The Little World

I pasted that title on because of the tail of this Soviet fighter plane.

Sukhoi did a bang-up job of designing a fuselage for this one – the curved lines of he corrugated metal are superb. The fairings for the Rhone engine are massive, but give the front end a really sleek look. I cannot say whether the engine was all that powerful, but the look is there.

He buried his aviator deep in the body of the aircraft and faired the headrest in – all good. And then at the end he just tacked on a couple of sheets of duraluminium.

The Zvezda model company followed suit. The horizontal tail planes are separate, but need not be – the tail just sits on the top of the fuselage and holds on with superglue. The vertical stabiliser locks it on, but not by much. There are braces on the bottom, but that’s it. I am going to be very careful of this one in the rest of the assembly because it is all smoke and mirrors.

Nevertheless, work is proceeding well, and the Soviet paint scheme is going to be laudably simple.