Official Natural Metal Finish Group Build II

OWL, good save!!!! Looks goos from here!!!!

B17, looking great mate!!!! WOW what a splash of color will do!!!!

iv made a start on my tonka your builds all look great i doubt thisl come up to your standerd but im goin for it anyway

B17, man that does look good, i'm not a civil aviation enthusiast but your build makes me want one...well done

Eat, looking forward to seeing some more of your work

I normally get more done on the weekends, and this was no exception. I put together all the weapons in the kit. They were the kits typical thick plastic with little or no alignment tabs. All has some kind of seam that popped up, even the k-13s ( a knock off of a sidewinder) because there was a raised seam line from the molding process. There are a few options that I can load out my MiG with, but I'm debating whether or not to load it up or keep it a clean bird.....

on the rockets ( I think they are called S-24b's. I could be wrong. I don't know Soviet weapons and the instructions didn't label them. I had to do a Google search to see what the heck some of these things were actually called) I broke off the little fuse thing on the tips, so I drilled a small hole with my pin-vice and inserted a length of wire. Its a bit sturdier now.

OWL

Everything is looking good here.

Yesterday the wife was at a craft fair all day so I got significant time at the bench and made considerable progress toward completing the B-36.  I finished all of the painting and applied most of the decals (still have the Hamilton standard decals to apply to the 18 propeller blades).  This morning I got up early and used an old drafting pen to do the wing-walk indicators.  That was a tedious job that initially I thought I would mask and airbrush, but after all the masking I'd already done, the prospect just felt too daunting.  There are still several little parts to attach, some mild weathering to do, and then it'll be time to take a bunch of pictures.  I hope to have all of this complete by the end of the coming week.

I actually ran into a problem with the Alclad lifting around the cockpit.  I've never encountered this before in using Alclad, so I'm wondering if I didn't get the primer sufficiently coated.  Not sure what happened there, but it was an exercise in frustration to re-mask and re-paint several times around that area.

Jeremy - so sorry to hear about the finish on the Airacomet. I totally sympathize with the frustration!

Julez - hear ya on the rain! Thankfully we've got a "cold" front sweeping through central Texas today. Highs down into the mid-80s, lower humidity, and no rain! 

Owl - nice catch there! I'm in awe of your tenacity and inventive thinking on this build. I probably would've that kit across the garage by now!

B17 - wow that thing looks slick with decals on! As much as I hate commercial flying (not the actual flying part...just everything surrounding it), that's one sweet bird.

Steven - looking forward to seeing that monster all silvered up!

Made a bit of progress myself last night. I managed to stay awake at the bench, better than I can say for Friday, but I had an hour or so chopped out to deal with a toddler in full exhaustion meltdown mode. Joy.

I managed to get the Wildcats' cowls and wings masked off, and tried a dozen times to mask the fuselage bands before saying screw it. I just couldn't get the bands straight. Got the barrel of the fuselage alright, but things kept going weird where it kinks in at the top. Rather than sacrifice my sanity to what are supposed to be two fun builds for the kids, I went ahead and ordered a set of fuselage band decals from Yellow Wings. I also finally managed to track down a number/letter decal sheet.

I'm planning on spraying primer tonight, polishing tomorrow, and starting the metal finishes on Tuesday. A week later than my last projection!

well iv manedged to lose the tonkas nose lol so im gonna have a wayyyyyyy overdue clean up of the garage ie my room lol

DoogsATX your new build will be added to the front page in the morning, lookin forward to seeing it.  As for the Wildcats cant wait for the NMF

B17Pilot those winglets came out great ! In fact I cant find anything I dont like about your 757.

Aggieman its gonna be a long week waitin for those pictures.

CallSignOwl I wish I could overcome the problems one runs into building as easily as you do. Great saves.

eatthis

well iv manedged to lose the tonkas nose lol so im gonna have a wayyyyyyy overdue clean up of the garage ie my room lol

Eatthis I hate it when that happens

It's amazing what a cold front can do! After all the paint issues that kept popping up (I'm wondering now if the humidity was causing condensation somewhere in my way-too-long compressor line running across the garage and that was messing with the various lacquer-based paints), and the absolute nightmare that was Saturday (a true Murphy's Law day in every possible respect), the winds shifted around to the north today, the high stayed in the mid-80s, and the humidity vanished.

In other words, perfect weather for laying down some primer! 

The Mr. Surfacer 1200 went down perfectly. Think I'll give it a very light polish tomorrow - seriously like with a lens cloth or something - and then move on to the NMF.

Getting closer!

