Crazy bug strikes again (no. 1) - F-22 Rebuild

mchoo2005 · April 09, 2011, 06:57:13 AM

OK... I got bitten by the crazy bug again. After I finished my last project (Su-47 Berkut), all of a sudden I got this urge to rebuild all the models that I built when I first got into plastics almost 3 years ago. I found myself going into autopilot... I picked up the very first F-22 Raptor that I built... Italeri's 1/72 version.

I haven't quite decided what I'm going to do with this bird. All I know is I will end up building this as another WHIF/fictional bird.

This kit was originally built wheels down, with all the missile bays open. The first thing I did was brushing fairly generous amount of mineral turpentine over the wheel and missile bay doors to "unglue" 'em. Took a few tries over several days before they came off... along with the Sidewinder bays and one of the main gear bays! With sheer luck, both Sidewinder bays fell out, but the main gear bay is still rattling around inside the plane!

When I first built this bird, I just started using airbrush. I painted the whole plane with Tamiya acrylics, so stripping off the old paint was pretty easy. I simply rubbed it all off using methylated spirit.

The plane wasn't in a great state before I started "bashing" it, and it got worse when I was done stripping off all the paint! Funnily enough, the thing that upset me the most was losing one of the front wheel bay doors!

Here are some pics that I took after I reinstalled the missile bay doors. I've done a bit more work since I took these pics but haven't got the chance to upload 'em yet. I'll do that tomorrow (hopefully).

Taiidantomcat · April 09, 2011, 07:48:26 AM

Not bad at all, looks like you got the paint and other stuff removed while keeping it in a good condition

mchoo2005 · April 10, 2011, 03:30:08 AM

I used Milliput to plug the large gaps on main missile bay since I lost the original parts that were meant to go there. I also decided to use Milliput to plug the gaps on the top of the jet intakes, as well as to fix chipped plastic.

As I mentioned previously, I lost one of the front wheel bay covers. Rather than trying to scratch build it, I decided to simply fill the front wheel bay with more Milliput. Looks pretty bad, I know, but... I know that I don't have the patience, nor skill, to scratch build the lost cover anyway.

mchoo2005 · April 23, 2011, 05:02:44 AM

Been chipping away at this thing slowly.... Like the F-15D rebuild, I came close to running out of steam on this.

Since last update, I decided to finish off the left-over Tamiya Grey Surface Primer on this bird, and found more need for putty and sanding in quite a few places... Did a bit more puttying and sanding today. I then gave it a quick rub with 1200-grit sandpaper, then gave it a quick wash.

I'm still unsure what colour scheme I'll use for this bird. Anyone got any ideas? The more colourful, the better!

GTX · April 23, 2011, 12:12:35 PM

How about another agressor type scheme - this time based on something like this:

Regards,

Greg

mchoo2005 · April 23, 2011, 02:53:37 PM

Hmmmm.... I'm actually thinking of doing something "out there" for this Raptor. In fact, I'm thinking of spraying some sort of eagle silhouette on its back, or... something akin to GDI logo carrying thunderbolt(s) in its claw. But... if I can't pull off creating the stencils for either, I might fall back to one of those beautiful Flanker colour schemes.

Taiidantomcat · April 24, 2011, 10:15:38 AM

Kind of surprised that in all the years it has been around (i remember playing the C and C demo in the summer of 95!!) that I havn't seen many Command and Conquer models... maybe I am just not looking hard enough? Gold and silver scheme would look cool on this! Look forward to seeing more

Captain Canada · April 24, 2011, 10:22:42 AM

Nice recovery ! It would have been nice to see a pic of the plane before you stripped it. A Raptor in that Flanker scheme would look awesome.

mchoo2005 · April 24, 2011, 02:39:54 PM

Quote from: Captain Canada on April 24, 2011, 10:22:42 AM
Nice recovery ! It would have been nice to see a pic of the plane before you stripped it. A Raptor in that Flanker scheme would look awesome.

There are some pics of this bird next to Revell Raptor that I built a little while back here:
http://s742.photobucket.com/user/mchoo2005/slideshow/Revell/Revell%20Raptor%20no%201

mchoo2005 · April 29, 2011, 05:47:11 AM

OK... A plan is beginning to form in my head today in terms of how I'm going to paint this junk. All I can say right now is, there may/will be 2 or 3 different shades of metallic colours, and.... a bit of a surprise.... Well, not if you remember my EF-2000 rebuild project a little while back.

I won't/can't disclose more since it's still in early design stage.

In the meantime, I used this bird to test Citadel's metallic paint. OMG!!!! I think it's even better than Mr Metal Color!!!! For me, it's the perfect metallic colour. I mixed roughly 3 parts of Chainmail (which is somewhat similar to Mr Metal Color's Stainless) with 1 part of Codex Grey, thinned with distilled water at 1:1 ratio, then airbrushed over this bird. Astounding result!!!

In my eyes, the coat looks extremely close to actual Raptor coat (at least the ones that took part in Avalon 2011 Air Show).

The pigment on the Citadel metallic is soooo fine! No wonder Citadel paints cost almost twice as much as Gunze and Tamiya, and almost 4 times as much as LifeColor.

At the moment, I'm trying to find the closest alternative to Codex Grey in LifeColor range for cost reasons. I have a hunch that LifeColor's FS36118 might be the closest....

mchoo2005 · June 04, 2011, 08:26:03 PM

I haven't really worked on this that much since I could not quite make up my mind on what to do on this thing, until recently.... I now know what I'm gonna do, but not sure how it'll turn out.

Anyway... masked and sprayed Tamiya Titanium Gold on the nose, then using Blu-Tack, masked and sprayed the centre upper fuselage with a little concoction that I hope to use as the dark metallic grey camo on my future Raptor build (got a Revell and an Academy in the stash). Up next (I think/hope) is more Blu Tack masking and light misting of... something (haven't decided on the colour yet).

Thanks for looking!

Taiidantomcat · June 05, 2011, 08:13:01 AM

Wow that metallic paint is awesome

mchoo2005 · June 05, 2011, 03:31:35 PM

Yeah... I'm completely sold on Citadel's metallic range! Absolutely awesome! Might be a tad expensive, but... absolutely worth every penny!

mchoo2005 · June 14, 2011, 04:20:59 AM

Over the course of a week or so, I gradually put on some Blu Tack sausages across the fuselage.

Made the paper mask tonight.

Thanks for looking!

Taiidantomcat · June 14, 2011, 02:25:09 PM

No way!!