Sfreddo y Paolini SyP-II , Matías Hagen miracle kit - 1/72nd resin

 

72Topia of Argentina has just released a jewel, an elegant Golden Age biplane made by a pioneering local aircraft factory. Matías Hagen has created another superbly detailed, very limited edition resin kit of exquisite craftsmanship. If you click on the photo above to make it larger, and point your phone camera to the QR at the bottom left corner of the box art, you will get to a page where more information is provided.

 

(The completed model can be seen here:

https://wingsofintent.blogspot.com/2023/09/sfreddo-y-paolini-syp-ii-golden-age.html

 

Once you open the sturdy cardboard box you will see the carefully-packed contents:

Excellent instructions, a pattern sheet and the home-made decals (more on that later). The instructions have a QR that will take you to the English translation of the plane's history -and the instructions themselves:

The kit provides a clever and very welcome jig to rig the wings and struts:

Contents:

The fantastically mastered and cast parts:

Full interior, detailed fuselage sides, wire-reinforced struts and landing gear:

Tastefully made rib detail, a superb engine rendered in several parts. And guess what, the Townend ring just perfectly fits the engine, like a glove:

No pinholes, no short pours, no strange excrescences, no deformed parts, none of the banes that plague other manufacturers. A high standard scores of other resin kits could aspire to:

Most of the parts have locating devices to help the modeler. The trailing edges are paper-thin and the thickness of the tail feathers to scale:

A careful wash with lukewarm soapy water inside a finely-meshed container (coffee machine filter), paying very close attention not to lose the smaller parts:

This is the carburetor, one of the many out-of-this-world detailed parts. You can see the butterfly valve:

And more detail in the body. This is nothing less than genius, and NO 3D-printing here, ALL HAND MADE by Matías in the most precarious of conditions, in a country where imports have prohibiting costs and materials are super-scarce. To produce this level of kit, in the most difficult of environments is a bonafide miracle:

I added aftermarket instrument dials to the panels, but they do have engraved instruments:

Just a minimum of cleaning and the parts are ready to paint. The assembled jig to the left. Base colors are airbrushed:

Aftermarket HS prop logo decals (from Arctic Decals) are added:

Notice how the end of the exhaust pipe is "hollowed":

The minuscule engine, hand-made masters...by a Master:

The perfectly-fitting assemble, how I wish all the kits were like this one!

Not much now until the fuselage halves are joined, just the seat belts:

All parts in place and fuselage closed. Excellent fit. Didn't have to sand to size anything at all. What a pleasure and what a change from the norm. The clever separation of parts follows natural lines and presents a good impression of the different materials (metal, fabric):

Such a beaut, the fuselage walls thin and detailed in an out, not the thick walls with resin blobs we so often have to endure from other less caring manufacturers:

Don't you love it when everything just falls into place? See, this can be done, and if this can be done by a one-man cottage "industry", why not by scores of other manufacturers with much better technical and human resources? Yet another mystery of the Modeling Twilight Zone...:

By the way, here a link on Scalemates to the instructions in English:

https://www.scalemates.com/products/img/8/3/5/1495835-86-instructions.pdf

Lower wing on. Perfect fit and alignment again:

Horizontal tail on, ditto. The kit provides control horns, but I used photoetched ones from an aftermarket set:

Vertical tail on. The tail feathers are all keyed to help the modeler, they fit and align perfectly and thus are a breeze to add. You seldom see/build a kit like this one, thought to help the modelers, by a modeler, that is a true pleasure to build:

Dry-testing the jig, all works ok:

The fuselage front has a keyed bulkhead where the engine sub-assembly just fits in position, another perfect fit (testing here):

Same for the prop (dry-fit):

The quality of this kit is so good that I think I may be having a kitgasm.

Now for the decals. The manufacturer clarifies that these are home-made decals. The carrier is continuous, they are ink-jet printed and come already with a protective clear coat, but the white base color is not printed (nor are the metallic colors, replaced by ink equivalents). So, a pattern is provided for the modeler to paint the white color on the model before applying the decals, and a chip is provided to match the red color with the paint used on the model (don't panic, the English instructions contain the pattern sheet translation). So I see several approaches to this: paint the model and then using negative ("hollowed") masks paint the white and add the provided decals, or paint the white color areas (or the whole model as a base for the red and aluminium of the wings), mask them, paint the model red, unmask and add the decals, or print you own set of decals using the files provided following the QR links. You see that the pattern provides the Humbrol codes for the white, gold and aluminium colors, but the ink-jet rendition of them is of course grey for the silver and yellow ocher for the gold. I know, it sounds complicated. I think I will be commissioning a professional set. If doing that or using your own ALPS or similar, you only need in gold the lines and the "Stormy Petrel" small text; the "R" and "269" in silver, and the little triangle with the Argentinian flag (light blue and white), no red whatsoever if you use the kit's "cross", but perhaps better include it in the decals you can make or commission:

