Hasegawa Mig-25: The one that got away!

I remember hearing about the Viktor Belenko defection on the news back in late '76 and when old man Peterson at his hobby shop showed me an advertisement from Hasegawa of their upcoming model of Belenko's Mig-25, I was thrilled! He told me he'd put me on the list for the first ones to arrive, and a couple weeks later he called, and I got my Foxbat. I think the plastic parts were still warm from the injection molding machine! It was an exciting time for modelers and an exciting model to put together. I was still a few months away from getting my Badger 350 airbrush on my birthday, but I didn't do a bad job brush painting the Mig.
On this rebuild I sprayed it with Tamiya Light Ghost Gray, which is fairly close to the medium gray recommended on the instruction sheet. I checked first though and nobody makes the "medium gray" either in bottle or spray that Hasegawa lists in the painting diagram. At any rate, new and old color pictures of Foxbats show many different shades of gray so who's to say what's right or wrong?
It was fun to revisit this model and notice the crisp clean molding, but many joints and assembly lines didn't quite line up and required much putty and sanding. Perhaps the engineers at Hasegawa were a little to anxious to get this model on the market. At any rate, I had fun building it again, and aside from the nose pitot tube I broke off during handling and couldn't find, I think it looks fine. Belenko's Mig was unarmed when he defected so I left the missiles off on this rebuild.

Another Williams Bros. Boeing 247! This time it's Roscoe Turner's Racer

I like the Williams Bros. Boeing 247 so much I decided to do another one as the Turner Racer shown on the box top. I also wanted it "wheels up" and that saved a lot of time. Yes, I actually used the Williams Bros. clear display stand included with the kit! I also inserted a Roscoe Turner like figure into the pilot's seat. He's actually the leftover pilot from the Italeri La-5. To simulate the spinning props I simply removed the blades from their hubs. Even with gear up though I still had to install some of the landing gear struts into their slots. I sprayed it overall Testors Gloss Gull Gray to replicate Turner's airplane after it had received a gloss gray paint job at some time during or after the race.