THINGS UNDER WINGS
I mentioned earlier that I had tested
some of the decals on the ordnance;
I had been building these as a
background task when I couldn’t
bring myself to do anything major
on the airframe. I also mentioned
in the intro just how extensive this
aspect of the kit is. About 640 parts
are dedicated to things under wings,
and there was no way I was going to
make everything, so it was a matter
of choosing a load-out and making
those items. But what to use?
There are the usual air-to-air
missiles: R-27s (both radar and EO,
four of each), R-27ERs (both radar
and EO, four of each), R-73s (four),
and R-77s (four), so that’s already
more stuff than could be fitted on
the available hard points, and that’s
only two sprues! There are a couple
of huge fuel tanks and a selection
of other missiles, some of which
I had to look up. There are a pair
each of Kh-59, Kh-31, Kh-58, and
R-172s, and very interesting they
are too; the Kh-31 in particular
looks like a little Bloodhound (I
would love one of those in 1/48,
modern injection-moulded please,
if anyone is listening), and the
anti-AWACS R-172 is very striking.
Should you want to move mud,there are four more identical sprues,
each containing FAB-100 (six),
FAB-250 (three), and FAB-500 (one)
bombs, plus an MER (I’m going to
stick with Multiple Ejector Rack,
though I know the Russians call it
something different), and parts for
a KMGU-2 munitions dispenser.
The MER alone consists of 30 parts,and as mentioned, there are four of
them. I didn’t make them all, just
one to show what they look like.
There are also some smaller
sprues which provide two of each
of the EO, laser guided versions of
the KAB-1500 (a BIG bomb), and two
APK-9s, which are data link pods,
apparently, though the instructionsdon’t point that out. You may need
to fit one of these, depending on
the weapons load you go with.
So I made up lots and lots of
missiles and bombs (and still had
many sprues left over), but one
slight moan about the ordnance:
again it seems like the weapons
were done by those two completely“ABOUT 640 PARTS ARE DEDICATED
TO THINGS UNDER WINGS”
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