(DONE, pics pg 16/17) NATO Reporting name "Bull." Cuban Tu-4 Heavy Bomber

[zenrat]

I like my weights to rattle a bit.  It freaks out people who pick up my builds.

[TheChronicOne]

I like my weights to rattle a bit.  It freaks out people who pick up my builds.

Good stuff...   

[TheChronicOne]

Not much of an update, but, it's pretty important.

I'm going to try to apply the fin flash transfers to the rudder. I have some printed transfers I bought online. I tried a couple on my test bed plane and they were trying to shatter. Granted, many of the areas of the sheets are less fragmented than others and I intentionally chose the most fragmented roundels on the sheet. The rest shouldn't be as bad, but, I elected to to throw a couple of mist coats of clear on them.  My worry is that I put too much clear and the things won't release from the sheet. I recently cleared a sheet for my Tucano and all it did was make a solid piece that hardly no amount of coaxing would have the transfers come loose. I fought and prodded and managed two tiny little decals then threw everything else in the trash.

I hope like hell I don't have two entire sheets of....... fancy decorations that will just sit there and laugh at me as I try to get them to release from the paper.

We'll see...   If this jive don't work then I need to come up with some sort of alternate plan involving transfers from the stash and masking/painting. 

[TheChronicOne]

Just to prove I'm still chugging ahead!

They're sitting atop a box of some other stuff but here are the engine cowlings and props and stuff. I think they look pretty good! 

I wanted to paint the cowlings a different color for... whatever reasons.. safety maybe for the ground crew, but didn't want to make such a stark difference between the overall scheme (as if I went with red). Don't judge the fin thingies at the rear too harshly... I'd like to come back in and darken the "gaps" to make them look better but this is a good start.

[Captain Canada]

They look Christmassy especially on that card lol

[TheChronicOne]

They look Christmassy especially on that card lol

Right you are!! And ol' Afro Santa there definitely seems pleased!   

Going to try that fin flash transfer today... God I hope it works because it's too late in the game to source more or probably even attempt painting it free hand as I haven't even gotten the fud halves together yet... . ..   

[zenrat]

Cuban rudder flashes are blue & white horizontal stripes with a red triangle within which there is a white star.
All fairly easilly paintable with masking (thin tape needed mind) apart from the star which could be cut from other decals.
That's how I did this.

[TheChronicOne]

Damn that's cool.... what we have here... some Viggen wings on a MiG 21 body?  Sweet!

Yeah, I just remembered my initial plans which were to mask for the triangle and stripes and then steel a star from a US roundel. Pretty sure I could manage that but then the actual roundels... are... round...  and I'm not sure how to go about masking a circle?  I was thinking of folding the tape in half, drawig a half circle on it, and cutting it out, then unfold the tape and it SHOULD make a circle...  is this about right? 

In other news... probably, again, won't get any work on this done because of an emergency irrigation leak at the new contract place.. gotta jump on that and make a few hundred. This pays better than picking up garbage.    Probably take all day.

[zenrat]

Damn that's cool.... what we have here... some Viggen wings on a MiG 21 body?  Sweet!...

http://www.whatifmodellers.com/index.php/topic,41849.msg723706.html#msg723706

For the white star I think I printed one with a red border onto white decal paper.  I then didn't have to cut it out too neatly as the red was hidden by being on red paint.

[TheChronicOne]

Jeeze... the further into trimming and trying to get this transfers to work the more I'm thinking I'd rather just mask and paint! The "cut outs" where the rudder hinges, etc, and other minor discrepencies.. I'm just going to save these fin flash stuff for some other project and get to masking.

Now, the actual roundels I'll try to use from the transfer sheets but if they wind up not working, I have a back up plan for that, too...   we'll just have to see.

I like Fred's method of having white stars bordered with red but I ain't set up to print my own stuff yet (getting close.. Ihave a printer, ink, and bought a sheet I just haven't gotten that project off the ground yet.. )so what I can do is cut the stars from some of this fin flash to use and everything should be alright.. I hope. 

[TheChronicOne]

Got a lot done yesterday.  Like... 4-5 hours worth. Still a long way to go but....  maybe I'll make the deadline.


Got all the masking and paint work done on the rudder. Just need to try to get stars on there now.

[TheChronicOne]

Just tried a star from the printed sheet.

The red washed away! It left me with a fat, bulged star. Good news is the transfers will release from the paper. Next time, I'll try my best to cut the star out exactly as it is shaped. If I can do it once, then once again, my rudder will be good to go.

After that we're on to joining the fuselage halves and gluing the gear bay nacelle thingines together. I need to take a better look at the wing roots as well. I puttied the hell out of them and then sanded them quite a bit. I'm not expecting perfection but then again won't tolerate blatantly mishapen wing-rootery!!! 

[zenrat]

 

[Captain Canada]

Nice work ! I guess you should worry more often, seems to work 

[TheChronicOne]

I think so! I either need to worry more... orrrr..... worry less?  lol?   

And I always seem to get a lot done when there's only a day left to go, as well.  Looks like that's what will be happening with this one again just like the last 2 group builds... working on everything up to the last minute and barely getting finished. But, hey, whatever works, right?!