Chronic's Research and Aeronautics Project (C.R.A.P.)

[TheChronicOne]

I wonder what elephant meat tastes like? 

Well a Hotel I stayed in in Kenya served crocodile, zebra and gazelle amongst others - no elephant though. As I figured zebra would be akin to horse meat and gazelle to venison (both of which I've eaten) I had the crocodile. Interesting, a little tough and not much flavour.

I like the Mayan idea. Mayan/Aztec/Inca Empires in conflict perhaps ?

Definitely was thinkin of something Aztec. The camo pattern would be a hoot.... Aztec pattern, naturally.  Considering some sort of blocky pattern for this bird here in fact. But anyway... as far as all that goes... why not global conflict?  Roman Empire?? Vikings??  Mongols??  ::shrug::


In other news... I've been pretty busy lately and not feeling the best. Exhausted and heat-sick and all that. Haven't been getting much done but I DID work on the 1/2500 Enterprise the other day. Painting on it. I've gotten most of it done. I need to paint some hilights on it around the impulse engines and some of the silvery crap on the nacelles then I can go ahead and glue on the last little pieces then clear coat it and apply transfers. I aim to be done with it by the end of the day.

To that end, I need to check my stand!!  I think it SHOULD finally be dry enough all the way to start polishing on it. I'm going to try my 2500 grit stuff and see what happens. I may have to go back in for a couple more coats of the gloss black. 

Going to also work on the F-84 some. I painted the frame work on the canopy the other day, I just need to paint on the vinyl support webbing then I think......   I just need to touch up some black a tiny bit then I can gloss it, too. I'd like to gloss it the same time I gloss the Enterprise then I can do transfers on both at the same time maybe?  I think it would work well... work on one then let it dry up while I work on the other to keep from messing them up by accidentally touching the fresh transfers.

[TheChronicOne]

Ain't much to look at thanks to my lousy photography skills but believe me... the paint is 100% better now and most of the other body work issues have been sorted. I've manage not to snap the engine-twigs so far, too. 

[ysi_maniac]

What if the Mayans never went away? What if they survived to contemporary times and have their own aircraft manufacturing an' all'at? 
....

Welcome to the Anachronistic Madness! 

[TheChronicOne]

What if the Mayans never went away? What if they survived to contemporary times and have their own aircraft manufacturing an' all'at? 
....

Welcome to the Anachronistic Madness! 

Thank ye, kindly! So far I like the digs and just might stay awhile.   

[TheChronicOne]

My own crappy skills and lack there of strike yet again!!!!  I failed to dry fit the deflector dish and the part it connects with to the secondary hull. Go figure... I get ready to actually put it on so I dry fit it, now, as a practice run.. OH crap, it doesn't fit.... maybe I can apply a little bit of force. . .. . .  .. ..  and get it to.... *snap* into place. . .. . .. . . .


......     There goes the $#%&#^&% deflector dish..... there goes a percentage of the paint I put on it and the hull....... there goes the #$%#%&^&$%  port Engine-Twig.  #%^&$^#$^&*$$^%$&

PISS... so now I'm re gluing... re painting...... re sanding and filing and of course at this stage I can't get it back as good as it was without setting it down and bringing out more heavy artillery once again. It's just going to have to stay. This thing has flaws ALL OVER the place. What can I say?  When I started it months ago I was less skilled and had less supplies than I needed and am still suffering lack of adequate supplies and skill. I have more of each and things are definitely improving but I can only polish a C.R.A.P. for so long. The flaws will just have to stay. The glue cluster that I lovingly sanded and filed away is now back (although I took steps to smooth it... now I'd have to sand and file and sand and file again... not going to happen). Paint finish is no longer as smooth as it was a couple day ago... etc.  Truth of the matter is this is a very old mold that wasn't that great to begin with so this isn't ALL my fault. I didn't cast the non-fitting parts that need surgery and the ridiculous raised window detail. I mean.. I can keep beating myself up but honestly this kit itself has a lot of inherent flaws. That and it's small. Smallest kit I've ever dealt with and I don't consider painting 1/700 aircraft as "kit building."     Not to say there is no skill in painting them but as far as assembly goes? Not a lot going on.... so I don't count them.   