First coat of primer. Zero fixes to do. Now that's great, isn't it?:

Upper wing, look at the beautiful ribbing effect:

And the detail:

Struts, rigging and aileron linkage positions all clearly marked, also visible are the grip handles:

To use the jig you have to leave the LG out, but as my right eye has a blind spot on the very center of the field of view, I can't judge distance/depth properly, so to add the LG to a painted model filled me with dread, as I knew the chances I would make a mess were high. Thus I carved and lifted the jig on wood runners to accommodate the glued landing gear:

The landing gear is superbly detailed, and the main legs have a wire reinforcement embedded into the resin. Still great care is needed. Their locating holes match perfectly:

My strategy, as the assembly was fiddly, was to use a very strong acrylic glue for P.E. parts called Gator's Grip. With a very small amount of it in the part's pips I inserted them, measured the distance needed, and let them dry. Once set, I added a very little amount of thin superglue:

Then I inserted the cross part, in the same way, with barely a little dab of glue where it touched the fuselage and legs (previously I cleaned up the "U" end that braces the wheel axle, for a perfect grip). Once more when set a smidgen of thin superglue was carefully applied. Be sure to take your time and be gentle and careful. Again the parts' fit in their positions is flawless, something hardly ever seen in kits:

Now the model can bed painted, and then put in the jig to add the upper wing:

The upper wing is given a gloss black base for the aluminium dope color:

This is what happens when an unauthorized pilot takes the airplane for a flight test. As a testament to the integrity of the model and its good engineering, please notice that the complex landing gear is intact as well as the rest of the model, and only the stabs and rudder broke off (actually the rudder just unglued). And this falling from the altitude of a grown man! Fear not, it will be put back together soon. The reprehensible culprit is my test pilot, Johan Gambolputty de von Ausfern-schplenden-schlitter-crasscrenbon-fried-digger-dingle-dangle-dongle-dungle-burstein-von-knacker-thrasher-apple-banger-horowitz-ticolensic-grander-knotty-spelltinkle-grandlich-grumblemeyer-spelterwasser-kurstlich-himbleeisen-bahnwagen-gutenabend-bitte-ein-nürnburger-bratwustle-gerspurten-mitzweimache-luber-hundsfut-gumberaber-shönendanker-kalbsfleisch-mittler-aucher von Hautkopft of Ulm:

And the broken (entirely my fault) parts are re-glued without a problem:

The red paint sample you see there has been painted with a Mattel Vac-U-Form flask that could be as old as 60 years. It diluted well, airbrushed without a problem, and dried to the touch in about half an hour, providing a well-covering solid color of good surface. What about summoning the spirit of that chemist to help the many time clueless, consistently inconsistent, and often crap-selling paint manufacturers of today?

The aluminium paint is on:

Masked and about to apply the red color: 

Work continues with the addition of the head rest, windshields, the anti-slip walkways, an aftermarket Venturi seen in photos, the engine, the tail wheel, two of the six tail control cables, and two of the four tail rigging cables (the rest better added after decals are applied on the fuselage sides):

A new professionally-made set arrived from Arctic Decals with beautifully and sharply-printed metallic inks, this will replace the set offered with the kit that requires more work necessitating background painting and a multi-layer approach, as it is a home-made set. The build can now proceed:

 Application begins, the decals have to be individually cut and applied, as the sheet has a continuous carrier. They behave splendidly and look great:

As shown somewhere above, I modified the jig to allow me to pose the model with its landing gear on, as I don't trust myself to add it later risking marring the finish:

First a dry run to see if everything works well and aligns:

Following the suggestion of 72Topia, the wings are set using very small dabs of white glue on the jig. This will allow some minor fussing around whilst the model stays put:

The wing and cabane struts go in:

Again as per the manufacturer's suggestion, the white glue is softened by putting a few drops of water on each glue spot:

Once the glue has softened enough, the model is very carefully removed from the jig and cleaned up:

With the addition of the aileron linkages it's all done. Next will be the rigging (the anchoring holes are molded already in the wings):

Only a few lengths of control wire and it should be done:

I don't think that there would be more rigging projects for me in the future, as my eyesight is not (for some reason) improving (and please don't mention that I should switch to the despicable 1/48th or the grotesque 1/32nd scales, Scotch before dishonor!)

Completed model here:

https://wingsofintent.blogspot.com/2023/09/sfreddo-y-paolini-syp-ii-golden-age.html