Hi everyone! Here's my new project I wanna share with you, the Sukhoi Su-17M3.

But hold on, it's not the infamous Kitty Hawk Fitter and neither is the new HobbyBoss one. We're talking about a Modelsvit one in 1:72 scale. And from what I've seen so far, it is by far the best Fitter in this scale... and quite possibly in any.

Ejection seat consists of, believe it or not, 23 parts! What you see here is 22 parts as I left of the commendably thin ejection seat lever to add at the end. All in all a model inside a model I could say and the level of detail is just great. The only problem are instructions as they are not very clear with the location of some of the tinier parts.

http://imodeler.com/uploads/fileupload-temp/inflames/rescaled/59c0383720ffc.jpg
http://imodeler.com/uploads/fileupload-temp/inflames/rescaled/59c038316075e.jpg

Nicely molded exhaust turbine
http://imodeler.com/uploads/fileupload-temp/inflames/rescaled/59c03827a4ae3.jpg

The exhaust pipe is of correct length and made out of 3 parts. It is a bit tricky to assemble, but for some time lost during the assembly, you get some really nice interior details and the dreadful seam lines that usually plague the exhaust halves, won't be seen here.
http://imodeler.com/uploads/fileupload-temp/inflames/rescaled/59c038340f023.jpg

Cockpit and front wheel well details is awesome as well - larger companies should be learning from a small short-run company like Modelsvit.
http://imodeler.com/uploads/fileupload-temp/inflames/rescaled/59c038379fb1a.jpg

I've bypassed the instructions a bit here - instead of building the cockpit/front wheel well assembly first and then gluing everything into the fuselage halves, I found it easier to just glue the cockpit halves into each respective fuselage half and build on from there. And guess what, the fit is perfect!
http://imodeler.com/uploads/fileupload-temp/inflames/rescaled/59c0383516773.jpg

Just look at the back wall details. Much better than with KittyHawk kit in larger scale. You get two different instrument panels - one with flat surface if you choose decal and one with all the little details if you fancy painting all the little details. I guess I'll go with the later option and if I fail miserably, I still have a back up 🙂
http://imodeler.com/uploads/fileupload-temp/inflames/rescaled/59c03833c0e8a.jpg

7 attached images. Click to enlarge.

Thank you Jeffry! Here's some more progress.

As suspected applying some paint and weathering brought all the details forward. I still can't believe what Modelsvit achieved with injection-molded technology. And the 23-piece ejection seat to boot 🙂

7 attached images. Click to enlarge.

Thanks, Greg! Modelsvit Su-7/17 series are really great kits. Yeah, they're short-runs and require a little bit more of prep work, but eventually they build into really beautiful models. The first of Su-17s released was the kit of Su-17M - it is not as detailed as the M3, so you can actually see a progress that Modelsvit makes... but despite that, it still has more details than your normal 1:72 kit. Oh and I just glued together wings and dryfitted them to the fuselage and guess what - they fit perfectly!