No worries...  I'm going to press on. I've " fixed "  (big quotes here) the screw ups and might slap another coat of paint on the port side of the secondary hull but that's it. I'll gloss it then it is ready for transfers. Ya know... for the size of this thing... it should be just fine. The painting is pretty neat. There's about 5-6 different colors painted on in various places and the transfers will add a lot to the project, as well! 

[TheChronicOne]

TYPICAL.

About 30 minutes ago ....or less...  I looked out the window and studied the wind for a minute. Nearly dead calm. Nothing moving hardly... looking at trees... the slightest breeze has the leaves and branches moving all over the place so them sitting nearly perfectly still was a good indicator that... hey... the wind isn't blowing. So, I stop to make the last post then do a couple touch ups with paint then collect all this stuff and go outside...   only to be met with wind so bad that my projects were spinning and waving like a flag in the breeze.     

This is a lot like how I'll go out and be mowing all day in the heat with not a cloud in the sky and no wind then when I get home all of a sudden there's a nice breeze and it clouds up and shades everything nicely. It's like... why can't this happen when I NEED it?!?!?!?   

ANYWAY, I hung the malarkey up on the chandelier and some at some point this week I'll clear 'em up. 

[Old Wombat]

It's called "O'Toole's Law", Brad, & states that "Murphy was an optimist!"

And it happens to all of us, believe me!

[TheChronicOne]

That's the law I've been violating this whole time and now I know what it is!

I suspected that that "Murphy's" stuff was just child's play anyway. 

In other news... I was downstairs a bit ago preparing the glorious feast for this evening when I noticed the anti-modelling maelstrom had subsided a bit so I took my wares outside and glossed them both. I tried to pay attention and do it correctly but I always seem to get carried away spraying...  never the less, rather than prolong the agony, I simply put the cap back on the can and re-hung the projects from the chandelier. I'll hope and pray that I didn't lay it on too thick and create a bunch of crazing.

[NARSES2]

Neat use for a chandelier 

[TheChronicOne]

Yeah, it's pretty handy!!  Improvising on the spot and what not....  And heck, with the lights on, it provides a small bit of radiant heat that helps things dry up and the AC register is nearby, too... just gotta watch out for dust. I should have dusted the thing before I hung my wares up but I only knocked one little dust bunny off and I think it went right past the work.

The gloss coats appear to be in good shape on both projects!!! Time for transfers today! I'm not sure when or if I'll get to it... first time in a good while that I DON'T have any paying lawns to do today after I go out and pick up garbage. This means I now have to make an attempt on the gargantuan yard here at home (and also wash my dog... poor lil feller has grass allergy). It normally takes about 4 hours if things are going smoothly but things are NOT going smoothly so more like 6 hours. I'll either be working on it until about 2 PM, which is bunk, it'll easily be up around 100 by then (and still humid around here) or I'll have to break the project up into two days. This is more likely so that I'll have time and energy left to wash Buddy. lol 

Lil turd... he doesn't like baths. I have to pick him up and carry him out to the water spout then hold his collar as I soap him up. He normally does pretty well at this stage but when it come time for the rinse he turns into a wild stallion and tries to run off. It's all I can do to keep him stationary and it's rough on my back and takes a good amount of sheer strength and gusto to hold on to time. In short, it's no easy task!!

Oddly enough, the stand still has a bit of tackiness to it and still is emitting paint smells so I need to let it sit a few more days. This ridiculous humidity around here is slowing things down. That said, I can do some sanding on the Nipples-Go later if I get done with transfers in time. It struck me that I can go ahead and prime this up and even start putting on the gloss coats of black. Have to mask first... still not decided on how to do that. I have half a mind to use one solid strip across the windows which of course will leave a different shade of silver color there. This could potentially work because "window frames" but then again I don't think it would be correct so I'll likely be masking each individual window. Not a fan of masking in this fashion but it should go pretty quickly if I just put my head down and do it.

