1/72 Hasegawa Su-27

by Nathan Slesinger

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I built this kit a few years ago and just got a hold of a half decent camera so I thought I'd share a few pics.  This is Hasegawa's kit with Cutting Edge Decals and a True Details seat.  The kit is great and since it was the Hasegawa release I got the photo-etch bits and the white metal seat which I didn't use because the True Details seat was better in my eyes. 

I hit two snags during the build, one was my fault and the other wasn't.  Problem #1 was that when I was painting the camo (BTW I used A LOT of masking tape for this) I spilled the paint in my airbrushes paint cup all over the rear fuselage.  I don't know if this works for other people, but I grabbed a rag right away and wiped it off instead of letting it sit and waiting to strip it later. This took almost everything off and didn't leave any streaks.  I lightly sanded the area of the spill after the paint dried and just had to repaint the rear fuselage. That wasn't nearly as painful as stripping the entire paintjob would have been.  Problem #2 was the decals.  Cutting Edge Decals are awesome but the wing stripes were too short (about 1/4 in on either side).  If I did it over again, I would paint them on.  I ended up trying unsuccessfully to match the paint, so now there is about 1/4 inch on each side of the stripe that's a little patchy.  Oh well, such is life...

Click on images below to see larger images

I brought this to a contest two years ago at a local hobby shop (Galaxy Hobby for those of you in the western Washington area) and took 2nd place with it, which came as a pleasant surprise.  I know it shouldn't be armed like this since it's an airshow bird, but how can you have a mean looking Su-27 without missiles filling every pylon? 

Nathan

Photos and text © by Nathan Slesinger