Sabena Airbus A350-900, my first civil airliner whiff

[Spey_Phantom]

after years of building warplanes and military hardware, i though i might start of the year with something more peacefull  
i decided to build a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, in the colors of the former Belgian National Airline, Sabena  

this is going to be my first civil airliner what if model, just to have a change of pace.
i might build a concorde in the near future with the same markings  

i dont have the kit in the stash yet (going for the Revell kit) but i have already begun designing the decals.
for this, i used my previously built KC-787 as a testbed  
i printed out the decals on normal paper and appear to be satisfied with the result.

but because the all gloss white color scheme is a pain in the bum to apply, im gonna get some cans of white spraypaint from a local hardware store. these will come in handy when i build future models  

here's a pic of the pre-designed decals, based on that of the present day Sabena Flight Academy (the only branch of the airline still in operation, appart from Sabena Technics).

[TallEng]

Looks interesting Nils, I suppose you've already checked out Daco Decals?
Only they seem to do exactly what you want.
http://ultra.glo.be/daco/
Should get you to the Sabena decals for the Airbus A330/A340, I know it says
Only available in 1/200th but I would have thought that would be close enough for a Boeing

Edit: it just gets you to the start page, you the go top right for skyline decals.

Regards
Keith

[Spey_Phantom]

Looks interesting Nils, I suppose you've already checked out Daco Decals?
Only they seem to do exactly what you want.
http://ultra.glo.be/daco/
Should get you to the Sabena decals for the Airbus A330/A340, I know it says
Only available in 1/200th but I would have thought that would be close enough for a Boeing

Edit: it just gets you to the start page, you the go top right for skyline decals.

Regards
Keith

i have looked at DACO first, but most of them are sold out or are the old logo.
im going for the new redesigned logo 

[Green Dragon]

Hope you test the spray paint on some scrap plastic first  Nils, some of them EAT plastic! Guess how I figured that out! I use Halfords Gloss Appliance White for airliners, don't know if you can get that in Belgium?

Paul Harrison

[PR19_Kit]

That looks pretty promising Nils, go for it. 

[NARSES2]

That looks pretty promising Nils, go for it. 

It does doesn't it 

[Spey_Phantom]

Update:

there has been a change of plan!

since no 787-8 kits were available in the local stores atm, i have bought an Airbus A350 kit instead.
besides, Sabena standardised its fleet to an all Airbus fleet before going belly under in 2002 

so i think the A350 would be more fitting.
colorscheme will remain unchanged
the kit im using, is the new Revell kit 
at first glimps, it looks very good, nice details, but  i dont like the way the fanblades are moulded into the sprue  .
just like the props on the 1/72 A400M, its gonna be a pain to cut those out.

[Spey_Phantom]

Thread revival  

work has begun  



i started on the hardest part first, the tail. i going with blue in a streamline patern, because all-white is boring  




i found this scheme on Google, im going to base it arround this

[Captain Canada]

Nice one Nils ! That's goinjg to look awesome !

[Spey_Phantom]

Update:

cockpit fitted, fuselage halves met.
i decided to build it wheels-up on a display stand, as a desktop model.



first decals on the tail 

[Spey_Phantom]

time for an update

i just finished applying a 2 layers of gloss-white (first one on last night, second one just applied this afternoon).
im gonna wait and see if the coating is sufficient, or a third thin coat would be needed.
white is always such as a pain to paint, even if the plastic is already white, the best way to do this was to thin the paint as much as possible (but not to much, otherwise the thinner might caose the first layer to chip)

so far, no chipping.

when its dry, and the cover is good everywhere, i will start on decals.



meanwhite, work has also started on the wings.
the tailplanes have already recieved 2 coats of paint.
once dry, they will be tapes of and the edges will be painted with metallic aluminium.




ive also finished the main assembly of the wings (without the engines). these have already recieved a first layer of grey, but i still need to do the wingtips. im thinking painting these blue 

as for the engine nacelles, im thinking either white with the new sabena logo (same as on the tail), or Blue, with the old sabena logo (for nostalgic purposes, i still have some Sobelair decals left from a revell 737-800, thought these would go nicely)

[NARSES2]

Coming on well mate

[Spey_Phantom]

UPDATE:

this morning, the white paint was dry, and ive seen it covered up pretty good, although some parts were quite thickly covered.
so this afternoon, i started work on the fuselage decals. the large grey Sabena titles were a bit difficult to apply, due to they're size they were prone to curling up, but after a good roll/pet down, they came out alright 

all the decals have now been applied, and a re sealed in in a high-gloss finish, but i might have to give it a second gloss coat.
next up, im gonna start on the engines and wings. i already given the wings a think coat of clear, to make the surface smooth for decals.
i still need to mask off the slats, and paint the forward edges in metallic aluminium.

pictures to follow tonight 

[PR19_Kit]

That's looking pretty darn good Nils, I'm keen to see the finished job. I didn't realise the A350 had such high aspect ratio wings, I've just GOT  to build one now of course. 

Just a pity SABENA didn't last long enough to have A350s, I loved their later colour schemes and still have a few SABENA decal sheets in my stick. I really MUST use one of them on something soon, maybe a VC10?

[Captain Canada]

Really looking good Nils ! That's rather a large a/c eh ?