Help with Putty

My fear with all those little square was that if I went through to the plastic, they may start falling off. The putty does seem to bond well to the plastic, but I wanted to be sure. I forgot, after you let it dry for a day, you can chip up the edges with a knife to give it that beaten up look

I, too, mix a little less hardner than an equal length. It doesn't lengthen the work time very much, but every bit is a help. I also tried scraping a little roll of the mixed putty onto the back edge of the Tamiya zimm tool and was able to spread and texture it at the same time. It worked well for me. One other thing you can try is using Bondo automotive putty hardner. It's red, but seems to give a little more work time.

Scraping through to the base plastic isn't really a problem. Once it's painted, you can't tell it's down that far. I had an easier time controlling my texturing by scraping all the way to the kit plastic.

Oh, one more thing...Don't over look the little scraping tool that is on end of the handle of one of the bigger tools. I did for a month or more, and it is really a handy little tool for those tight spaces areound the kebelblende and driver's ports.

I hope some of this helps.

I spread it on with a 2 inch by 1 inch piece of photo etch (I had it left over from a Pz III set). Anything that is stiff and has a straight edge should do. I really did not have a hard time getting it even with one exception- the ball turret on the front of the Panther was a royal pain in the . As for how much, it was just a little more than the thickness of a credit card. Enough so it can be textured without going through to the plastic, but not to much as to look artifical. As for the amount I mixed up, thats hard to describe. It was a lot of trial and error. Sometimes I had to quickly make more, but mostly I made too much.

thanks, how do you spread it on and how much? Is it hard to get even?

Moses helped me. Squirt equal lengths of putty and accelerant and mix together (I usually use a little less of the green tube to increase working time). I am working on a Panther with this. I did one side at a times- masked off all the areas where I didn't want putty, put a layer on and spread it smooth with Tamiya's photo etched Zimm tool. I let it site for a few minutes before I did the zimmerit, which for me was the simple tile pattern. I used a sharp pencil and a ruler to make the lines. Practice first. It isn't real hard, but it takes a bit to get used to it. Oh, and open a window- it stinks really bad like melting plastic.

If you go to (justaskmoses@aol.com) Moses can give you everything you want to know about zimmerit and working with the Tamiya putty. He's pretty much the resident expert on zimmerit application. Semper Fi, mike