F-86 Shiny or not

Sabers in Korea operated in a pretty harsh environment. Summer monsoons, winter blizzards, no hangers, etc. Add in a high op tempo and there was not much time for polishing them up. Do an image search for some good ideas on how they appeared.

Shine it up nice for a new plane, for one that has been in theater for 6 months dull aluminum. Repairs will be shiny.

Here's how I did mine:

I guess it depends on opinion. I just built one, but made it really shiny. More out of artistic license, than what a line bird would have had. However, it had to be bright, shiny and new at some point!

It didn't take them long to get worn, though. I understand they flew as many as 8 missions a day sometimes.

Depends on environment and the care it recieves. In wartime there are far more things to do than clean and polish the airplanes.  So they start looking a bit grungy.

In times of peace, there will be at least one plane that is really shiny, the squadron commander's plane :-)

Don Stauffer

Depends on environment and the care it recieves. In wartime there are far more things to do than clean and polish the airplanes.  So they start looking a bit grungy.

In times of peace, there will be at least one plane that is really shiny, the squadron commander's plane :-)

Very true... so at the time of the cease fire in 1953 there were 4 Fighter Wings equipped with F-86s....

4th

51st FIW

18th FBW

8th FBW

None are exceptionally shiny...

If you plan on using Alclad, try some gloss black enamel as a primer then use Alclad Polished Aluminum. It will be very shiny as is. But when Alclad Aqua Gloss clear is sprayed over, the shine will be dialed down to a slightly weathered finish.

I've been bouncing around on google and for the most part here is what I've seen. Time period photos most of them were grungy.  Modern photos have the fuselage shiny and new while the wings have a flat sheen to them. That's how I'm going to do mine.

Gloss black enamel-Alclad aluminum- Alclad clear coat. The kit has the yellow decals for the band around the mid section and wing tips, but for that big of an area I think painting would look better. Whats the best paint (since I'm doing the enamel-alclad combo) method of doing it? Stick with enamel or can I use acrylic on top of the alclad?

I had to paint the underside of the Sabre I built, since the decal would not look good over some of the raised detail. I used Yellow Tamiya acrylic, cut down with a bit of orange, but only to the match the decal on the side. I carefully cut the black decal outline out from the decal, for the border. Since Yellow goes well over silver, I was able to get a decent finish.You could use enamel as well, though acrylic is a bit more tame.

I have read various techniques to cut down the shine. One was floquil old silver (if you can find it) misted over airframe aluminum. I suppose you could use others. Alclad Dull aluminum? misted over the high shine, just enough to cut it down?

You only use gloss black with the High shine Alclad colors, Chrome, Polished Alum and Airframe alum. The black is the key ingredient for the depth in the high shine Alclads and is not necessary if you use the non high shine Alclads, The reason for sealing High Shine Alclads is because the decal setting solutions may damage the finish as recommended by the manufacturer.

It's not necessary to seal the finish when using the regular Alclads. Some modelers spray Future over the plastic as a primer and then (after curing) spray the regular non high shine Alclad for a light to med oxidized look.

This explains it: http://alclad2.com/