Now as the MiG is closer to completion, I am going to concentrate on this for the next few days. In the last update on this project, I was in the process of doing the panel lines on the fuselage. This was completed last night and I moved onto fitting the undercarriage into the bays. I don't know what it is with this kit, but nothing fits properly or looks like the parts in the instructions. It gives me the feeling that this is two different kits thrown together as one. The last model that frustrated like this was the Airfix 1/24th scale P-51D Mustang, and that was due to the age of the tooling.
Now back to this model. The undercarriage, and guess what? It didn't fit. The location holes in the bays for the main gear were too small for the gear supplied in the kit. I had to cut off the pins for the back location points and file the plates down to allow the struts to get into the bays. Even then they would not fit, so out with another file and a grove was filed into the main struts to clear the outer side of the bays.
The front gear went together without any trouble. It was the ram for lowering and raising the gear that was too long to fit in the space. I must admit, the front gear does look a bit fragile for this aircraft. You think, this aircraft weighs over 50 tons and I'm surprised that the undercarriage takes the punishment from each landing of a plane this heavy!
There is so much weight to the rear of this fuselage. Even with the extra weight I put in the nose section, it still wants to lift up. So to try and counteract this, I have added some pieces of solder wire in two of the main gear wheels. And if this does not work, I will add some lead shot to the front ends of the external tanks which sit forwards of the main gear. Now back to doing some painting on this old girl.
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