.First up is a Yak 3 by Special Hobby kits. The Yak 3 was a small wooden fighter powered by a Klimov V12 of about 30 litres, producing about 1350hp. It was quite fast at about 410mph in speed and very manoeuverable thanks to light weight. Considering the lack of resources available to Russia, they learned to design some very good planes.
I modified the model to make the canopy slide using stock plastic 1.5mm right angle pieces, filed and painted to fit.
Cockpit.
Next up is an Airacobra P-39Q. This one is the KittyHawk kit, which is not an easy kit but turns out well if you take care with every step. Fitment is very tight. The P-39 is a very polarising plane. Some hated it, and some loved it. But you can say the same of the F4U Corsair too. The Russians loved it and used it to great effect and it remained in service as late as 1952. German pilots avoided it as much as possible. The P-63 King Cobra was designed largely with exports to Russia in mind, and with a lot of input from Russia too.
On this one, I made hinges for both doors from 0.5mm brass wire and 1.0mm brass tube so that I can open or close them which keeps dust out of the cockpit.
Here's the actual plane. The pilot is seated on the far left.
Lastly, a Polikarpov I-16 Type 17 on skis. The I-16 was the most advanced plane in the world when first flown, with cantilever monoplane wings, retractable undercarriage and an enclosed cockpit but very quickly overtaken by more advanced designs in just 2 years. Pilots didn't like the enclosed canopy, so that was soon dumped in production. However, it acquitted itself very well during the Spanish Civil War against the Messerschmitt 109B as performance was about the same, and the I-16 was more manoeuverable. Alas, by the time of the Type 17 in 1939, performance had dropped thanks to big weight increases. This model represents a plane flown in the Winter War of 1939-40.
This one had cabling added for the manually cranked undercarriage and other things which was later fed through a hole below the pulley at the base of a cockpit frame. I also added a floor as the cockpit was enclosed within the fuselage, then the wings added
I've also added spark plug wires to the engine.
I'm presently working on a P-47D Thunderbolt in Razorback form. The engine is what I'm presently fixated on, wiring all the spark plug wires. Then I'll be hacking holes in the side of the model to see the turbocharger workings. I'll bet I get this finished before a
P3D version of the same plane is released here 
Cheers,
Mike
