PACIFIC CARRIER AVIATION GROUP BUILD

Steve: To answer your question, yes, you are over thinking the process . You should not encounter much of a problem if you just lightly score around the frame and slowly remove the masks. Certainly one key is to not lay any paint or clear coat on too heavily.

flyerduke: Oh Man, That came out looking great. Indeed, you will find that Mr. Color paints have a very strong odor. My large paint booth is unable to fully vent the fumes. But, I haven't noticed any negative effects from getting a snoot full of the fumes. HEY! Whadaya know, I have seven fingers on one hand. When did that happen?

I got the intermediate blue on mine yesterday. I need to implement a little touch up and then I will get some pics up this evening of my silly putty process.

Lookin' good from this angle!

Not sure why the photos didn't appear in my last post.  Let's try it again.

Well my vacation has started so I thought I'd better get my ass in gear and start working on this plane.  I shot the Mr Color white 316 this morning.  The paint hasn't dried, so the photos may have a little shine to them.  I tried to evenly shoot the bottom so the panel lines still show through.  The booth works pretty good.  Not 100% fumeless in the room, but a whole lot better without the booth.  It's pretty cold in my house, so hopefully it will be fulled dried tomorrow morning so I can shoot the Inter. Blue.  Hopefully the lines will show through the IB.  I plan on taping it off.  Don't trust my freehanding of small lines at this time.  I'm also going to have to touch up my cockpit.  Some of the tape came off and a bit of overspray caught the headrest and back bulkhead.   Anyways...  Her's a few pics.  Any tips or comments would be appreciated. 

Craig

Hey Joe Thanks for the game plan. Very nicely laid out and logical. Expediency is the key word here. I can’t progress on the fuselage until I install the turret gun, I can’t install the turret gun until I paint the turret canopy, and I can’t paint the turret canopy until I get a consistent and uniform process for the exterior paint. Here is my concern about adding another paint layer, and you guys can educate me. My concern is primarily with the canopy parts. I plan to paint the first layer on the turret canopy interior green so that from the inside, this color shows through mirroring the areas that the exterior color covers. Then I will paint the Dark Sea Blue color coat over that. If I follow your plan, I will add an additional clear coat. What will happen when I pull the masking off? With thicker paint, isn’t it more likely the paint will chip or break off ruining the demarcation lines? I realize, I will probably have to cut around all the masking prior to de-masking. That should help keep the demarcation lines cleaner but will it be harder to cut though? Cutting through thick paint may actually cause fractures and chips. My other concern is that thicker paint could create a higher paint step. Am I over-thinking all this? Maybe the solution is to paint extremely minimal coverage. What are your thoughts on this? BTW— at this point, I don’t want to use Future as a final clear coat. I would stay with a clear paint. Or maybe I use Future on the canopy and the rest of the plane clear? Would there be a noticeable difference? All these questions. LOL.

Steve, Your issue is not with the paint. All you need to do is spray your paint on, regardless of the sheen, and when completely dry apply a gloss coat. Either Future floor  polish (water based) or say Testors Clear gloss, (lacquer based). The Testors can be sprayed on either with the spray can variety or with your airbrush. Although, some paints/colors will already be glossy and not necessarily require the extra coat.In any case, it is highly suggested that after you have applied the decals that you spray on a gloss coat in order to seal them and protect them. Then after that you can apply your wash, then spray on your desired finish coat. My paint job is an excellent example for you. Again, I am using MM enamels. The white is gloss, the intermediate blue is flat and the dark sea blue is gloss. This is not an issue as I will applying an overall gloss coat. This should expedite your efforts immensely. I sure hope this helps.

Hey Greg... thanks!  My next problem to deal with is the color coat.  I have the canopy pieces all masked and ready for color...but I need to nail down the paint process.  I am trying to use Acryl Deep Sea Blue for this build and I believe this paint is supposed to be a gloss. At least that is what I read.  I have been experimenting with the paint by first spraying some plastic spoons.  The best I have been able to get out of it is a satin, or semi-gloss.  Today, I tried adding some Acryl Clear Gloss in hopes that will help.  It did, but it is not where I want to be yet.  I am beginning to think that the paint is drying too fast.  It's not going on wet enough to allow itself to level and gloss out.  I guess I will try adding a leveler.  I also bought the same color in enamel.  I will see how the enamel works for me too.  Sigh...

Hey Steve, what a novel idea using Tamiya thin to join those turret canopy halves. I will keep that in mind in the future. Surely looks good.

Oh how great this day is!  I have been imbued in your light of styrene.  I am awash in it. What a mess it is.  

LOL LOL LOL!!!! You are indeed a righteous member of the flock Brother Bakster. He Who Knows only Styrene will be anointing you greatly for your faith.

                                 Rev. Joe

Thanks Clemens.  It's good it worked out that way or I might have been grounded for the rest of this mission

Say Joe--That is funny about the Flash.  

Well, we are fast approaching Thanksgiving. For those of us in the States that celebrate it....I want to wish you all a fantastic holiday. Enjoy it!  

Steve

Below: A special message to Reverend Joe.

That turret looks perfect, Steve!

I normally use Revell's Aqua Color Clean for both cleaning my airbrush and removing paint from models. I find it to be a wee bit stronger than normal alcohol.

Thanks.  I'll try the glass cleaner first then alcohol since I have both on hand.

