Hobby Boss Easy Assembly 1/48 P-51-D, ''Yellow Nose'' - Work in progress

Well gents,

Something somewhere went terribly wrong... 

I sprayed a clear coat, Mr. Color GX UV Cut Gloss Super Clear, over the well dried Vallejo metallics and some sort of reaction happened resulting in what appears to be cracking/waves/rippling of the color.

Does anyone have a clue as to what might have happened?

I am starting to really get frustrated with Vellejo as I have this sort of problems only with their stuff.

Am I doing something essentially wrong by mixing them with other products?

Thanks in advance.

Best,

Nikola  

Oy. That's a neat effect, if you were looking for it. Unfortunately you weren't.

Just a note, but I haven't had a weird reaction with Vallejo matte or gloss over the Metal Series yet. I've also tried Dupli-color clear.

Hi gents,

It turns out that probably two factors contributed to this - the first being using different brands of paint and clear, and the second being that I have only waited three days for Vallejo metallics to dry where in fact, from what I've been told, I should've waited at least seven.

How much each factor contributed, that I am not sure of though.

Well, lesson learned! That's why I chose the Easy Assembly kit for my first NMF.

Best,

Nikola

Hi gents,

Decals on followed by another gloss clear. Ready for washes...

I've definitely learned my lesson not to mix certain types of paint and to wait longer for metallics to dry, as I've had crazing and lost some of the effects which I had prior to the first gloss clear.

I hope that I can fix some of the crazing and that I can achieve the effects again in steps to follow. 

Best,

Nikola

Well gents, since my Badger 150 does not have the cup cover and since I am stupid, I managed to spill the clear coat over one of the wings and that was that.

Luckily, I had one more in the stash so I salvaged the cockpit, the prop, hub, and the landing gear with wheels, and gave it another go. I used this opportunity to try Vallejo's gloss black primer as well. Not bad.

The first one just didn't want to get built. This is take two. 

It might even be a better build as I did not over-sand the tail, don't have paint crazing and damage as I did on the first one.

But, there is still time to spill things and screw up.  

Anyway, this is where I'm at this time.

Best,

Nikola

lawdog114

Looking great Nikola. Just an FYI, you can decal right onto natural metal without a gloss coat, at least with Alclad and AK Extreme. I have no experience with Vallejo unfortunately. Perhaps try X-22 with Mr. Leveling Thinner 50/50. Best gloss I've found yet. Dries smooth hard, as a rock, and has yet to react with anything.

 

Thanks for the tip LD! Appreciated.

I'll give that a try that on my second NMF build where I will try Gunze metallics.

Vallejo metallics are not bad, but slightly grainy as they are water based. And they are very fragile! A good thing is that they are not as poisonous as the others. :)

Best,

Nikola

Hi guys,

A little update - masking and painting done. She received a number of coats of Vallejo Metal Varnish, as this time I didn't want to mess with incompatible chemistry and wanted to test this varnish specifically. So far so good.

As with other Vallejo varnishes, I thin them 50/50 and they spray ok, but are somehow trickier to control, for me at least, so I have to be very careful not to create puddling. 

One thing which I have noticed is that even after 48h of drying, the varnish is still slightly tacky, so I am reluctant to start decals as yet. Plus, I thought it would be glossier for some reason. I am tempted to give it one or two coats of gloss clear before decals but I am not sure as I don't want to screw up the panel lines before washes.

Did anyone else have the same experience? Any tips? 

Best,

Nikola

Really sorry to hear about the paint mishap after spending all that time on this but it looks as though your attitude is really good about it and that you are progressing very well on round 2 of this build venture. 

mustang1989

Really sorry to hear about the paint mishap after spending all that time on this but it looks as though your attitude is really good about it and that you are progressing very well on round 2 of this build venture. 

 

Thanks for the support Mustang! Appreciated! :)

Hi guys,

I noticed that the anti-glare OD, yellow nose and black tail stripes (Tamiya acryilics) are not tacky, but the metallic paint still is slightly. The white aluminium which was sprayed a couple of days after aluminium is less tacky than the aluminium which had more than a week to dry before I applied the metal varnish.

The varnish is applied over all the above mentioned colours in the exacly same time and manner.

Could I coat it with clear gloss even though the metallics are still a bit tacky?

I can handle it no problem without leaving any marks but still not sure about the gloss clear.

I have no idea what's going on.

Any clues?

Best,

Nikola

Hi gents,

After reading and researching, the answer probably lies in the fact that I didn't wait long enough between coats and had them too thick, trapping coats which haven't fully dried underneath. I found it tricky to visually judge the amount sprayed over the metallics (due to reflection) in comparison to spraying over regular paints. Lesson learned.

However, in my first attempt on the first kit (the one with which I started this topic) I used Gunze gloss clear in a similar manner and it dried normally, despite the fact that incompatible chemistry made Vallejo metallics underneath crack.

I guess that I will have to wait it out however long it takes, if it ever dries. 

Any suggestions for fixing this quicker?

Thanks in advance.

Best,

Nikola