Having recently finished a Chinese Nationalist Air Force P-51D Mustang, which can be seen here, and having enjoyed working on a metal finish I've decided to start a MiG-15 as my next project. This one might take a while due to the Christmas holidays but what's the rush anyway.



I'm using the Airfix MiG-15 which looks to be a nice little kit. Deep panel lines work for brush painters like myself and show up wonderfully under a good wash. I know there's some talk about the wing sweep being off but I don't care really, it looks like a MiG-15.

I do have a few small gripes with the kit though, mainly with the location of some ejector pin markings.



The first is on both sides of the intake trunk. They're not to difficult to fill and sand but I still think it's a terrible place to have them considering the large nose intake is a prominent feature of the MiG-15.



The second is a raised pin marking right inside both of the wheel wells, right between all that delicate ribbing. I wouldn't fancy trying to remove those but luckily before I started the kit I decided to put it on a flight stand.



The third is on the back of the cockpit tub. This one wouldn't bother me so much except for the strip of rib running through the middle of it. I mean why put the strip there if you're going to ruin it?



The last little gripe is with the exhaust tube which is completely featureless... except for the slight ejector pin mark in there. A little bit of detail would've been nice.

Anyway, enough griping. It probably looks like that I and the kit have gotten off to a bad start but I'm am actually looking forward to building this.



My plan is to build this MiG which was reportedly sighted over North Korea in '51. A few people have done this variant, I've checked the galleries on ARC, and I could've chosen a more exotic scheme but I quite like the red tail so that's the one for me.

You know I was looking at a drawing just last week that had both the red tail and the North Korean markings but I can't seem to find it now. I don't think that drawing was based on any evidence though.

In fact the reason I believe most drawings of that MiG-15 leave off the national markings is due to uncertainty over who it belonged too. I've read that China operated a squadron of red-tailed MiG's and this could be one of them.

I don't have any PLAAF markings at the moment though so I'll probably add the North Korean markings to my MiG, at least to the wings as I'm not sure how they look over the red tail.

Most companies employ someone to place ejector pins in awkward spots, and Airfix have long been world leaders in this regard. They do a nice line in flash too.

Love the scheme choice Sean, looks good on paper, should be even better on a kit.

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How do you eat an elephant....
....start at one end and keep chewing.

On the bench:
1/24 Airfix Bf109 E OOB
1/24 Trumpeter Hurricane IIc, most definitely not OOB.

In the wings:
Trumpeter Hurricane MkI, BoB in flight versus Airfix B2 Stuka, 1/24 dogfight double.

Sean,

These photos, which were taken at a Dublin Chapter meet some time ago (probably, at a guess, February 2009) are of a Mig done
by Lee McGuire (which model, incidentally, did very well at the Cork Nationals in 2010). They might give some inspiration - especially
of the use of alclad for the natural metal finish (especially for the engine).

















(I thought I had put them up in the past, somewhere on the forum, but can't find them now.
Anyhow, they are well worthy of showing again.....)

Philip

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"To boldly go.....wherever"

To be honest, I have only quickly goooogled that 'Korean MiG15' in images and what I've seen it said something along the lines that this 'red tail' MiG drawing is based on witness' memories that it has been seen over Korea in 1951. Didn't get into it too much, but you can always do a bit of research about Chinese or Soviet units in Korea around that time.
Personally, I doubt that it would fly without fuselage/fin marking, question is, if that would be Russian Red star or Korean star. I'd say the 1st option is more likely...

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Filip

So I've been hunting around the internet for about an hour or more and this is what I've got.

Firstly although the Soviet Union did commit MiG's and pilots to the Korean War all of the aircraft either carried Chinese or North Korean markings. In fact, Russian pilots were under orders to communicate via Chinese or Korean. Of course during the heat of battle this orders often broke down and Russian was spoken openly but officially the Soviet Union wasn't involved.

As for the MiG with the red tail, well I'm not finding much information about it. I did find a review of a Hobby Craft MiG-15 which has put the Chinese Star & Bar with the red tail. Most MiG-15 models I've found online also pair the red tail with the Chinese markings. I even found a thread from some RC aircraft guys who've paired the red tail with the Chinese markings.

That leaves me with a little problem, I want to model the red tail but I don't want to buy PLAAF decals right now (December is costly enough as is). So I could either model the MiG without any national markings or I could throw some North Korean markings on it.

Thoughts?

I looked into it bit further and found that profile on the ACIG and it says beneath the profile: 'This North Korean MiG-15 was reportedly sighted in spring of 1951'

In other words there is no conformation that it bore Chinese markings at all. I think that this all started with Hobby Boss kit... So I would use North Korean stars on wings and on the fuselage too, as it was common practice, without any worry.
It'll look nicer than those Chinese copies of American marking anyway.

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Filip

Well, at least these issues are all happening in a small internal area that won't be seen much! Looking forward to seeing some pics of it.

I'm still working away on my BV P.194. I've come to realise that assymetric aircraft means 8 wing roots instead of four, and four fuselage seams instead of two!

J.

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On the bench -
Revell 1:72 F-16B

Completed builds
Click here

Coming attractions -
Eduard 1:48 Bf 110 G-4
Academy 1:72 F-22a Raptor
Tamiya 1:35 T-55a
Moebius 1:128 Seaview

I've had decals do that before.....strange how they take off like that!

The ejector marks are a curse. The hobby was so much more fun when we could ignore them cos we knew no better....

That Mig with engine looks great!

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Cheers
Sean

It's not mine actually, I spotted it on Aeroscale and thought you might find it interesting. Personally I think it looks like a tram car spliced into the wing.