............................and if that don't get it , try some 70% Isopropyl alchohol. That'll get anything off and it costs slightly  over $1. I use alcohol pads and they work great.

Craig, Try Windex first. That may be enough to do the trick. Another option is Polly S Easy Lift Off paint and decal remover. I've used this stuff a number of times and it works like a charm. Here is a link to some on Amazon.

www.amazon.com/.../B000BQSKQE

Question- What's the best way to remove acrylic paint from parts?  I shot some of the landing gear and doors with Vallejo model air white a couple weeks ago.  I took a closer look at it this evening and it looks like crap.  Thick in spots and thin in others.  One of these days I'm going to figure out the airbrush of mine.  Anyways...I want to strip off the Vallejo and use Mr. color this time around when I shoot the underside of the Hellcat.  Thanks.

Craig

Craig: Nice spray booth you got yourself. That will definitely put you in business. I know that I would be severely handicapped in my building if I didn't have a spray booth at my disposal.

Steve: Thank you for the photo lighting tips. Very informative indeed. I'm assuming that if you throw a flash into the mix it will explode your camera.

Joe: So, let's see some updated pics, post tutorial. Very curious to see how they look using a more proper setting.

I've finally got my Hellcat masked up for the intermediate blue application. Will shoot that tonight or tomorrow. I'm also looking forward to some extended time off from work over the holidays. Should be able to make some hay with the available free time.

Thanks Checkmate..  Too bad I didn't know that about the toothpaste.  It would have saved me a trip to the store!  I will make a note of this.

Thanks again...

Steve

Hey Mustang...way to go buddy!  That is awesome to hear...  Ok.  So now that you know that...another lesson for you.  Just in case you ever change your lighting source..keep in mind that the different technologies of bulbs operate at different spectrums of light.  All these new fangled light bulbs can really play havoc with image color.  Or like with my workbench as an example. The bench light has fluorescent, and my magnifier light is incandescent. If I have both lights on at the same time, I get a mixture of light.  If I take the image during the day, then I have sunlight coming in adding yet another spectrum of light. If I took a picture using all those light sources, I would have a mess. The point is this.  If you really want to get an more accurate color rendition, try to control your light sources.  Stick to one spectrum of light and set the camera accordingly.  BTW...cameras are designed to try and identify color temperature while in the automatic mode.  The problem is...most cameras do a poor job at.  That is the very reason you had to set it manually to make it look right. Cameras get especially confused if there is more than one spectrum of light going on in the room.  

Probably more information than you needed.  

Way to go buddy!!!

Steve

Hey Steve. I finally found that dam incandescent setting on my camera. Fixed it and it works like a charm now!!  Thanks a mil.

Hey Craig

Thanks. BTW.. Nice looking spray booth you have there.  I made one from scratch many years ago and it may need revamping or replacing..  It worked well for model cars but space is kind of tight for an airplane.  Seeing yours has me thinking.  Have fun with it man!

Steve

Ha ha ha ha! Woooo hooo! I know that feeling!! No yard work to do.............................but you didn't hear that from me...

Lets hope the weather is nasty next week.  That way I'll have to stay inside. 

Looking forward to your progress Craig. Off all week.......................hmmm...........................the modeling one could get done.  

Steve-The canopy looks real nice.  I'll have to remember this page if I ever run into canopy problems.

Well, I eliminated one of my excuses for not working on my plane.  My spray booth arrived today.  Nothing fancy, but it will do for what I need.

Unfortunately, work is starting to pick up.  I may be using it as an excuse more than I like.  The good news is that I'm off all next week.  So things should start rolling along.

Craig

Nice work with the canopy, Steve.

And if you really get hard pressed, when the hardware store is closed, toothpaste can polish clear plastic pretty well, too.  But it has to be the paste type, not the gel.  Then, finishing up by rubbing with t-shirt material will often give a nice shine.

Thanks Mustang and Joe.

Joe you are correct.  The Testers is a decent bond if you don't put too much stress on it.  So for standard canopy use, I think it is a pretty good option. You called that from the beginning.  You stated as much that it won't have a real strong bond but it should be better than what I was using. I think you nailed that. One other nice thing about the Testers glue was that it was easy to remove from the canopy.  It was like rubber, and you could roll it right off.  It did not affect the plastic in the least.

Yes I decided to use plastic polish because the canopy still had a fog to it after polishing with the stick.  For grins, I brushed on some Future to see if that would remove it.  It helped it, but it was not as clear as it was before. So then I progressed to the polish.  The polish removed that remaining fog. 

As to what kind of polish I used, my options were limited with the lateness of the hour and on an Sunday. I did not have any at home, so I went to a hardware store. I found something called Flitz Polish.  There are probably better options out there but it is all that they had.  It served its purpose and did the job.

Well.. I have some nice time off coming next week.  I hope to really dig in and make some progress.

Steve

It's all good!!!  I'm at a loss for anything camera related; good to know that other folks know what they are doing to help each other out!!

TAD

Thanks Dave!!! The pinkish backgrounds....lol .. Man I'm still learning that camera. Bakster has given me a little insight on that to help out so hopefully it doesn't happen again.

Mustang- great job on the Corsair!!  With the pinkish backgrounds you could say that you're just doing your best to raise awareness for *** cancer, like the guys in the NFL do!!!  Seriously though, looks really good!

TAD