F16 Build

Instructions on your phone?  Too Much Tech!

They're on my tab. Had to download a copy because I lost the originals. I like them better on the tab, though because I can zoom in to see little details better... 

I'm afraid my tablet would be the recipient of unwanted glue and paint, but it does seem like there are advantages.

Sheeesh, these kids can't do anything without their phones nowadays...

Yup, it's a scary "I hope I don't mess this up " moment when finally gluing the fsg. together.  trust me, it gets easier... as a tip from the great people here on the forums, I use Tamiya extra thin on the fsg join.  Simply hold the halves together and glue an inch or so at a time by touching the glue brush to the joint and it just disappears by capillary action into the seam. Hold it for a few seconds and move on to the next inch. This technique works well on good fitting parts.

Sorry I haven't been keeping up with this as much as I should be. I've been bitten by a late spring cleaning bug, but have been slowly picking at little pieces and parts to put together during my cleaning breaks, mostly just messing with landing gear parts. Got them mostly painted, figured out how they go together, but not attached, so not much to show. 

I do have a question though. I have a gut feeling I need to get the main part of the jet painted before I attach the landing gear. I'm not sure how I'd mask the gear off to keep it from getting sprayed, but would like to temporarily attach the covers so that the paint job matches really nicely. How would I go about doing that? There's plenty, plenty Itty bitty little detail pieces that would need to be masked off too. Do you guys just wait to add those after, too? 

Also, is there a certain glue that you use for the clear pieces? 

Hi Michelle,

If I could, I'd like to offer my two cents. I like to add the fiddly bits (i.e. landing gear) after the airframe's been painted. Like you, I look(ed) for ways to temoparily add the doors to the build so that they'd get painted at the same time as the fuselage. In the process, I came up with two methods that work pretty well for me.

First, I use Silly Putty (yeah, the stuff we played with as kids) to fill in the wheel wells. Once it's packed in there, it stays where it's supposed to and it's resistant to even enamel and laquer paints. So much so that I've used the same two eggs of Silly Putty for years. It's flexible enough to get into all the nooks and crannies, and when you're ready, it peels out cleanly.

As you can see, I painted and weathered my wheel wells before spraying the NMF fuselage color, and the Silly Putty pulled away clean without damaging the underlying paint.

Granted, you have to paint the doors and fuselage separately if you use this method, but you can use Silly Putty to paint the doors and fuselage as one assembly. First dry fit your doors until they're as good a fit as you're going to get. Then paint (and weather if you prefer) the wheel wells, and doors' interior their appropriate color(s). Next, stuff some Silly Putty in the wells then press the doors into place. The Silly Putty's sticky enough to hold the doors in place while you paint the exterior color. It's OK if the doors don't fit perfectly. The Silly Putty will hold the doors in place and, if you packed enough in the well, will seal off the edges and interior from the exterior color.

Once everything's all painted, I carefully pull the doors from their place, pull the Silly Putty out, then finish the construction.

Sorry I don't have pictures of the second method, but I hope I explained it clearly enough to make sense. Let me know if you have any questions.

Cheers!

-O

Dang, Omar!! Silly Putty is a great idea! Gonna hafta try that on my next build. I always just stuff ripped-up paper towels in the bays and cockpit. It works, but takes a while to accomplish.

I second the "good idea on the Silly Putty"

For the clear parts you need special glue . I use the "5 Second Fix" as seen on TV. The laser activated stuff. it's pricey but works as advertised and ideal for canopies and such. I've seen others use Elmer's white glue, Testors window making glue etc. but these don't bond very strong.

Hi Jay - Jay !

 I haven't tried it yet but I am thinking that "Clear Spru - Glu "  would work in very small beads to attach a canopy.

Michelle

Sorry I haven't been keeping up with this as much as I should be. I've been bitten by a late spring cleaning bug, but have been slowly picking at little pieces and parts to put together during my cleaning breaks, mostly just messing with landing gear parts. Got them mostly painted, figured out how they go together, but not attached, so not much to show. 

I do have a question though. I have a gut feeling I need to get the main part of the jet painted before I attach the landing gear. I'm not sure how I'd mask the gear off to keep it from getting sprayed, but would like to temporarily attach the covers so that the paint job matches really nicely. How would I go about doing that? There's plenty, plenty Itty bitty little detail pieces that would need to be masked off too. Do you guys just wait to add those after, too?

 

Also, is there a certain glue that you use for the clear pieces? 

Sometimes kits supply different bay doors for gear-up and gear-down options, and they can be slightly different, so it can be a problem to try to use the gear-down doors in the up position so as to paint them at the same time as the plane.

I usually fill the gear bays and paint the doors seperately.  I like Omar's tip about using Silly Putty.  I'll have to try that.  I usually use a combonation of foam and blue tack, but the blue tack leaves a lot of residue that takes time to clean out.

For attaching clear parts I usually use elmer's glue for the canopy and super-glue for smaller bits, like landing lights.

Cheers, Mark

Howdy Michelle, I use the Testors clear parts glue. It cleans up with a damp cloth with water, seals very well, and once dry (cured) isn't very easy to get the part back off. Option two is to clear coat the canopy with acrylic floor finish, clean or sand the mating edge and use super glue. Once clear coated the clear parts won't fog up due to the super glue fumes. A often forgotten step in building plastic models is the first step---wash the entire model spru with parts and loose parts in a soapy warm water bath scrubbing the parts and then rinse in fresh/clear water pat dry and the let dry over night. this gets rid of residual mold release lubricant. A lot of loose tiny parts can be put into a tea strainer that is used for bulk loose tea or any thing that will allow soapy water into the parts and then rinsed without loosing parts. Glue and paint does not like to adhere any kind of lubricant. Good luck, Andrew Magoo

I hope the pic actually shows up. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong...

Anyways, finally getting a little progress to show. Decided to start painting the camo in yesterday. Grabbed a pencil, sketched in what I hope are close enough to be passable lines, thinned down a little bit of paint and got to it. Let that dry overnight just to be sure, did a really light sand this morning, and am deciding if I wanna start on the underside, or make another pass topside... Still have a long way to go, but getting there slowly!

Nice start on the camo.

How are you adding the pic. It looks like you are useing the insert/edit link option. You need to use the one to the right of that, insert/edit image.