The
Vostok 1 (type 3KA) was the first spacecraft that brought the man to the space.
This historical event happened on April 12th, 1961 in the former
Soviet Union
and the name of the first cosmonaut (=astronaut in Russian terminology) was
Yuri Gagarin.
The kit
of the Vostok 1 is produced by the Czech company NewWare http://mek.kosmo.cz/newware/ .The
main body of the kit, antennas and some surface details are from resin. The
radiators and other “flat” details are PE parts. The kit contains also
decals – white stripes on the ball nitrogen tanks and the black circle
windows. The construction manual leads us through the building both by the
detailed schematic pictures accompanied by detailed verbal step-by-step
description. The detail history description and web links are provided on the
additional A4 sheet. Plus, some cleaver approaches help with some details or
assembling – ball tanks on the rods, printed schematic part of the service
module in the scale that can be cut off and glued in the real shape and that
much better showing different surface details etc.
Click on
images below to see larger images
|
|
|
|
However,
despite of that the kit caused me a lot of headache. This was my first fully
resin kit and I mistakenly expect that building will be similar to standard
plastic kits. A big mistake. The first of all it requires a lot sanding, probing
and double-checking positions before gluing. The main body consists of the
return module (white ball) and the service module built up from three different
conical parts. What I missed was something that would help me to fix all four
main parts in the correct relative axial and radial position. I realized that
something is going wrong after the service module was equipped with all details,
painted and radiator were being glued to their positions – see the middle
picture above. So, the radiators were removed as well as part of the wiring,
antennas were moved couple millimeters to the new (but no correct) positions and
finally radiators glued again. It was only compromise, not perfect solution.
Radiators look better now, but the relative radial position of the upper
antennas on the return module to the low antennas on the service module is not
correct.
The
service module had a part of the wiring and pipelines represented by very subtle
raised lines. But I was not able to paint them. So I sanded them off and I made
them from a thin cooper line. Here the glued “3D” part of the instruction
manual helped me very much again. I was not also able to cut off the resin
antennas so I made them also from the cooper wire.
Click on
images below to see larger images
|
|
|
|
I
equipped the kit with the small “T” antennas as the Vostok with Gagarin
flied to the space had. The mockup exhibited in the
Moscow
has different antennas – long thin wires. This mockup also has return module
covered by metallic foils. Gagarin’s Vostok
had return module covered only by white hexagonal blocks of the thermal
protection without metallic
foil, as can be seen on the next picture. I have found it somewhere on the web,
but I unfortunately do not remember where.
The
main body of the kit as well as radiators was sprayed with the automotive grey
primer. Then Return module was sprayed with the automotive gloss white. The rest
of the kit was airbrushed with the Humbrol and Revell green and metallic shades,
my own mixture according to the instruction manual. The small surface details
were brushed. The kit was not weathered. Very thinned black/brown oil color was
used only to highlighted different surface details. Finally completed kit was
airbrushed with the Humbrol matt coat.
Additional
picture is historically completely wrong. I used it only to give you an
impression how big, or small Vostok was in comparison to the astronaut in the
same scale. This particular figure does not represent Gagarin (who btw wore the
orange suit) but it is from the old Monogram 1:48 kit of the Apollo 11 Lunar
Module, that you can see together with Vostok and a part of my collection on the
last picture.
Click on
images below to see larger images
|
|
|
|
|
The
final conclusion? If I take into account all rebuilding, corrections and
repainting resulting from the lack of my experience with full resin kits, I
built it basically twice. However, it is the only choice if you are interesting
in such rare but important flying crafts. Recommended, but modelers with the
experience with the full resin kits have a great advantage.
You can
find a lot of info and interesting pictures on the following pages:
I hope
you enjoy it.
Best
regards,
Misos
|