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Okay, the Su-27/30/33/35 Flanker family has to be one of the purtiest jets ever built. Sukhoi got the basic shape right from a looks standpoint. No idea on the rest but she's a looker. Except when camo'd as a crater. This is Minibase's first kit release. It came out a couple years ago and I got it shortly after being released. A different company, Tan Models had announced they were going to do.a 1/32 version which would have been 1) huge, and 2) awesome because huge, but sadly wasn't more than vapourware so I was happy this was announced. The other option for an Su-33 in 1/48 was the Sol conversion using the Academy kit as a base. I remember one of the shops near me had it in stock and I'd look at it but it wasn't cheap nor an easy conversion. Anyways, back to this kit, they've done a nice job in the packing. It's a full box but carefully packed. There's an inner lid of sorts. You can build the the kit in either configuration, with wings, tailplanes, vertical tail and stinger folded or unfolded. The flipside of the inner lid has more artwork. Finally the sprues. The blue box has the missiles in them. They're one piece with all the fins attached. Some truly impressive moulding techniques there. For my build, I picked up the Minibase detail set and some paint masks. The detail set has 3D printed burner cans, landing gear, seated pilot and seat harness.

Peter, that's a fabulous start you've made on the kit. The cockpit looks exemplary between Miniart's moulding and your paint and assembly skills. To me, Miniart has been known for small, potentially fiddly parts but great detail and overall fit. Their armour kits are fantastic and what they're probably best known for.

Fantastic build Ernie. First one yet I've seen of this kit. Carl

Thanks Paul! I guess jumping around from project to project sort of keeps me going. It doesn't always work of course. I've got the Andy's Achilles in the stash. I'm still trying to figure out how to paint something that big before I tackle it so I can relate to your Sherman build. My folks' families were part of the Nationalist gov't that lost the Chinese civil war and moved to Taiwan as a result. That couldn't have been easy for them, same as for your Dad's family.

Still my favourite movie.

The paint needed a couple touch-ups. I wasn't surprised so at the same time, I did the fit of the wingtip lights, gun barrels and pitot. For the last two, I used a set from Master.

Some sublime work on the nacelles. Have you got the Wingleader book on the Whirlwind? There's a few pics of the moving nacelle section and linkages.

I just realized my HK Mossie suffered a similar fate. But that was due to my son attempting his first solo flight on a twin. Sadly, I'm 1 for 4 on completing HK kits. Only the Mossie has made it across the finish line but she didn't last long as per the above. The B-25s are long gone. The Lanc is still here but I need a big motivation drive to get her done. The M29 Weasel made me feel the same way.

Thanks! The kit has moulded on battle damage that replicates what was on the filming miniature. Thanks Peter! Here's the kit stand.

Time to get moving on this build. I broke out the masking tape and started on the upper sections. Then a coat of XF-24 for the Dark Sea Grey. Unmasked. Yup, it's nice to have things go the way you expect.

And done! Now to decide if I use this stand which isn't a perfect fit for the Bandai kit or use the kit one.

Time to finish this up. Just need to complete applying the decals.

This kit is absolutely over engineered. That wouldn't be a huge problem but Takom insists on these tiny instructions where you can barely make out the part and not always where it goes For example, there's a tiny PE bit that goes on the end of a cylinder on the top of the firewall. There's 4 in total. It's so small, they give 6 extras. Even then I lost 7 so I'm short one. Plus I have idea if I have them on right or not. Okay, rant over. I started work on the inner hull. The drivers compartment has a lot of levers to add. The backside of the firewall has additional details. At this point, I took a good hard look at my progress and hated what I saw. The tracks are a complete mess. The links don't line up. The road wheels and bogies have the worst alignment and angle all over the place. I haven't done this badly on running gear since I was 5. Originally I was going maybe do some weathering and muddy up the tracks to cover up some/all the faults but there no way to do that and make it look realistic. Best option would be to sink it in a diorama up to the waterline. Which doesn't help my cause as this was supposed to go inside an LVT. Anyways, I'm putting it back in the box for now. Best option is to try and find another one and apply what I've learned from this mess. Sigh.

