The Wife's Three Week Challenge!

[Gekko_1]

Hi Allan,

this time around all I did was wipe the little excess away with my finger. As you can see by the residue remaining it wasn't entirely successful so maybe a damp cloth would have been better.



Richard.

[Gekko_1]

What's this, two updates in one day!  Ian will be pleased  B)


OK here's the upper fuselage sanded and re-sprayed. Tailwheel and wing tip lights have been masked






Time to mix some paint. For those who are unfamiliar how to prepare paint for an airbrush here's what I did. Firstly find some sprue cut from the tree of kit parts, mix the paint with the sprue stiring in both a circular and up and down motion. Do this until the paint looks well mixed. Then using the same sprue I dropped in fifty drops of Tamiya XF-53 directly into the airbrush cup, followed by thirty drops of Tamiya X-20A Acrylic thinner (pored into the bottles cap and dropped in using a Testors dropper [A]). Stir this together and your ready to go.


Then here's what I spotted! The canopy had popped off! So I will have to take it off, clean it up and re-apply it! The yellow arrow points to a spot of dust.


Here we see a hair stuck to the surface. Do not remove these straight away. Wait until the paint had thoroughly dried and remove it with a gloved finger or slightly stiff brush.


A glue run that will need some light sanding to eliminate.


So far so good, now we let it all dry over night.



Richard.

[Ian the Kiwi Herder]

Yaaayy, go Richard !

Ian

[Allan]

Hi Richard
This thread is getting bigger than Ben Hur!!!
A little while back you said you mixed Mr Surfacer with thinner and painted the stuff onto the tailplane/fuselage joint.
Did you have any trouble using the cotton bud/metho method with the thinner in the Surfacer?
Nowadays checking on this thread is getting part of my daily routine.
Great modelling!!!!!!!!!
Allan in Canberra

[Damian2]

I love following your step-by-step guides!!

[Gekko_1]

A little while back you said you mixed Mr Surfacer with thinner and painted the stuff onto the tailplane/fuselage joint.
Did you have any trouble using the cotton bud/metho method with the thinner in the Surfacer?

Hi Allan,

what I noticed was that the Enamel Thinner / Mr Surfacer combination had eaten, or etched, itself into the plastic a little. Nothing too problematic and hardly noticeable really. I had no trouble using the metho / cotton bud removal method, though I did use a little wet & dry sand paper (used dry) on the area too. It worked great! I would however be cautious using the Enamel Thinner / Mr Surfacer combination on areas where the plastic is thin.



Richard.

[Gekko_1]

With all the sanding and repair work done it was time to try a little experiment before moving on to the actual paint job. What I wanted to achieve was a chipped paint effect on several panels and various areas of the model that would be a different tone to the rest of the paint as opposed to "silver" paint chips. Sort of like the paint had chipped down to an undercoat.


I began by masking out a panel and beginning the paint chip masking using the "Vegemite method".

For those who had missed the Vegemite experiments look here:

http://www.whatifmodelers.com/forum//index...showtopic=14931

http://www.whatifmodelers.com/forum//index...showtopic=14932

http://www.whatifmodelers.com/forum//index...showtopic=15044



I began dabbing on the Vegemite with a piece of scouring pad held in a pair of tweezers.


Here's a close-up of it. A piece like this is great for achieving nice organic shapes. Note the Vegemite mixed with tap water on the lid to give a thinned down medium. Some of this was applied with a very fine brush.


By painting and stippling-on the Vegemite in both a "dry" (straight out of the jar) with the scouring pad bit and wet application by fine brush I got this effect.


This is meant to represent panels that have had heavy usage by ground crews as well as scuffing, chipping and general wear and tear.


It was all going so well.........................and then I airbrushed a darker coat over it, waited for it to dry about 15 minutes and washed it off with soapy cold water only to reveal.............................................










TOTAL FAILURE![/size]    


I'm not sure at this stage what exactly went wrong, but this was NOT the effect I was after!


