Revell 1/144 MiG 1.44 MFI By Matt Bittner

Introduction

A couple of years ago I thought I would purchase - and build - the Revell 1/144th Su-47 Berkut, only because it was an interesting looking aircraft, and it wasn't something I wanted to build in 1/72nd, my primary scale. It was quite the pleasure to build and I enjoyed every minute of it. After building it, I thought I would buy the "companion" kit, the other Russian "4th generation fighter", the MiG 1.44 MFI. I didn't start it long after the Berkut was finished. However, because the fit wasn't as good as the Berkut it sat in its box, in various stages of "unfinishedness". Well, since finishing the Eduard Avia CS-92 - and with seeing finished models from the likes of Bruce Simard - the 1/144th bug hit hard. So I knew I should finish the 1.44 before continuing on the 1/144th road.

Construction

Like I mentioned in my Intro, the fit on the Revell MiG 1.44 isn't as nice as the Su-47 Berkut. Most of the seams needed attention, and most of those were with putty. However, it sounds like mine was a unique case because another modeler I talked with had no major fit issues at all.

Since this was to be an out-of-the-box build, there isn't much to say. I painted the interior "MiG green" without realizing it probably wasn't green, but it was too late to change it. The one thing I did change, though, was everything that was going to be directly under the canopy. That area I painted "scale black" to help tone down the rest of the "green".

Aside from the fit issues there was nothing else that was unique about this build. I painted the dielectric panels Polly Scale "Scale Black", the top of the model was "Israeli Grey" and the underside was "German Underside Blue". I then over coated the entire model in Future prior to adding the decals, and once those were added and dried, another coat of Future went on. I think I sprayed either the initial paint, or the Future coats, too thick, because when I applied the oil wash into the panel lines, the wash wouldn't settle into some of the panel lines, especially on the topsides of the wings.

Conclusion

If you're unlucky like me and get one of the kits with fit issues, just persevere and you'll overcome. This build took me a number of "real" years because I didn't do that and let the "seam worship" get to me. Thankfully I decided to bring the kit back out and finish it up, so at the very least it's finished. Probably not my best modeling effort, but more and more I'm getting to the point of just wanting to finish models, instead of making all of them contest-ready and perfect. I'm going to have only a very few be the "near-to-perfect ones" and the rest will be finished, as soon as is possible for me. Most, if not all, of those will be 1/144th and I really am looking forward to working on the next kit in this scale.

The MiG 1.44 looks great next to the Su-47 Berkut, and I think that's how I'm going to display them  mount both on a single base, side-by-side.