Hasegawa

1/72 Su-27 Flanker "4th CTC Aerobatic Team"

Kit Number: 00944

Reviewed by  Jim Pearsall, IPMS# 2209

MSRP: $58.95 Distributor's website: www.dragonmodelsusa.com The Aircraft Some time around 1970, the Soviets realized that the United States was developing a new fighter to replace the F-4 Phantom. They started a program to develop a new fourth generation fighter of their own. As both the US and Soviets figured out, you really can’t get one aircraft to do all the roles necessary, and the results were the F-15 Eagle, the F-16 Falcon and the F/A-18 Hornet. The Soviet aircraft were the Su-27 Flanker and MiG-29 Fulcrum. Since there are "navalized" versions of both the MiG-29 and Su-27, they also covered the F/A-18’s mission. The Su-27 has the normal "air superiority" mission, and carries up to eight missiles. The Soviets also envisioned using it as a deep penetration fighter to shoot down tankers and AWACS aircraft, which fly quite a ways behind the front. For this reason, the Flanker is very large, a necessity to carry the fuel for a mission deep behind the lines. Like the F-15, there’s also a Flanker with an "air-to-mud" mission. My reason for wanting to build a Flanker is that I got an Eagle as a gift, which came with the "Flanker aggressor" decals and camouflage, and I wanted a Flanker with a similar scheme to display with it. The only air-to-air combat I know of for the Su-27 was when Ethiopian Su-27s shot down Eritrean MiG-29s in 1999. Sukhoi 6, MiG 0. The Kit Big airplane = big box. 16 ½ X10 ¾ X 2 ½ inches (42 X 27.5 X 6.4 cm) Inside are six gray sprues, A, B, C, D (two of these) and an F. E is clear. There’s a large fret of photo-etch, and a large decal sheet. Additionally, there are two sets of instructions. The reason for the two instructions is that this is a reissue of the plastic kit, with new decals. The second instruction covers the new decal sheet and painting instructions. The first instruction sheet also has painting and marking information, but the decals are not included for this aircraft.

The main part of the kit is the fuselage sections. These are two very large parts, consisting of the upper and lower fuselage and wing sections. This is quite nice, as getting a good fit and alignment of the blended wing/fuselage would be more difficult if the wings and fuselage were separate parts. There is, of course, a nice interior, with choices of either decals or PE for the consoles and panel. I was skeptical of the instructions’ statement that the seat should be black, but a check at The Ejection Site (www.ejectionsite.com) confirmed this. There is some natural metal/silver detail, but the seat is mostly black. This Flanker’s decals are for an aerobatic team. As I said before, I wanted an aircraft in the standard markings, so I’m off into finding different decals. I settled on Ukraine AF, although there are 11 other users, including the US, which reportedly bought four for evaluation and dissimilar aircraft combat training. The reason this is important is that while assembling the wing/fuselage and intake trunks, it’s necessary to drill out holes for the armament pylons. Well, not necessary, but it would have been a lot easier to do it from the inside, where the locator "dimples" are than from the outside, guessing where the holes should be located.

The intakes are a real engineering triumph for Hasegawa. The original kit includes injection-molded screens for the intakes, but this kit has photoetch. It’s really nice photoetch for the screens, as well as on both sides of the intake. I put more putty work into the intakes than any other part of the whole project, but fit was still OK to good. The one spot where I felt the instructions were vague was the ventral fins, which should line up with the edge of the fuselage. The way I figured this out was that there’s a decal that runs from the vertical stabilizer above the fuselage, across the fuselage edge and onto the fin. Fortunately I caught this before I glued the second one on. Painting Painting the Flanker could have been another real chore, as the instructions for the original kit give only Gunze and Mr. Color references. The new instructions, however, give FS references. Even better, Testors Model Master ® has Flanker Blue Gray, Flanker Medium Blue and Flanker Light Blue. Of course Ukraine doesn’t necessarily use the same colors as the Russians, but at least I had a starting point. The camouflage scheme for the Flanker uses a soft edge, so I was able to free hand the airbrush. Ukraine has a really neat looking "splinter" camouflage on one of their airshow birds, but that would require a lot of masking, and then my Flanker wouldn’t match the Eagle, which was the original intent. Decals I used the Hasegawa decals in every place except the national markings. They’re a lot better than they were a few years ago, when they had a (deserved) reputation for being thick. Not any more. In fact I had a few moments of near panic when applying the intake warning decals, which, being in an almost inaccessible place, decided to fold. I also did some "due diligence" on that big decal which is supposed to go clear across the leading edge of the wing and fuselage. It’s long enough to do that, and the angle nicely matches the wing. It would still be a bear to put on, but it will fit. Finishing I’ve learned to hold off putting on the landing gear, canopy, and other small parts until I’ve finished the decals. Too often, I’ve picked up the plane to put on a decal and broken or detached a small part. I waited until this step to put on the PE gunsight, and then added the windscreen. Well, not so fast! Both the windscreen and canopy have a fine mold line that runs from front to rear. Not hard to remove with a fine sanding stick, and Future repairs the scratches. This is where this kit shows it’s an early 21st Century mold. The nose gear is long and pretty thin, and the main gear is sort of wobbly too. I couldn’t find one, but if someone would come out with white metal landing gear for the Flanker, it’d be useful. Quickboost sells a "corrected" nose for the Hasegawa Su-27, but I might be worried about adding that weight to the nose without beefing up the nose gear. I also used the missiles. Figuring out exactly where the pylons went was tricky, as Hasegawa’s engineers didn’t leave dimples where the partial holes were in the wing and fuselage, which I didn’t drill out before assembly. Yes, I read the instructions, where they told you to drill out the holes for the pylons, but I was on a roll, and I forgot. Overall This project started out fast, then slowed down. The early assembly went quickly, and there were no fit problems. My decals were slowed down by the printer suddenly deciding that yellow was not a viable color. I bought a replacement color cartridge, and it didn’t print yellow either. Turned out that the replacement was bad, but that took time to troubleshoot. Also, I think I spent a lot more time at the computer trying to decipher the reality on markings and colors than I did in the workshop actually gluing and painting plastic. Is this what AMS feels like? Recommended. I really like the PE, it adds a lot to the kit. The model itself fits nicely, and the instructions are pretty good. The molding is good, although there is a little flash creeping into the mold as it ages, but nothing that can’t be taken care of with that original modeling tool, the thumbnail. Thanks to Dragon USA and IPMS for another adventure in modeling.