1/72 MikroMir Lockheed Martin "Hopeless Diamond"

[Frank3k]

With some trepidation, I started this kit:


https://www.scalemates.com/kits/mikromir-72-031-lockheed-martin-hopeless-diamond--1646333

It has relatively few parts, so I figured it wouldn't be too difficult of a build.  With my experience with MikroMir I knew that most of the build would be  fit, sand, test, fit, repeat. The cockpit area, landing bay and exhaust are all multi-part affairs with considerable flash. The main cockpit tub looks like it's enclosed, but the front and back "walls" are actually flash and have to be removed.

I spent a lot of time carefully fitting and sanding the forward edges of the lower fuselage until it all but snapped into place. After adding the main landing gear bays I noticed that they hit the upper fuselage, so it was either remove them and remove yet more plastic, or trim and sand away the sections that contact the upper fuselage. That's what I did, but sanding the lower edges of the bays (where they go into the lower fuselage) would work as well. I also had to do extensive trimming near the exhaust to get the two fuselage halves to mate at the same level:

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Top view with the cockpit and PE intake grills - which don't fit perfectly, but close enough:



The real debate has been how much to detail the cockpit. The ejection seat is pretty bland, but it's both narrower and shorter than any modern ejection seat. I even tried a resin seat for a P-80 and it was too tall. I may just end up adding some belts to the kit seat and calling it a day. The instrument panel has been colored with some AK pens and brushed with a pencil. The side panels have only been brushed with a pencil:



Carl pointed out this 3D printed add-on for this kit from AMP that may help solve some of the fit problems (or may have problems of their own). It looks good, though:



The next big show stopper is the canopy. It comes as two flat clear styrene plates. The instructions show the plates glued along the top edge, then dropped into place. That's not going to happen because the canopy sections are about 1mm too long and 1mm too wide at the bottom. A combination of very careful but extensive sanding is required just to get them to barely fit in the provided space. I probably have an hour or more of test fitting and sanding (and puttying) before they fit properly.

The instructions have you trapping the nose gear in the nose bay halves as you build them. We all know this will lead to great unhappiness, so I carved a channel from the two depressions that hold the nose gear "T" axle. By twisting the nose gear slightly, it falls into place.

[Jeffry Fontaine]

That parts count reminds me of an Aurora kit from long ago. 

[GTX_Admin]

I would do this as a UCAV

[Buzzbomb]

Nice one Frank

[Kerick]

I would do this as a UCAV

Good idea!

[Frank3k]

This one is finished:



The canopy popped out slightly.... I'm not going to fix it, though:



I added some Vallejo irridescent paint to the Vallejo jet exhaust:



I used some Hasegawa TF903 "Polarize Finish" interference film on the inside of the canopy:



It does create some cool effects:



The decals have a "CAPT J POEWRS" flying this plane. I thought this was a misspelling of "Powers" so I shortened it to POE. Good enough for a raven black aircraft:



Surprisingly few issues for a MikroMir kit!

[Buzzbomb]

Nice one. The film does add a degree of interest to what may, in some peoples minds,  be a mildly non-interesting shape.

[Kerick]

Capt. Poe? Star Wars influence?
Actually that looks pretty interesting. The paint on the exhaust and the material over the canopy is a nice touch.

[Old Wombat]

Capt. Poe? Star Wars influence?

Try Edgar Allan, author of "The Raven" & other works of dark fiction.
 
I still don't like this aircraft ("mildly non-interesting" is an understatement) but you've certainly made it look much more interesting than I would have thought possible, Frank! 

The iridescent paint & the interference film are pure genius! 

[Dr. YoKai]

 I actually like the shape, but my eccentricities are a know quantity.  I am surprised at how small the thing is overall. The interference film looks like it would have a number of uses in SF builds-I'll have to pick some up. Beautiful job as always, Frank.

[Frank3k]

If this had been built to fly, it looks like it would have had just enough fuel to taxi to the runway, take-off, then fly around the field for a landing.

The Hasegawa film is hard to find. I have TF903, which is Brown-Cyan. I found this variant:

TF901 Polarize Finish Cobalt Blue-Yellow

[GTX_Admin]