Atlantis Models 1/54 S2F Hunter Killer Build Review

By Michael Benolkin

Build Review

For a brief discussion of this subject and a look at this kit out of the box, look here.

And now for something a little different - this is the Atlantis (Aurora) 1/54 (box scale) S2F-1 Tracker kit. Just for fun, I thought I'd see what could be done with this model straight from the box, but I also want to try a few new products as well. Here I've used my Sujiburido files and the Alec R-Boko scraping tool to remove the mold flash from the parts. I dry-fit the parts together to ensure the mating surfaces were all clean.

I've started building subassemblies and priming certain areas with Stynylrez black including the inside of the fuselage, the leading edges, and the backgrounds of the engine faces. In the background is a Polar Lights Universal Dome Base to replace the (too small) display base in the kit.

The subassemblies are together I dry-fitted the wing center section to the fuselage to see how much filler might be required. The gaps were minimal and this isn't going to be a contest entry, so I skipped the gap-filling. Note the pylons under the wings - the kit has rockets molded to the pylons and I used a razor saw to remove them. I did spend some time with the wings and fuselage wet-sanding the seams to blend the parts halves together. There were slight steps that needed to be fixed.

I glued the outer sections of the wings to the center section we'll soon be heading to the paint rack!

One of the objectives of this build was to try out Mission Models' paints. First I painted the area where the walkways are located using a Tamiya gray, then masked the walkways. I applied Mission Models Sea Blue, which is glossy out of the bottle. I used two different techniques to evaluate the paint, and these are all described here in our Mission Models paint review. As you can see here the paint went down nicely over Stynylrez, Tamiya paint, and bare plastic.

After painting the deicer boots on the wings and tail leading edges, I glued the wings and horizontal stabilizer to the fuselage. The kit has a few interesting features like a radome that can be extended or retracted and locked up, as well as a movable MAD boom in the tail.

The Polar Lights display base works well with this kit. It uses a ball and socket between the model and base to allow the model to be positioned in different attitudes for display. I glued the socket to the hole in the lower fuselage that had its own socket for the kit stand, then snapped the model onto the base. The model is tail-heavy and needs ballast to sit properly on the stand. I placed .75 ounces (21 grams) inside the nose through the open windscreen and that provided the needed balance. I would recommend 25-26 grams to get a better balance.

While I'm glad I left the clear parts off the model until I figured out the ballast requirements, the glass was designed to be put into the fuselage before gluing the fuselage halves together. I did my final touch-ups of the base coat and then added the kit decals. The instructions don't provide decal placement information, but that's okay, the kit has the outlines for the decals scribed into the surface of the plastic. This is truly old school modeling! I also used some Gundam paint markers to apply metallic gray on the cylinders inside the cowlings and engine gray on the crank cases.

Once the decals were dry, I applied a coat of Future to seal and blend the decals to the surrounding paint. The final task was to mask up the propellers and finish them off. I finished up by masking the exhaust troughs atop the nacelles and painting some gray exhaust stains to replicate the look I found in some reference photos.

The Stoof is finished and I like the results. The project took a little longer than I expected, but the effort was worth the results. If you want a project that will take you back to modeling basics, grab one of the variety of classic kit reissues from Atlantis Models like this one!