Yesterday I took delivery of a pair of Revell (ex-Zvezda) 1/72 Su-27SM kits, with the intent of building one of them in the box-top blue-over-blue camo scheme (which is the most gorgeous production scheme the Russians have ever fielded); and the other as a what-if of some sort, no real plan specified.
I had a first look at the runners of the two kits yesterday, and discovered that one of the kits has a deep sink-mark in the headrest of the ejection seat. "No big deal, I can put the pilot figure in and no one will see it, no need to mess around with putty."
Then I painted both pits blue as is good and proper for a Flanker, and then this morning I installed the instrument panel decals. And used too much Mr Mark Softner on one of them. "Okay, the decal is still there, just a little crooked, no one will see it anyway if the pilot figure is in the way and the pit is closed up."
And then as I was carefully cutting off the parts for the seats, one of the armrests failed to separate from my fingertip while it was still over the table, and instead landed on my floor, where it vanished.
"Fine then, Plan: Westernize It is a go. Where's my spares box?"
I only just decided to follow through with this, so I haven't taken any pictures yet, nor have I even decided which nationality to go for, that will basically depend on which of the seats in my spares box has the best fit.
The broken Revell F-22 seat I had on the desk needed a bunch of modification just to go inside the cockpit, and it's too long in the seat department and will interfere with the kit flight stick. I may be able to use a sidestick from the seat donor kit, but I'm not sure where I put the box or whether the stick is still there, it's been a long time since I worked on my models.
I know I have several Revell Typhoon and Tornado seats in a box somewhere, assembled and unpainted, but I don't remember what the back of those things look like so I don't know how much modification they'd need to fit in the seat pit. I may also have an F-16 seat and a Super Hornet seat, though the latter is probably not going to work well at all without removing the box the K-36 sits on in the Su-27 pit.
I do have unused decal sheets for Revell's Typhoon kit (with options for Germany, Britain, Austria and Italy); Revell's F-22 kit (several USAF options); a Revell F-16C-50 kit (USAF options again): and somewhere I pretty much have to have two sheets for the old Revell (ex-Italeri) JAS-39 Gripen, since I've found the airframes and they're unpainted.
I also have *plenty* of Western stores to use, as I haven't gotten to the weapon installation stage on an aircraft kit in a very long time, and I just keep buying more... I have the complete weapons fit from:
3 Revell F-22A Raptors (AIM-9M, AIM-9X, AIM-120C, GBU-32)
2 Revell Typhoons (AIM-9M, AIM-120B, ASRAAM, IRIS-T, Meteor, Storm Shadow, Taurus)
1 Revell F-16C-50 Fighting Falcon (AIM-9M, AIM-120C, GBU-10, AGM-88)
1 Academy F-35A Lightning II (AIM-9X, AIM-120C, GBU-31/BLU-109)
1 Hobby Boss Rafale-B (MICA-EM, MICA-IR, Apache/SCALP)
1 Revell F/A-18E (AIM-120C, AIM-9X, I have absolutely no recollection of what else there was in this kit...)
1 Hasegawa Weapons Set VI (GBU-10, GBU-12, GBU-16, GBU-24/BLU-109)
1 Hasegawa Weapons Set VII (AGM-154, GBU-31, LANTIRN)
1 Hasegawa Weapons Set VIII (AIM-120C, AIM-9X, ECM pods)
1 Hasegawa Weapons Set IX (GBU-31/BLU-109, GBU-38, SNIPER, LITENING)
Anyway, the spares box is plenty healthy, the only things I actually feel lacking in are Small Diameter Bombs, JASSMs, and British ordnance like Brimstone, ALARM and their 1000-lb LGBs.