Just started on the 1/48 Kinetic Su-33. I was really excited about building this thing because I'd heard so many good things about it. I have to say that so far, and it's still early in the kit, I am not impressed. I started with the seat as you see here. The instructions are rather vague and unless you are familiar with the intricacies of the real thing, you'll have difficulty figuring out where some parts are supposed to go. The fit so far is terrible. The seat back, for instance is a separate, curved piece, yet the part it's supposed to rest against is flat causing it to rock back side to side leaving big gaps along its sides. I had to take a bone bur and add curvature to the horizontal piece on the seat frame. The seat bottom is too thick and the bottom front edge has to be thinned in order for it to fit in the frame. There is a lot of flash and the plastic feels a bit "waxy". The CAD illustrations are really terrible and as I mentioned, parts location can be vague. So far, I've spent 3 hours on the seat and it looks terrible.

Hey, George. I'm looking forward to your next Russian fighter project.
I hope things will do better with the kinetic kit as the build proceeds.

I guess you know the documentaries Wings of the Red Star and Wings of Russia, do you?
It's all on YouTube.
I can't say much about their historical correctness but they are very entertaining, especially the ones spoken by Sir Peter Ustinov.

Hi George, I see what you mean about the seat. It looks a little..er... basic, but I'm sure your skills will win out in the end. I'm a fan of Sukhoi aircraft so will be interested to see your progress.

Work on the 1/48 Kinetic Su-33 cockpit is complete. I decided to paint the side panels instead of using the Dream Model PE as they were totally the wrong color. I had no choice but to use the instrument panel PE. I painted over some of the seat PE parts with Vallejo acrylics because I thought the printing was once again too grainy and the colors were a strange purplish blue. The cokpit parts were given a wash of Ammo of Mig PLW.

3 attached images. Click to enlarge.

I do not know the subject, but painting of the cockpit is really excellent, all detail are properly highlighted.
Roberto.

Here's the front landing gear to the 1/48 Kinetic Su-33 I started a few days ago. I hate to sound like a broken record, but their instructions are just plain terrible. Some of the parts on the weird CAD illustrated instructions don't look anything like the parts on the sprues. Parts are shown assembled on top of one another or on the same location. I had to look for photo references of the real plane in order to figure out where stuff went. Even so it's coming together quite nicely.

2 attached images. Click to enlarge.

This is looking really good so far. For all your reservations on the cockpit, the end result is pretty impressive! The detail on the landing gear is spot on as well.

I'm glad that the moulding is making up for the lack of an instruction book anyway. I've read some really good reviews on this kit actually, I would like a go at it at some point in my life. I see that Hobbyboss are releasing a 1/48 kit of the SU-34 towards the end of this year. I think I'm definitely asking our man Santa for that.

I've attached the two intake sub assemblies to the fuselage contrary to the instructions. Kinetic's directions have you attach all the different components to the fuselage bottom before attaching the intake shrouds. This didn't seem to make any sense as the parts fit precisely into the shrouds. I've noticed that with Kinetic left is right and right is left many times and their parts numbering can't be trusted.

The landing gear are finished and I'm very pleased with the results.

2 attached images. Click to enlarge.