What an excellent build. Thanks for the backstory as well. Mostly when it comes to the Devastator and the Battle of Midway, you just hear they were all lambs for the slaughter.

P-51B/C Mustang! By Eduard! This Spring! Good or bad, it's 1/48!

That's a great looking kit Paul. The Pegasus vinyl kits are works better than the old ones I built back in the '80s. Those were hollow, often badly deformed so you had to reshape them and hope they didn't collapse after assembly. Which they often did. Are you going to get any of the War Machine kits that Pegasus made?

I suspect they did it as the kit suspension wouldn't be able to take the elastic stress of rubber tracks. Most reviews I've read the reviewers broke the suspension arms during assembly. It doesn't surprise me seeing how they designed it. Usually folks complain when rubber tracks are in a kit but this time, it would have been the right choice.

The tracks and suspension are a real fight. I finally got the second side done. But it's nowhere near perfect. I had to remove a link, trim off some track teeth, sand off a few end pins. Ugh, what a pain. Guess I'll be breaking out the mud to hide some of those gaps. Takom overdid it in their quest for detail. The suspension could have and should have been simplified a bit. It wouldn't have hurt the overall look and would have made things much easier to put together.

Peter, It's like any other retailer (Costco, Sam's Club, etc) that has a membership. They figure if you've paid for it, you're going to want to maximize its use as much as possible. Which hopefully means you end up buying more from the one place rather than spreading it around.

I looked at this when I got the email from Sprue Brothers. Like several other members here, I don't order enough to make it pay off. Especially when postage to Canada is so high. Then again, shipping to Canada has made ordering from most overseas retailers a non-starter. Shops in Hong Kong and Japan along aren't too bad, the UK is a bit more and the UD is oftentimes the most. Oddly enough, the furthest from Canada is the cheapest. Australia seems to have some of the lowest shipping costs. Go figure.

Reading your comment made me think of this song. And yes, all these tiny, not so great fitting parts are a real mind killer.

With the chassis assembled, I painted it in Olive Drab. I'm going to be doing a British one but the notes day it was left in OD and not repainted in SCC15. I used my newest Iwata to freehand paint the road wheels rims in rubber black. They're just too small and fragile to mask properly. This Iwata is perfect for these sort of jobs. No big colour cup so you can mix up a small amount of paint (two drops in this case), fine needle and a separate air control valve right on the airbrush. The best part is that it was $71 direct from Iwata. I think they may still have some. Anyways, back to the Weasel. Most folks complain when tank models have rubber band tracks in them. Guess what, the Weasel had rubber band tracks in real life but Takom has done them as link and length. Not only that, but the Indy link bits go in a specific spot so don't hacking them all off the sprue at once. They're also directional and there's a scrap diagram in the instructions that shows you which way is forward. Took forever though to see that the only way to tell is by the centre section at the end. They should have made the pic bigger. Again, the fit is just sloppy enough to make them move around on the drivetrain. That, and the lower run is one track too long. At least on the first side I've glued together. Once that dries, I'll start the other side.

Oh and Trumpeter is showing a 1/32 S-3 Viking in their catalogue.

Thanks to @ScottsGT's efforts fighting through the Hobbycraft Sea Fury kit recently, we now have a new one coming for the end of the summer. DBMK has announced that their Sea Fury kit should be ready by then.

The idler wheels have a PE rim that goes inside both side. Then it was onto the road wheels. I found the easiest thing to do was to remove them as a strip, clean up the sprue joint along one side, then cut them free and clean up the second joint. Repeat 64 times. I then glued them onto the bogies. The fit is a bit sloppy so it's hard to keep them vaguely aligned. The problem is made worse in that there's no positive joint between the paired road wheels. Anyway, the suspension is all done and next step is the floorpan. This is three parts.