BIG Russian Jet Groupie GB

Okay just purchased the Decals, and Flory Models concrete wash there were three colours so I am guessing its the closest for panel lines, I still after years I cant seem to ever get the lines right, anyway so far thats the Quickboost Nose, Seat, Decals and flory wash for the Flanker. I am going to have the canopy closed so I think the kit supplied cockpit will suffice but the seat is awful lol, it's like the guy designing that part of the kit had 10mins of work left on a Friday and was told to design the kit seat lol.

Awesome! Yeah, panel lines are tough, although someone here pointed out in a photo that you really can't see any, so....not sure if I'll do mine or not. Guess I'll see after painting--if the overall appearance looks too toy-like, I might.

But, yeah, that seat is awful. Most kit seats are afterthoughts, it seems.

I agree the panel lines on Flankers are nearly impossible to see, so not sure if I'll even do all of them, but I'll probably use it around the aft end of the aircraft. On the Decal sheet I have there are a few options including Ukraine and a host of others its the Bergemot BT4804 decal set, I hope its decent as I remember a long time ago I bought after market decals for a mig 29 and the things literally fell apart on me in the water so I am not sure but I hope it wasn't Bergemot either way I'll find out!

Those missiles look great, PB.   Very nice and clean- how much fun was in masking the forward fins?

Begemot decals are crazy thin and kind of difficult to work with because of it, but if you can them to work they look great and lay down super-smoooth.

For panel washes, I use acrylic Payne's Grey- it looks black in the tube but dries to a chalky medium grey.  Used in the right places it really does look like the typical staining and streaking found on most aircraft without the starkness of a black wash.

About 7 days to go before I can even think of returning to the bench..  

Thanks, Dre! LOL, man, you nailed it...those fins were NOT fun. At all. Let's see....four Alamos @ four fins per so 16 fins total @ two sides per fin so....32 total sides to mask and paint. Not to mention the question of "Do I mask white and paint gray or mask gray and paint white?" Oy. No wonder some guys prefer armor modeling. :-)

One more week? That's not too long, fortunately.

Lol, you ain't joking!  Look at the bright side- that's the same number of road wheels on a panzer!

One more week isn't too long- I just have to get through it!  The NASCAR circus comes to Bristol this week and guess who has to be there, rain or shine?   Luckily, the black Flanker is 90% built and I just need to clean off the tape and old paint from the engine panels (the tape melted into the enamel and lacquer paints!) and then I can begin to mess it up anew.

You've already started the Black Flanker? I'm not sure when I'll get to start mine, so for now I'm gathering bits and pieces for it.

Eh... "started it" is a bit strong, more like a 2-year-old, left-over project that is getting a new lease on life.  It's been so long that I've forgotten if it is a single-seater or two-up!

Anyone got any good ways to remove enamel and lacquer paints that won't dissolve the plastic?

Well there is one way that works well. If the model is old and you don't mind I have done this before, get a Tamiya spray can, any colour and spray it onto enamel paint and within minutes it will destroy the paint and you can literally wipe it off with your hand. it's how I stripped the paint on my 1/32 Flanker before I converted it. Must be the mix of chemicals, I mean spray it on the enamel paint as if you're painting it. and you will see cracks in the paint form, don't leave it too long, but after a few mins of drying and wipe it off with your hand.

Any old Tamiya spray can?     I'll have to give this a try as all I really need to do is get the tape residue out of the paint and off the plastic- I can cover the remaining paints with an overspray, but I'd ideally like to start fresh on those engine panels after seeing what everyone else has done with theirs.

Seems any colour will work, though I know humbrol spray cans work as well.

But obviously if you paint the plastic with the over spray it will actually paint the surface again, but spraying humbrol over tamiya also rips up the paint.

Bring on the black Flanker! :-)

I swear I once read something about using brake fluid or brake dust cleaner to remove enamel/lacquer paints, but the search function here is less than useful in that regard...  I think that I'll dig around the house tonight and see what nasty solvents I have at hand before I go to the LHS for a Tamiya spray can...

BTW, it will be a Su-27UB C that gets the Black-Out treatment.  

I actually prefer the look of the twin seat versions, nail polish remover cleans basically everything off any surface so thats always worth a shot, in fact it's designed to remove dry nail polish off nails which is usually enamel based so if you happen to have any of that in the house it would be a cheaper way to remove the paint and not quite as quick, but definitely a way which means no sanding. use a green brillo pad whats normally used for washing dishes, it's coarse but not enough to damage the paint.

Not coarse enough to damage the plastic I mean.

I can vouch for nail polish as a paint remover.  The incorrect use of it on my Su-33 build set me back a week. 

A plastic scrub pad... I hadn't even thought of that, but that should get that nasty tape goop out of the paint quick enough.   Thanks for the ideas, guys.   I appreciate it!

T3chDad- whatever it is that sets you back seems to motivate you to a higher effort- keep it up!!

Agreed...! I've been meaning to post on your build thread about the awesome work you're doing so far on the Su-33. I like reading about builds, but I think they're even more helpful when there are screw-ups and the builder shows how s/he fixed them. So...great recovery there. Reminds me that we all make mistakes, but you can work through them. There is hope!

Hey, guys:

Well, now that major construction is done, next step is to paint the engines. I'm going to attempt with Alclad paints, which I haven't used before. Probably not a great idea to use a kit/plane I really like for my first try, but... here goes nothing.

