow]

OK, so I've got very little to show for an awful lot of work...one could argue the project has regressed. 

 

Upon closer inspection, my windscreen mock-up was not going to cut it. The fit was not at all close enough. Though this project spent a fair amount of time on the Shelf Of Unwanted Things, I have spent some time on it. For starters, my vac windscreen was too wide. I narrowed the resin vac master some, and tried again. As an aside, I quickly learned that the vac master must be perfectly, as in ready for NMF, smooth. If it is not, tiniest of flaws in the master will end up being visible in the vac part. Then, too, at least for me, the PETG plastic doesn't take a polishing anywhere near as nice as styrene. The new windscreen's width was just about right, but the fuselage required some re-work. This is the third iteration of styrene pieces that build up the fuselage sides under the windscreen, and I had to take a sanding stick to the resin so that the windscreen would sit flush. I think I'm there. I'm leaving the tape on the windscreen as long as I can, with the hope that its clarity will be preserved. Of the major changes I wanted to make to the vanilla Flanker (stinger, wing chord/wingfold, landing gear, canards, and windscreen) I figured this windsreen would be the easiest to handle. It turned out to be the toughest. 

 

Here's the sausage so far:

 

 

I'm hoping progress will pick up as I think I've cleared the last major hurdle.

 

Thanks for stopping by,

 

jp

[johncrow]

Ha! I knew it!  My nearly two-year odyssey will be at an end soon!  Thank you Tan Model!  I'm slappin' my FrankenFlanker together, gonna call it good, stick on the bottom shelf way in the back, and get in line for at least 2 of the IM kits. Too much time invested to quit on mine, but the new kit will be far and away better than what I've come up with.

 

I'll update here and there....but be forewarned, my already low standards will now be even lower. I'm changing my motto, temporarily, to "It's not about the journey, it's about the destination". 

 

jp

 

Now...I wonder.....the only thing I've wanted more than a 32nd 33 is a 32nd F-106. Maybe I'll start to scratch one.

[dutik]

Such is life!

 

But nevertheless, you have balls of steel to tackle this project and did an excellent job too

 

Regards

- dutik

[The Dude]

Ha! I knew it!  My nearly two-year odyssey will be at an end soon!  Thank you Tan Model!  I'm slappin' my FrankenFlanker together, gonna call it good, stick on the bottom shelf way in the back, and get in line for at least 2 of the IM kits. Too much time invested to quit on mine, but the new kit will be far and away better than what I've come up with.

 

I'll update here and there....but be forewarned, my already low standards will now be even lower. I'm changing my motto, temporarily, to "It's not about the journey, it's about the destination". 

 

jp

 

Now...I wonder.....the only thing I've wanted more than a 32nd 33 is a 32nd F-106. Maybe I'll start to scratch one.

 

Ah yes, we all thank you deeply for your sacrifice to the plastic gods by scratch building a subject so it can be released in injection mold. Sometimes such sacrifice is necessary to get things made in IM and your efforts will be noted in the annals of modeling history!       

Edited February 9, 2017 by The Dude