However after having a good look at it, it did have an interesting effect. Perhaps some of this effect would work well to replicate the look of US Navy jets after a few days of intense Carrier operations?


Ah that damned canopy!   Now the white glue has come away from the plastic! Looks like its back to the drawing board with that too!  


Perhaps the Vegemite was too thin? But then it definitely acted as a masking agent, only it left me with a soft edge! Which is actually really interesting! All I have to do now if figure out what went wrong........or is that right? :dum:  And try and work out how to replicate it for a sharp edge and soft edge when needed.

Bloody hell this was supposed to be a three week challenge not a three year Degree in model making!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



Richard.

[bluntie]

Hmmmm, dont know that i would call that a failure Richard,definatley a very interesting effect,as a matter of fact the more i look at it, the more convincing it becomes. i think if i was looking to replicate paint that had been exposed to salt spray and strong uv light i would be pretty happy with the result.
  Cheers Bluntie.

[nev]

H Richard, a couple of comments from someone with about 0.03% of your ability

1)  I think the effect you've created would have been better if it had been replicated over the entire upper airframe - you could have varied its heaviness, but it looks kinda weird having some panels completely mint, and others shot to pieces

2)  I'm not sure about the places where you used thinned Vegemite

3)  It looks more like weathering than chipping/flaking because your base coat is very similar to your top coat.  Every other use of the marmite method I've seen (usually armour), the base coat is very dark, the top coat is very light.

[Gekko_1]

H Richard, a couple of comments from someone with about 0.03% of your ability

1)  I think the effect you've created would have been better if it had been replicated over the entire upper airframe - you could have varied its heaviness, but it looks kinda weird having some panels completely mint, and others shot to pieces

2)  I'm not sure about the places where you used thinned Vegemite

3)  It looks more like weathering than chipping/flaking because your base coat is very similar to your top coat.  Every other use of the marmite method I've seen (usually armour), the base coat is very dark, the top coat is very light.

One thing's for sure Nev, what I was trying to do didn't work



Richard.

[Gekko_1]

Canopy off. Scraped down any paint build-up and windscreen attached with watch makers glue. So far so good.


Canopy sill removed (purple arrow), other side still to do.


Canopy back on and gap filled.

After that photo was taken I decided to try a little more experimenting with the Vegemite. I thought that perhaps the Vegemite was still wet when I spayed in the initial experiment so I sped up the drying process by holding the wing up to my halogen lamp............

idiot![/size]


Yep. I held the wing up to the lamp for too long didn't I! :dum:  :dum:  :dum:  :dum:

And melted it! Jeeeeze I'm a dumb fuzzy bunny!  

Once I realised what I had done I calmly put the model down and walked out of the room. About a week later I came back to it and decided what would be the best way of getting things back on track.


I had to cut out the worst of it.


And fill the rest with super glue and Mr Surfacer.


I know it looks bad but since I've already spent so much time with it I couldn't just slam it against a wall and walk away. Plus I'm curious to see how it looks finished!


Plastic card glued into place with the thick Tamiya glue.


Although its hard to see in this photo there is quite a dip in the middle of all that Mr Surfacer.


So, next day another layer of Mr Surfacer is applied!


Whilst waiting for the glue and Mr Surfacer to dry I got to work on cleaning up the canopy, then sprayed it black. So far so good.

I'm pretty confident I'll be able to repair it. At least I'm going to give it a good try!



Richard. :dum:  

[Brian da Basher]

That's the spirit, Richard! I know you'll get this one repaired and back on track! It definately pays to persevere!

Brian da Basher

[cthulhu77]

Wow...what a process !  You know what, though, in the end, this may be one of your favourites, just due to all of the pain in the arse...

[BlackOps]

Aww man that sucks! you coulda experimented with battle damage but I'm confident that when your done no one will be the wiser.

[ysi_maniac]

Definitely out of my human, too human, reach.