SO....

1) Which Alclad colors should I use to get the requisite "stressed" look of Flanker engines? I know Alclad colors come in a variety of metal types, but the only one I know for sure I'll need is transparent blue (for heat/exhaust bluing of the metal).

2) Apparently, making sure the surfaces are prepped to perfection is essential, since Alclad shows every teeny tiny flaw, and gloss black is a good primer. But I'm not sure priming is absolutely necessary in this situation. Thoughts?

Thanks!

PB

Gloss black is definitely always required for alclad as without it you may as well use an silver paint. I would use aluminium, white aluminium, blue, pale burnt jet exhaust, and the tamiya pigments are excellent for this job, I dont think ive seen any two flankers with engines that had the same discoloured pattern.

I don't know what Alclad colors to use.  So if you are set on using those, stop reading now.

On mine, I used MM Metalizer Aluminum Buff.  Then I used Tamiya weathering eye shadow to do the engines.  While it took a lot of trial and error, I was happy with the result in the end. 

i hope this helps...good luck.

Thanks, guys! Colors duly noted, Dean.

Awesome result, techdad. I've used MM metalizers quite a bit, so I'm using this as an excuse to finally try Alclad, but appreciate the input.

I forgot steel

Added! Thanks.

You simply airbrush one colour over another until the heated effect looks right, I used the aluminium as a base as its really bright, and then blues and tone it down with steel, and pale burnt metal which is a yellowish silver, also Pale burnt metal if I didn't say it. It's down to your creative abilities which is what makes it so brilliant, though after you have used alclad you'll never use silver paint again. Also a thing I should say, you need to spray light layers really light and build it up gradually, takes no time at all as if you spray a normal coat it will lose the metallic effect and look like ordinary silver.

I began to strip the paints off my engine panels, but apparently I put them on really well the first time and they're resisting my efforts thus far to come off...   but it is leaving some interesting effects that sadly I can't use on this model.

From what I've read, you can use Alclads over just about any enamel/lacquer gloss paints to achieve a specific metallic color, but gloss black is the 'standard'.  Light greys are popular for aluminum, a darker grey for steel, etc.  It really is up to your imagination (and daring).

If you want to be somewhat safe- you can always use the clear tinted Tamiya paints over whatever metallics to get the heat discoloration.  In theory, these would be easy to remove with Windex so fixes and corrections are possible.  If you plan on making mistakes, then MM metallizers are a better bet as they withstand abuse better than Alclads.

One thing I've learned in my efforts to do these panels is that MM Titanium is far too warm for realism.

(adds all this new information to "alclad.txt" file)

Thanks again, Dean and Dre. Dre, there is good chance I'll make mistakes and I have used MM metalizers quite a bit, but I'm kind of digging the chance to try out Alclad. I'm hoping that because it's a limited area and is a bit open to interpretation in terms of color (as Dean mentioned, no two Flanker engines look the same), I can have fun with it. Then again, I could just end up ruining everything. Hm.

So couple more questions:

1) If I use gloss black as a primer instead of, say, darker gray, would this be a mistake ie, make the finish too dark?

2) How durable is Alclad? Will Tamiya tape pull it up?  I ask because if I do manage to use it successfully, I'll need to mask over the engines when it's time to paint the airframe. I know some MM Metalizers aren't especially durable. Especially the buffing kind, unless you use the sealer (which then dulls the finish, unfortunately).

3) I'm assuming I thin/clean up Alclad using lacquer thinner? I'm also assuming it doesn't need to be thinned much.

Thanks!

This stuff I learned the hard way on this Flanker two years ago...and I am far from an expert in these matters.

Gloss black or a darker grey ought to be OK for your base for either MM metalizers or Alclads.  Since you gradually build up the metallics, it is up to you.   I put the metallics on too heavy (a combination of MM and Alclad) , so the base color was moot in my case.  Heck, go nuts and use a variety of neutral colors on the different areas and see what happens!

Tamiya tape doesn't do Alclads or MM Metalizers any favors- in fact it melted into the paints for me, even after letting the paint cure for a few weeks before masking.

It seems that the best thing (for me) to do is to work on the engine panels last, after all the other camo painting.  It is a big ole PITA to mask those panels out afterwards, but that should dramatically lessen the chances for errors (knock on wood).

Yes, lacquer thinner for Alclads- I use just a little to thin them out so I don't lay down too much to start with and then blast a larger quantity through the AB to clean it.   I'd also field strip the AB afterwards and detail clean out the remaining gunk so the lacquer thinner doesn't melt the seals.

Among all the issues surrounding Flankers, these engine panels seem to be the Achilles' Heel.   This was my first effort, using Alclad steel on the forward panels and MM Titanium on the middle panels over MM gloss black.   It looked good until I tried to mask this for the rear-most section.

hope this helps! 

Dre, nooooooooooooo! Those look great, especially those panels towards the rear. So shiny! Yeah, don't want to know what "after" looked like. =/

Interesting that you did them last. I've seen two builds online where the builder painted the engines first, then masked them off and painted the airframe without any issues, so I assumed that was the best route. But I was also wondering how the heck the builders didn't ruin the engine finish when removing the tape. Maybe a coat of Future?

In any event, this is THE part of the build I'm dreading the most, and all the stuff we're discussing is why. But I guess I first need to decide whether to paint the engines before or after I do the airframe lol.

(bangs head against wall)