nice updates fjs3!!!

What frank you builded Stick  excellent and equilibrated build!

Most excellent Frank SP very nicely done Sir!!!

Stick a fork in it, she is done!  I present Tamiya's 1/48 Ki-84 Hayate (Gale), Allied code name "Frank".

Testors square bottle Flat Aluminum dry brushed on with an old red sable brush.

What did you use on the fuselage by the cockpit for the "well worn" look, a Prima silver pencil?

Not pristine anymore

I'm liking big time Stik!

SP: the soot and oil stains look very convincing. Looking forward to big finale.

All fiddly bits now glued on. But I still need to stretch some sprue and attach a wire antenna. That will be tomorrow most likely. (need more fluid for my Zippo ) And maybe add some pigments to the wheels. Anybody know what the soil looks like in the Phillipines and/or Formosa?

anyways here are a few sneak peeks of the fiddly bits before the final overall shots in the next few days.

pitot tube and left navigation light

landing gear doors and exhaust stains

cannon barrel and right side main landing gear

canopy and antenna mast...

Gamera

SP: your scratchbuilt sight looks better than ones that come in kits! So I have to ask, now that have built another and installed it has the original showed up again?

Thanks, I am glad you guys like it. The orginal has still not shown up yet. But after this little bit of work, I am kinda glad it took flight.

Trey: thanks for the tip. I drove past it a few times but I'm not much of a drinker. I did however drop over fifty bucks at Whetstone Chocolates...

Headed home now, am planning on hitting The Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum in Pooler, Ga on the way home.

Clean looking paint job Freddie

Amazing gun sight SP !

Cliff you've got to try and make it to the Sebastion Winery while you're there its worth the visit!

She's looking good Freddie, nice work!

Building is moving right along.  Painting has begun with both the upper and lower colors applied.  Tonight after the gloss coat, the decals will be applied and then tomorrow the final dull coat.

I hope by the end of the weekend to have it done, and all the details added.

Here's the pictures:

SP: your scratchbuilt sight looks better than ones that come in kits! So I have to ask, now that have built another and installed it has the original showed up again?

Sight glass installed

Late last night I painted on a base coat of Flat Black.and then I painted teh cushion pad and adjustment knob in Satin Black

and with my sausage fingers to give some perspective of how dang small this little scratch built sight is..

Then earlier today I glued the sight in place

Now I just need to add the reflector glass portions here shortly and I will be where I was before my kit part decided to take flying lessons...

Yeah I made one more search attempt, but considering that I did not even see which way my tweezers launched the sight, I figure it will turn up when Jimmy Hoffa does. So I did some quick online research, found a type of gun sight used on some Ki-84s, and set about scratch building one. Here is what I found on the real sight.

and this is what I came up using some PE stuff, and various bits of strip & rod styrene

I will add the clear parts once I have it painted...

SP: I know what you mean. Stepping away seems to work the best for me. Gooduck finding it. My best ways to find parts tend to be either step on and break them or fabricate a new one at which the old one always shows up.

Good luck, what you've got now looks great.

Well I am too frickin pissed to continue working on this now... I was about to install the gun sight into the cockpit when my tweeze rlaunched it to God knows where... trying to find such a tiny bit of back & clear plastic is not likely successful task and 10 mintues of searching was fruitless... so I am gonna put everything down and step away from the work area...

This kit has to have some of the finest raised panel lines that I have seen...barely there. They certainly made doing the washes a bit more challenging than usual.

so here are my latest update photos...

all the last fiddly bits painted and ready for installation

a close up of the wing cannon barrels. I bored out the muzzles awhile back and used Humbrol Metalcote Gun Metal on the barrels. For this photo I buffed one barrel and left the other in the original finish just to show the contrast, but both are now buffed and installed. 

And my main task for today, airbrushing on a top coat of Humbrol Satin

once that was on and dry to the touch I removed the masking from the anti glare panel and cockpit and installed the pilot's seat

just a little more to do today here... but this Halloween thing is about to get in the way

SP: yeah, I haven't gotten down panel washes on raised panel lines yet.

Len: good, I'm glad to hear your family is ok.

Trey: I'm hanging out in St. Augustine. Drank from the 'Fountain of Youth' today, hope it's the real one. I need the extra years to get all my stash built!

Hang in there Len! Glad to hear you and the Family are okay. I got nailed hard in 04 by Charlie so I feel your pain.

SP thats looking sharp!

Cliff hope you're enjoying the vacation what part of Fla are you in?

Gamera

Len: ack, I'm sorry to hear about all the damage to your home. At least i'm assuming no injuries to anyone in your family? Still, people talk about property damage that stuff can be simply replaced. The issue though is the time investment in finding your stuff and setting it up just how you want can't be replaced. My prayers to you and your family among with everyone else in the path off destruction.

As long as the detail is recessed  those pre-mixed washes work great. But on raised panel lines they are not so hot, so I prefer using enamel washes due to better control.

Len: ack, I'm sorry to hear about all the damage to your home. At least i'm assuming no injuries to anyone in your family? Still, people talk about property damage that stuff can be simply replaced. The issue though is the time investment in finding your stuff and setting it up just how you want can't be replaced. My prayers to you and your family among with everyone else in the path off destruction.

SP: look good, almost there now. Doogs got me to try pre-mixed washes and I've become a bigfan of them.

Sounds like you made it thru moderately well. Could have been better,but could have been far worse. I wish you a speedy salvage and recovery op Trouble.

Well lots of progress in the final steps of weathering my Frank today.

First up I applied Promodeler Wash "dark dirt" in all the recessed line areas

Then once it dries, a few swipes with a damp cloth removes the excess...

then on the raised detail I applied a pin wash of Model Master Enamel Burnt Umber, first on the lower surfaces

and once it had dried I removed the excess using a thinner moistened brush

then I repeated the process on the upper surface raised detail

MM Enamel Burnt Umber applied

and cleaned up

Tomorrow i plan on applying the final top coat, drybush chipping, and gluing the last pieces into place.

Hey Cliff, check out my post "Hurricane Sandy"...just gave the low down of what happened to us...a lot worse for others I`m sure...a storm I will NEVER forget!!!

Len: just sitting in a restaurant watching the Weather Channel and it looked like NJ is about to be washed away. Keep your head down and hopefully it won't be too much damage.

Funny i'm sitting here in Florida on vacation and the storm shot right up the coast and we didn't get anything but high winds here. First time in history I think Florida has been the safest place in a hurricane.

stikpusher

Oh that would suck bigtime Trouble! I hope that you weather the storm with minimal loss and trouble there.

Len

P.S. .....The full force of the storm won`t hit us until 7pm...yikes!