DoogsATX : I wish you luck on the NMF and am hoping the weather holds out on you!

Aggieman: I cant wait to see some pics of this beastie you have!

I decided to close the canopy on this bird. But that brings up yet another set of issues: the canopy does not fit. It seems it was made too small to fit over the ejection seat....  why??    so decided I wanted to practice some more with styrene shims.  I added some to the edges of the canopy to see if i can get it to fit on the fuselage...but then I needed to prop up the windscreen!   I got a decant fit, but it will take a bit of filler and sanding to get it to sit flush. Here we go!

oh, and I painted the inside of the canopy frames while I was at it too.

OWL

Laid down the metal finishes last night! Alclad Semi-Matte Aluminum for the blue tail, and Talon Aluminum for the pink tail.

Overall observations.

Alclad remains pretty much the easiest thing to spray ever. Spray well is another matter, and surface prep is still crucial. The bottom of the blue tail's wings got all tore up when I was removing the white primer way back, and the Alclad didn't like what was there very much. Up top, it went down much better, but I have to say semi-matte looks much more like matte to me. 

The Talon was...different. It definitely had a citrus smell to it. Still not sold on how it sprayed. Flow seemed anemic or non-existent until pulling the stick 75% or so, at which point it came in a gusher. Not sure what's going on here. The paint's not thick. I DID spray the Alclad before, but I made sure to put probably a solid ten ounces of water through the airbrush AFTER a full cleaning. Didn't notice any clumping or anything that would indicate adverse reactions with lingering thinner. The HP-C+ has had problems like this before, but with thicker paints (Mr. Surfacer being a perfect example). So, not quite sure what went on. It made the several-light-passes approach very difficult, but outside of a portion of the starboard fuselage around the cockpit (and lower wings with all their problems) I got a pretty uniform coverage. 

All in all, I can't really say I like one better than the other. Going to have to keep trying and see how they stand up to masking, decals, etc.

Anyway, enough blathering. Pics!

Very cool Doogs, i better not show my daughters pink tail or i'll end up having to make one Blue tail does look like it has a flatter finish to it but other than that they look the same from here...Sounds like the Talon had a bit more of a workload to get down on the model though...Given the similarities between the two i think i'll stick with the readily available Alcad rather than mail order the talon paints for my next NMF build...

Thanks for sharing your experience with the two products

Thanks Julez! The blue tail definitely has the flatter finish...but since these guys weren't bare metal in the sense that the Mustang, Jug, B-29 etc were, I guess it's what I was going for. Still, if this is semi-matte aluminum I'm very curious to see what dull aluminum looks like. 

Agreed I'll probably stick with Alclad for now. But I want to experiment with the Talon stuff a bit more, too. 

DoogsATX the cats are looking good ya gotta love a yellow wing and the blue and pink tails look great with the yellow. You used an orange/yellow paint ? A great color scheme IMHO. I can see a big difference in the NMF but I think its mainly due to one being a semi flat finish verses a glossier finish on the pink tail. Actually like you, I think the semi gloss is more of a flat finish.

Thanks for sharing the comparison between the two products. I have to say I didn't have the troubles you had  air brushing the Talon. In fact quite the opposite, my air brush loves thin paints and hates the thicker ones like Mr Surfacer. I do have to thin Tamiya acrylics by a bit more than 50%. I havent tried Alclad the lacquer fumes bother me a bunch, but I have used Tamiya and Model Masters metallics in my air brush and had nothing but clogging troubles, causing a spattered or blotchy finish.

vetteman42

Thanks for sharing the comparison between the two products. I have to say I didn't have the troubles you had  air brushing the Talon. In fact quite the opposite, my air brush loves thin paints and hates the thicker ones like Mr Surfacer. I do have to thin Tamiya acrylics by a bit more than 50%. I havent tried Alclad the lacquer fumes bother me a bunch, but I have used Tamiya and Model Masters metallics in my air brush and had nothing but clogging troubles, causing a spattered or blotchy finish.

Oh, my Iwata loves thin paints as well. My starting ratio for Tamiya is 2:1 thinner to paint. That's what threw me about the Talon. It's certainly not as thin as Alclad, which seems more viscous than water, but it should be thin enough to spray without much trouble. That's why I'm wondering if maybe there was some slight leave behind of lacquer thinner in there somewhere. 

Either way, it still went down alright for the most part, and I'm hoping a light buffing will smooth out where it didn't.

Owl you never cease to amaze with your resurcefulness!!!

Doogs, the cats are looking good mate!!! Have to say, untouched, I like the Talon finish better. Looking forward to more pics!!!