TTYL

[NARSES2]

Lil turd... he doesn't like baths. I have to pick him up and carry him out to the water spout then hold his collar as I soap him up. He normally does pretty well at this stage but when it come time for the rinse he turns into a wild stallion and tries to run off. It's all I can do to keep him stationary and it's rough on my back and takes a good amount of sheer strength and gusto to hold on to time. In short, it's no easy task!!

That's exactly what my Doberman used to do. She'd finally appear to relent when being soaped and then as soon as you relaxed your grip she'd be off like a rocket  And yet at the seaside or near rivers and lakes you had to keep a tight rein on her or she'd be in 

[TheChronicOne]

Lil turd... he doesn't like baths. I have to pick him up and carry him out to the water spout then hold his collar as I soap him up. He normally does pretty well at this stage but when it come time for the rinse he turns into a wild stallion and tries to run off. It's all I can do to keep him stationary and it's rough on my back and takes a good amount of sheer strength and gusto to hold on to time. In short, it's no easy task!!

That's exactly what my Doberman used to do. She'd finally appear to relent when being soaped and then as soon as you relaxed your grip she'd be off like a rocket  And yet at the seaside or near rivers and lakes you had to keep a tight rein on her or she'd be in 

   Ironic, innit!!!!! 

Mine is like a cat. I've never had him around lakes or ponds or anything but he treats the kiddie pool I fill up with water in the summer time as if it were full of lava and mailmen. 

[TheChronicOne]

Decalling is going SLOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW and I mean slow...  I got started around 3 hours ago and am probably about 20% done with each.  The F-84 slowed me down because I can't make much sense out of the transfer I chose for it and some are falling apart, etc. I'm having to improvise on the fly. It's actually kind of fun! This is a strange looking plane, though.... I'm not sure how good it's going to look, even after all the transfers are on, which normally ties everything together and makes the build *pop*.

Oh and by the way, those crazy Molossians paint their canopy reinforcing vinyl webbing black to match the limo tint, those nutters!    (Yeah, I'm fast tracking... I started painting them white like the would be normally but just wasn't feeling it).

Enterprise... well.....Go figure.. again, not dry fitting is killing me. Transfers this time....I'm having to cut pieces out of them so they can fit around protrusions and raised areas and to deal with elevation changes. Sheesh... had to do one while it was wet already. I have got to learn to remember to test fit everything including the transfers!!! I normally do, though, but I always seem to forget one or two things which is always more than enough to wreck things. 

Oh well.. I should be finished with at least the Enterprise. the F-84 still needs all the fiddly stuff like gear and gear doors glued on so I might not get to it this evening. We'll see.

[TheChronicOne]

Wow!  I really thought I could just whip these transfers on at lightning speed. Wishful thinking!       Most of the ones I was trying on the F-84 fell apart so that created all kinds of delay... mainly due to me brainstorming my way around the problem.

But that ain't nothing... this little Enterprise...man... out of the three kits that came in the box, this one has about 10X (seriously, not joking this time) the transfers of the other two...  possibly combined, and at 1/2500 scale they are TINY... ITTY BITTY... and as I said before... I'm having to trim them to fit the contours of this ship.   Not only that, I keep stumbling across things that are missing such as the landing pylons on the saucer section. I had to dive into my stash and find some adequate transfers then trim them to the proper shape and size. Thank God they didn't fall apart and are now happy at home on the bottom of the saucer section!!!  But yeah, there are, with the two I scratched up, FORTY in total.

That said.. these transfers are REEEEEEALLY bringing this one together!! I'm ALMOST half way done with them as far as count.... 22 still to go.... but already this thing is looking really cool!! 

Also had to stop and paint a few things that weren't provided in the kit transfers and weren't even mentioned in the instructions.

This is turning out to be a full "work day" of model building! 

Should be done soon but, but I don't know. I'm off work tomorrow so I'm having a few beers and I may get to the point where the tiny transfers are just too much. Not to mention I have to apply more gloss after it all, so, there's also that needing done. 

[TheChronicOne]

13 transfers to go! Down to the ones that make sense the most to put on last which are also some of the tiniest! Things are going well, however. I will be done with transfers in 30 mins or so then I will do another gloss coat.