Trumpeter's 1/48 scale
MiG-19S Farmer C

by Ingo Degenhardt

MiG-19S Farmer C

  images by Lutz Degenhardt

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The MiG-19 was the first Soviet-produced fighter plane capable of reaching supersonic speeds in level flight. The first production aircraft were already delivered in 1955, but showed several problems; the most significant being poor control effectiveness at high speeds. Primarily this was cured by inventing an all-flying horizontal tail. Hence the suffix “S” (stabilizator)

This version became operational in mid-1956. Soviet production of the MiG-19 in all variants was comparatively small, slightly exceeding 2000 aircraft, and ended in 1958.

The majority of this aircraft was build under license in Shenyang, China as the Shenyang F-6 with  a production of approximately 4000 aircraft to serve with the Chinese Air Force and Navy; but also for world-wide export.

This model was build completely out of the box starting with the cockpit as usual. This is nicely detailed with a clear-film insert for all the different gauges on the instrument panel. Gunsight and Sidewalls are also well detailed. Only seat belts from lead foil were added to the ejection seat..

The fuselage consists of seven major parts even without the vertical fin which is attached separately. The fuselage halves fit together very well but the various insert panels (to be changed for different versions) and the nosecone need some work – dry fitting, filling and sanding.

The completed wings with their separately moulded flaps and ailerons in the chosen position are glued into slots on the fuselage sides. This works quite well – with some attention paid to their slightly drooped angle to be equal. Only a little filling was necessary on the underside of the wing/fuselage joint.

While I attached the flaps and ailerons in their “up” position, the tailplane has the stabilators  glued on trailing edge down and the rudder in deflection to the left. The speed brakes are also all in the open position.

All the small intakes on the fuselage are separate parts with No. D48 being on of the smallest parts I ever had to attach to an aircraft model.

In general, construction of the MiG-19S is no problem if you keep an eye on all the seams found on the fuselage.

As the aircraft was to become an all natural metal plane, some extra care is necessary to prepare it for painting. Polishing the bare plastic (Dremel motor tool with polishing device) was the first. Next came a base coat of Tamiya acrylic black – this revealed some flaws that were treated with very fine wet&dry and afterwards the acrylic black was sprayed on once more where needed. This created the correct base for the overall coat of Alclad II’s Polished Aluminium. The model was held on a thin wooden stick inserted through the air intake.

The different shaded panels on the aircraft were sprayed with AlcladII Dark Aluminium while the exhaust area and gun blast-shield were painted with Testor’s Metalizer Magnesium. For masking I used Tamiya masking tape.

Two random panels received a further base coat of gloss black enamel as base coat for AlcladII Chrome – so resembling shiny brand-new replacement panels.

I do not know what happened, but on the left upper wing the AlcladII crazed the surface in two or three spots and no attempt to repair this was successful. So I finally had to sand off the paint from all the upper left wing – down to the plastic and then repeat the complete painting procedure.

A very strange incident – there was definitively no enamel paint in the area, no grease or anything else.

The cockpit colour is Xtracolor X629 Blue/Green, wheel wells, gear struts and ejection seat were painted in light blue (Humbrol) and for the wheel hubs I used X628 (Eastern block wheel hub green)

Weathering

Contrary to most of my models finished in natural metal this one received some noticeable weathering made from flat black washes for the wheel wells, hubs and gear struts while the surfaces were treated with pastel chalk powder of different shades from sand colour to dark brown and near black. The most heavy weathering was done to the wing tanks so these have a very ‘used’ look. The Chrome-painted replacement panels support the overall effect of some wear & tear.

Decals

Trumpeter gives the option of three different aircraft here: Chinese F-6 (with a few construction differences also), Russian Mig-19S and, also MiG-19S, an aircraft of the former German Democratic Republic in a special Blue/Gold/Yellow colour scheme with not further explanation regarding it’s purpose.

My choice was the soviet fighter with bort Number Red 37.

The decals themselves are not of a very good quality. As already experienced with Trumpeter’s Su-15TM, some decals simply splinter into two or three pieces when dipped into water. Furthermore they do not react with Superscale’s Set/Sol well enough to blend into panel lines.

Fortunately there are not so many decals on this model. The bort numbers and red stars were neatly cut out with no carrier film left and received an overspray with Testor’s Sealer for metalizer when they were all in their position on the model and had thoroughly dried. For masking I used paint masks cut from paper that were only a little taller than the decals themselves and so the sealer serves to protect the decals and keep them from coming off over the years.

Trumpeter’s decal placement guide is unfortunately only very limited and there are several decals where there is no information about their whereabouts.

The mentioned East German paint scheme includes some markings not provided as decals which I consider very hard to do by painting alone.

Furthermore a little information about the chosen aircraft would have been nice (at least for the GDR-FarmerC, as this one even includes some stencils in English!?)

Miscellaneous 

I did not dig in too deep about the MiG-19, so every mistake possibly found with the Trumpeter MiG-19S is also found on my example.

I like to do this ‘simple’ kind of modelling from time to time – no resin, no etched parts, very limited research, no extra-decals, no AMS.

• “The Complete Book of Fighters” W. Green/G. Swanborough

• http://216.110.156.31/mig19wlk.htm

http://216.110.156.31/mig19pgal.htm

Model and Text Copyright © 2004 by Ingo Degenhardt
Images Copyright © 2004 by Lutz Degenhardt
Page Created 27 July, 2004
Last Updated 26 July, 2004

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