Russian MiG silver/grey?

[munkster]

Just got the Academy MiG 23 Flogger-B kit and beginning to realise that Academy aren't that helpful (so it seems) with paint references - was just aiming to paint it in the dirty silver colour that many of the soviet planes seemed to be in but the kit just says "silver" - would it be a flat silver perhaps? Or even a grey of some sort? Is there a website anywhere that's the holy grail of model paint schemes even??

So many questions!! Sorry!

 

[yak face]

Hi munkster, most of the mig 23s that werent camouflaged were left in natural metal, so your guess of dirty silver is spot on. Obviously there were a few different shades of silver on various panels and round the jet exhaust but all over silver is ok for the rest, as for the matt or gloss , its probably somewhere in between - a natural metal finish will weather and lose its shine unless polished regularly ,which i dont think the russians would have been too bothered about!! hope this helps , cheers tony

EDIT> i forgot about the grey ones! Some were done in all over light grey too , cheers tony

 

[munkster]

Cheers for that. I do need to get my head around these various weathering techniques - as a newbie I can see just how much it can improve a flat colour and am keen to give it a go...

That said, I seem to have "accidentally" won an auction for a 1:48 F-15 (didn't think my bid would be high enough) so maybe that'll get built first. Might have to buy a bigger table though, have just calculated how big that one will be when built(!)