(The completed model is here:)
http://wingsofintent.blogspot.com/2013/03/ikar-172-tupolev-ant-25-completed.html
LONG LIVE UKRAINE
красные крылья
(Krasnye Krilya)
(Red Wings)
Or
The Reds Are Coming!!!
For those who know me, my limitless joy will need no
justification. Finally, a plane I can model that has, irrefutably, undoubtedly,
definitely, red underwings!
I owe the pleasure of having this one to Lars Opland of
Khee-Kha Art Products fame, whom, very kindly and unselfishly agreed to pass it
on from his personal stash. Those who know Lars are aware that he lives in
Wasilla, Alaska, inside an igloo made of kit boxes.
As said, my joy was immeasurable when I had the kit,
finally, in my hands. This Russian-made jewel is kind of hard to get. Made by
Ikar (Икар)
and with the box lid illustrated by E. Alexeenko, it can depict both versions
of the famous plane, the one piloted by Chkalov to Vancouver, Washington, or
the one piloted by Gromov to San Jacinto, California.
The plane itself was a real stylized beauty, and the model
is a good rendition of it. The kit is sort of rough, as you will see in the
accompanying photos. A little bit of flash, perhaps some subtle chunkiness, but
with some good surface detail and interesting parts’ count.
As you can tell by the images some of the parts got broken,
and a spare for one was included in the sealed box at the factory. No big deal,
easy to repair or replace. The transparencies could be rescued, but perhaps
using them to pop vacuformed replicas would be wiser.
The decals got a tad smashed in the long haul from mother
Russia, so we’ll see how it goes with them at the time of application.
The instructions are...there. But you should gather some
references. I did and had a very good time going through the history of the type
development, the construction, modification and trials of the machines, and the
record flights themselves. I chose to model the modified RD-1 that landed in
San Jacinto, California, since I live in the general area. My grandparents were originally from Ukraine and I ended up
in California, so it is sort of commemorative of the family history.
A short clip of it landed at that location can be watched
here:
It is the machine that has no blue nose (the blue nose is the
one mostly modeled, by the way) and could appear a tad less showy, but perhaps
some scratchbuilt details could bring some extra pizzazz.
The kit box is apparently made of recycled material:
recycled polar bear, recycled burlap, recycled politburo members, and so forth,
as the images describe (notice the fibers in the close-up). As per the broken
parts...I found at the bottom of the plastic bag a quality control tag stamped
“1” (see image) so, number 1....we know who you are, and we are watching you.
Another kit with broken parts and to Siberia you go!
The kit:
Now, the bad news. As you can see in the photos below, the
kit parts are, as said before, rough. The wings and ailerons are, by far, the
worst, and almost fall in the mission impossible category. Harbor no illusions,
to fix them will imply very hard work making the labor of the Volga Haulers
look like ladies on tutus on a paddle boat on a summer day at the lake.
And then, the bad news: once the parts are sort of cleaned
up, they won’t particularly feel inclined to match their opposite counterparts.
More work ahead.
Some bad news: references are not always perfect, look, when
possible, at actual photos of the machine you are modeling. There is good will
on part of the scholars and writers, but their product does not always match
reality.
Even more...bad news: the trailing edges are very thick, the
“flat” parts (like the inner surfaces of the ailerons, are not flat. The flash present is not of the "gone with the wind" type, but instead requires positive action to be removed. It is strange, but it is as if the wing/aileron
molds (which are bigger) were produced somewhere else, up to far lower standards.
And -finally- some good news: once you are done with the wings and
ailerons, Siberia will appear to you as a Cote D’Azur destination. AND the rest
of the kit is rather good, although not quite “there”, as in "normal". Yes,
Tamiyinsky and Hasegawoff this one is not. But, my friend, you are a modeler,
are you not? Get at it!
There is another one of these made by Eastern Express. I haven’t
seen one personally, though. For what I can tell from photos on the Net these
are the same masters, but modified. The wings are broken down differently and
the laid-down is different.
Was that one refined at the time of re-issue? I’d like to
know. Some halved parts of the IKAR kit are rendered as one in the
Eastern Express kit, the interior is not there anymore, the prop blades are
attached together, etc. Sort of simplified version seems to me, and again I
wonder if they did something –in case they are more or less the same masters-
to improve the horrid quality of the wings seen in the IKAR kit.
I will render this posting as a review, and the next one will be dedicated at the actual building, since the "critique" got kind of long.
I will render this posting as a review, and the next one will be dedicated at the actual building, since the "critique" got kind of long.
the "building in-progress" post in this same blog:
Did you know that this aircraft still exists? It is at the Valery Chkalov Museum about 2/ 1/2 hours by rural bus from Nizhny Novgorod. I have made this kit (for someone) a long time ago and with a bit of work it turns out fine. I have another but no decals!I have photos of the museum.
ReplyDeleteHi Richard
ReplyDeleteThanks for writing.
This a well documented plane, in spite of its relative rarity. Yes, I knew of its existence at the Chkalov museum together with the "replica" at Monino. Interestingly enough both differ in minor details from contemporary photos. And yes, not an easy one to make decals for, especially the white characters on the wing. Unless you have an ALPS printer (which I don't).
Best regards