The MLU SU – Su-27SM – part 2

As I said in the previous post, I am not entirely satisfied with this kit. And bringing it close to painting stage showed its faults even more. The plastic is very soft, panel lines rather shallow and there’s way too many sprue gates. In practice, this means, there’s gonna be a lot of clean up work, which will sooner than later lead to some lost detail, while sanding will create dents in the soft plastic, which will need puttying, sanding and rescribing to complete the circle. And this is the work I hate the most at modelling. But anyway, I have managed to bring the model somehow to this point, where I could start painting the engine/exhaust parts, so characteristic of the Flankers.

Here is how I do it.

The parts are first primed with Alclad Grey Primer.

Followed by Alclad Magnesium – you can use any other darker shade like Steel or Titanium for example.

Panels were then brush painted using ModelMaster Stainless Steel (any light metallic paint will do for this part).

Whole area was then lightly randomly airbrushed with Alclad Pale Burnt Metal.

Followed by Random strokes of Alclad Jet Exhaust. Procedure for the bottom part is the same.

Picture of the whole airframe with dryfitted exhausts. Later in the build, heat staining will be added to finish.