Thanks guys! I love figuring out the little puzzles that are plastic models!!!

I figured that since I was propping up the windscreen, that would allow room to install an instrument hood that was not present in the kit. I used bits of styrene to build up the basic shape and then Bondo to smooth it out. Turned out pretty decent, I think.

OWL

Canopies!

Can't say I'm entirely sold on vacform canopies. They're certainly thin, but cutting them from the backing sheets is completely nerve-wracking, and I'm still not 100% happy with the job I did.

What I am sold on, however, is masking with bare metal foil. LOVE the job it did on the windscreens.

Still have to clean up some of the adhesive residue, but the hard part's done...

nice work doogs. heres my last update for a while on the sabre. all the foils done. next shots will be when its fully completed. ill try get over to my gb's and do a bit of updaed. well see how i go.

OWL Excellent scratch work once again!!!

Doogs, I agree those canopies look great!!!

Scorp that is excellent foiling work!!! Well Done!!!

My Foil Adhesive just arrived!! 

EDIT:  what kind of brush should I use for applying this stuff? It says flat artists brush, but what does that mean exactly? A square oil paint brush?  A Fan brush?

OWL

I just use whatever brush i grab first. a wide flat brush seems to work best. But round brushes do the trick for those little inconvenient areas.

Doogs, excellent work, both Wildcats are looking outstanding

Owl, thats a nice little touch you have added there

Mikey, coming along nicely and shiney...Looking forward to seeing the finished product

Well i'm done with this Mustang...I took a dozen pics but this was the only decent one, i seriously need to learn how to use my camera...

One thing that caught my eye was how different this one looks in comparison to the one i did before...Thats what i like about this hobby, exactly the same kits can look completely different....

Julez72 - Love the Mustangs!!

Julez - AWESOME Mustang! So much variation in Mustang markings that you could build dozens and still keep things interesting...

Have to admit, I'm terrified to do my P-51D. The metal finish, the curving blue nose of the 352nd...I've got the supplies I need, but I'm still not convinced that I have the skill.

Nolan's Wildcat got the decal treatment last night. Happy to say the Yellow Wings stripes and bands worked flawlessly. Think I may need to hit a few select areas with Solvaset tonight, but for the most part they went on and snuggled down without difficulty.

The ID letters (I realize that's AAF convention, not USN...) on the side are his initials, and the "23" on the wings represents his birthday (3/23).

I was going to do up Lola's cat, as well, but the numbers/letters sheet I ordered only had two complete sets of letters in the smaller size I needed (four complete sets total, versus a gazillion numbers). 

Amazingly, the wife suggested I order another sheet. Had a few other items happen to fall into the cart before I made my way to checkout...a Zvezda T-34 for a whopping $15, ICM Spit IX with ground crew, aftermarket gear doors and decals for the Yak-3 I've got in progress over in the Ostfront GB, etc...

Julez: LOOOOOVE the Mustang!  Great job!

DoogsATX:  that little bird looks very nice. Im sure your son will love it!

I didn't get too much done, just glued on the canopy with the shims in place. Its gonna take a bit of filler to get things smooth.  And I also noticed these cracks in the canopy...what caused that? They seem to be superficial, however, and do not go all the way through the plastic.

OWL

heres some wip pics of the 1/48 tonka

the pit isnt great but i am improving iv since tidied the belt up a bit

its my 1st attempt at nmf

The B-36 takes flight!

And now for the final photos.  A bit of a background story here - this B-36 represents a fictitious bomber in an alternate reality where WWII has played out quite differently than it did and England has fallen in 1940, leaving the US with a pressing need to develop long-range bombers capable of making the round trip from the continental US to Europe and back.  Hence the B-36.  And in keeping with the tradition of bomber crews in WWII, there is nose art on this warbird.  It is somewhat custom nose art - the girl is not my original work but I put her in the particular pose and designed the bomber's name, "Texas Squaw".  A word of caution - these photos render this portion of the thread R-rated.

This was a fun build for me even though it required a lot of time, patience, perseverence - and massive quantities of liquid glue, Alclad and masking tape.  I was able to keep from breaking any of the gunnery up until I was nearly done, at which point during some final touch-up painting I broke off one of the forward machine guns and the piece promptly disappeared.  Never fear, I replaced both guns with Minimeca tubing I have in my bag of tricks, and then last night broke those off as well doing final assembly (attaching aerial antenna wires and bomb-bay doors).  So I had to replace them again.  But all is well that ends well.

that is an absolute beast i love it :)