Grumman F4F-4

[strobez]

Hmmm... well that didn't turn out like I expected.  I'm not sure I really like the cammo scheme, but since the plan is to use the hairspray to take off quite a lot of the top coat, I'm prepared to leave it as is and see what happens next.  Lesson learned about using a green/kahki colour scheme though... don't do it. 

[TheChronicOne]

Looks good to me, bruh!!!  Sleep on it and you may grow to like it.

[PR19_Kit]

I can't see anything wrong with it either, it looks very 'Fleet Air Arm' in character.

[strobez]

Well, part of the frustration with it comes from having too much thinner in my khaki mix.  I'm still struggling a bit to bend my airbrush to my will, so yesterday I bought a new nozzle/needle ($3 each) and decided to also test out a more agressive paint/thinner ratio (which was useless really because I didn't actually measure or write down anything anyway!).

I think the thinner affected the khaki's ability to cover the green undercoat and I started getting light spots appearing.  Not quite sure if the too much thinner was affecting the green coat or just evaporating unevenly.

Also, the contrast (in my dim painting box) was less noticeable than I expected, so I think I over compensated by painting even more.

About the only thing I felt was a success was being able to control the spray well enough that I didn't feel I had to mask the whole thing for a random placement/fade camouflage scheme.

Once I start wetting/chipping away at the paint, I'm sure it'll be a mess... but isn't that why I bought 3 of these $2 kits anyway? Right? RIGHT!?

Strangely enough, the cost of the kit doesn't really seem to matter once the plastic is in my hands.  I require them all to be masterpieces... and then adjust my expectations near the finish line.

[Old Wombat]

Once I start wetting/chipping away at the paint, I'm sure it'll be a mess... but isn't that why I bought 3 of these $2 kits anyway? Right? RIGHT!?

Yes!?

Strangely enough, the cost of the kit doesn't really seem to matter once the plastic is in my hands.  I require them all to be masterpieces... and then adjust my expectations near the finish line.

Sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

[zenrat]

It looks grey and green on my monitor and they go well IMO.
Nice pattern.

[DogfighterZen]

It looks grey and green on my monitor and they go well IMO.
Nice pattern.

Same here.

[TheChronicOne]

Once I start wetting/chipping away at the paint, I'm sure it'll be a mess... but isn't that why I bought 3 of these $2 kits anyway? Right? RIGHT!?

Yes!?

Strangely enough, the cost of the kit doesn't really seem to matter once the plastic is in my hands.  I require them all to be masterpieces... and then adjust my expectations near the finish line.

Sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

Aye!! Same here.    I'm the same way.. don't care if it is a 30 year old kit or the new Valiant.

[strobez]

I started chipping away at the paint and I'm feeling a bit better about it now.  The bare metal making a comeback really offsets the dark green/khaki scheme.  It's not perfect, but I certainly learned a few things.



In no particular order:

- The "white undercoat" that I saw the first time I tried the hairspray technique on my Folland Gnat build was most likely the aluminium undercoat I was looking for and not the primer I thought it was when I abandoned it.  I thought the same thing was happening again, but after pushing on and uncovering larger portions, it became clear that it was indeed the bare metal finish.  It's actually much harder than I thought to scrape off paint using nothing more than a toothbrush and some water. 

- I should have put coats of hairspray between the green and khaki coats of paint.  My coating is plastic/primer/aluminium/future/hairspray/green/khaki and the green paint comes off relatively easily (again though, not as easily as I would've have thought) but the khaki is very stubborn.  It'll come off, but not nearly as nicely or easily as the green paint... which has made for an uneven pattern.

- I should NOT get impatient and use the back side of a hobby knife to scrape off the khaki.  While it works much better than the toothbrush on removing the khaki layer... it is also much better at removing the green, hairspray, future, aluminium and primer layers... not to mention some of the plastic too. 

At least that's how I really know the toothbrush is only removing the coat of paint that sits atop the hairspray layer.

I probably removed more than I should have on the underside, but this was always an experimental build, so the learnings above are the most important part.  Besides, once the folded wings are attached, you won't really be able to see the underside unless you pick it up.

[zenrat]

Some hairspraying guides I have read say you should get to work distressing the finish as soon as the paint you've put over the hairspray is dry.
Which you can't do if you are putting more than one colour over the hairspray.

Are you using warm water?
I have found that warm water, and letting parts soak in it, can improve things and make the paint come off easier and more controllably.

[strobez]

What?! You mean waiting 4 months between spraying the hairspray and trying to remove the paint wasn't a good idea?!   

I suspected that might cause problems.  Oh, well... the warm water is a good suggestion though... especially since it gets cold on my hands!

I started scraping a bit of paint off the blue F4F as well and though the going is a bit slow, I'm okay with it because on that one I'm trying to keep the effect as subtle as I can.  I can imagine it's easy to go to town on the chipping and be left wondering what went wrong in the end.

[zenrat]

What?! You mean waiting 4 months between spraying the hairspray and trying to remove the paint wasn't a good idea?!   ...

Only if you believe whichever "expert" I was reading. Prolly depends more on which brand of paint.  Vallejo, which I favour, is so soft that at times I think I don't even need the hairspray.
I'm not sure you need the future between the aluminium and the hairspray unless it was to give it a shine - but then my thinking is that something that weathered would have oxidised aluminium which wouldn't be shiny.

... I can imagine it's easy to go to town on the chipping and be left wondering what went wrong in the end.

What gives you that idea?  This was meant to be a light weathering.
N1K7 Jetrex 016 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr

[Old Wombat]

Japanese, late-WW2 ... That IS light weathering!

[NARSES2]

Japanese, late-WW2 ... That IS light weathering!

Yup, indeed probably just been resprayed 

[strobez]

This project is now coming in for a landing (finally!).  I got the wheels/propellers masked and painted (still debating some yellow tips).  I've just got to add some small windows to the undercarriage ("Just" he says... ha!) and then it's a coat of Future, some decals and weathering. 

All in all I'm relatively pleased.  The green one was always going to be the proof of concept test.  The grey one has much much less chipping, however I learned that chipping light grey paint off aluminum late at night in dim lighting is a bad idea.  Didn't notice how much was removed until morning.  I didn't bother to take a picture of the undercarriage to hide my shame... but it's there.