1/32 Su-30SM

[johncrow]

I’ve always thought the Flanker family was impressive. So far I’ve got a vanilla Su-27, an Su-27UB, and a somewhat reasonable representation of an Su-33. All in 32^nd scale, of course. There’s also a bunch of Su-30 variants out there, and I’ve finally decided on the version I want. When I built my Su-33, I initially planned to hang a couple Kh-31 missiles on it. The more I thought about it, the more those didn’t seem right for that build. But I sure wanted to hang them on SOMETHING.  I thought about building the Su-30 MKK kit as an Su-30M2, but I didn’t really find any references that showed them sporting Kh-31s, either. Since I really dig the Flankers with canards, all this meant the Su-30SM was the chosen one. Plus, it’ll give me the chance to correct my biggest faux pas on the Su-33. That being the shoulders, for lack of a better term, to which the canards mount. They were just not beefy enough.

 

I think this will be an easier project than the 33. The big differences that need to be addressed are the vectoring nozzles, the vertical stabs/rudders, and the canards. I’m also going to give it a nose job. On the Su-33, I used a casted- resin copy of the MKK kit’s nose to account for the offset IRST and the refueling probe. That turned out to be a gigantic amount of work, and I still never got it quite right. This time, I’m going to use the nose piece from the Wolfpack Su-30K conversion set. I think that set is made for the Su-27UB kit, so we’ll see if it works here. I know there are other things that differ between the Su-30MKK kit and the Su-30SM, not the least of which is the cockpit, but I don’t want this to take years, so those things will remain as-is.

 

Just like the Su-33, this WIP will be sporadically updated with poor-quality photos. The more time I spend on updates, the less time I spend at the bench. But….doing the updates is something I can do on the couch during family TV time with the wife and two daughters. I get out-voted when it comes time to picking what to watch 6-1, so this gives me something to do besides watching “When Calls the Heart” or “Paddington”.

 

I started with the vectoring nozzles. This is pretty much a rough draft, proof of concept attempt, but I think it'll work.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I started with the Aires resin nozzles and added a styrene ring. 

 

 

 

I scribed the top of the rear fuselage with a simplified representation of the real deal. I’ll clean it up once all scribing is done. It looks like this area is actually part of the nozzle assembly on the real jet, while on the kit it is part of the fuselage. The area in red should be ‘cut out’ to be more accurate, but I’m not going that far. This will be close enough. The kit plastic will be thinned after all scribing is done. Hopefully, that will allow the fuselage parts to actually close, and the step between the fuselage and nozzle should be reduced.  I’ll also modify the countermeasures dispensers a bit to better reflect those on the SM. Some detailing will also be added to the nozzle assembly. 

 

Thanks for stopping by,

 

jp

Edited February 14, 2021 by johncrow

[misha71]

very interesting

[Marcel111]

Very cool project, so wish there was an SM kit! I went through a similar thought process to yours but have settled on building an M2 with run of the mill A2A weapons.

 

Nice start on the nozzles!

 

Marcel

[johncrow]

17 hours ago, misha71 said:

very interesting

Thanks Misha71!

 

12 hours ago, Marcel111 said:

Very cool project, so wish there was an SM kit! I went through a similar thought process to yours but have settled on building an M2 with run of the mill A2A weapons.

 

Nice start on the nozzles!

 

Marcel

 

I appreciate it, Marcel! 

 

I think I will one day also build an M2...love the camo typically seen on that one.

[RALPHY ROCHA]

enjoy!!

https://russianplanes.net/st/Sukhoi/Su-30SM

exhaust

[johncrow]

12 hours ago, RALPHY ROCHA said:

enjoy!!

https://russianplanes.net/st/Sukhoi/Su-30SM

exhaust

 

Thanks Ralphy...great minds and all that! I've got this as one of many saved from that site to use as references. 

 

[Youngtiger1]

I sure wish Tan models or someone will give us LSP Su-33. However, until that happens I sure will be watching your attempt at such subject as it’s just plain cool and not worth skipping. So, I’m glued to this wip 

[blackbetty]

will follow closely!

[johncrow]

13 hours ago, Youngtiger1 said:

I sure wish Tan models or someone will give us LSP Su-33. However, until that happens I sure will be watching your attempt at such subject as it’s just plain cool and not worth skipping. So, I’m glued to this wip 

 

I appreciate it, Youngtiger1. The Tan Su-33 was announced when I halfway, give or take, through mine. I thought for sure it would come out before I got mine finished. Nope. I've given up on that. I'm hoping a few things I learned on that build will help with this one. 

 

11 hours ago, blackbetty said:

will follow closely!

 

Thanks blackbetty!  Progress on this will be sporadic, but it'll get done. 

 

 

[Marcel111]

I just saw this today, could be of real interest to you:

 

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CKYETJCB1PU/?igshid=1ddak1yfacix5

 

Cheers,

Marcel

[johncrow]

Awesome, thanks Marcel! 

 

Looking forward to his step-by-step. 

 

Cheers,

 

jp

[johncrow]

Isn't V1 the point at which one is committed to takeoff? (I was a maintainer, not a pilot, so what I know of that side of things I got off the Smithsonian Channel.) 

 

That being the case, I've hit V1 with this project. The work I've done on the nozzles could easily be reversed if it didn't go well, and I could've just built an M2 more or less OOTB. 

 

The nozzles are done, at least for the time being.  A few details yet to add at some point. 

 

 

Though I'm not thrilled with the step that is present, I'm overall reasonably happy with how they turned out. I may redo the one on the right. They actually swivel.

 

 

Since this first step went OK, I pressed on with the vertical stabs and rudders. Once I started cutting up the kit parts, there was no turning back. 

 

 

Modified on the left, kit parts on the right. I cut off part of the rudder, and used pieces of scrap plastic to fill in the gaps. The parts are just dry-fit right now. It needs a few details and filler yet. It won't be perfect, but it is much closer to the stabs on an SM. 

 

Thanks for checking it out,

 

jp

Edited February 16, 2021 by johncrow

[johncrow]

A small milestone...I had intended to use the nose piece of a Wolfpack conversion set on this build. I decided to try and make a copy of it, just in case it got horribly disfigured in this build, and if it didn't get ruined, I'd have an extra for maybe another similar project some day. 

 

I have no pressure pot, yet. I was not overly optimistic about this, but I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. A few bubbles and pin holes to address, but it is definitely going to be useable. My only concern  is the fitting of this to the kit fuselage parts. I'm sure this casted part a wee bit smaller than the  original. My next step will be checking to see if this casted piece will work with the fuselage parts; I'm pretty sure I can make it work. If it will work, I'll then clean up the part. 

 

 

 

I had a bit of resin left from the pour, so I cast another copy of the Wolfpack windscreen. I saved the copy I made for the Su-33 to use again...but I'm not sure WHERE I saved it. The kit windscreen is not accurate, and the Wolfpack part is pretty yellowed and much too thick.  I'll use this to vac-form a better one. 

 

Thanks for checking it out,

 

jp

Edited February 20, 2021 by johncrow

[misha71]

very interesting 

[johncrow]

2 hours ago, misha71 said:

very interesting 

 

 

Thanks, misha71!

 

 

This is going to work. 

 

 

After just a few minutes with a file, it matches up fairly nicely. With a bit more work I think I can get that gap to close up. Next stop...fitting the radome. 

 

Cheers,

 

jp