AIRCRAFT - Battle of Britain Group Build (Jan 1st 2005 - May 31st 2005)

QUOTE: Originally posted by rjkplasticmod Tanky, best not to use the old decals. They were poor quality when new, can't imagine how bad they would be now. Regards, Rick

Hmmmm.... can you direct me to a source for AM decals then?

Short progress report on the 109. Got the washes for the panel lines & light weathering done today. Now its final assembly & flat coat time. Have a couple of other projects as well, but should finish the 109 this weekend. Spent about an hour drybrushing the Hurricane IP. It came out pretty good.

Regards, Rick

Tanky, measure the size of the crosses on the decal sheet and give them to me.... if they are close to any of the ones I have I can at least get you that much from a new decal sheet. (have some for a Bf110 and an He111 so one of the two should match fairly close)

Don't sweat it Tanky! Everyone knows Nurse Kremps took all your good kits when she got fired!

Actually some of the good quality older kits don't build into bad models... the revered Monogram OS2U Kingfisher is one... yeah it lacks any interior detail but sitting on a shelf it's allright!!

Just sit back, sip on a cold glass of Future and enjoy yourself!

Darren thanks for the compliment... I realy am anxious to do another now that this one is nearing completion... I may put finishing this one off for tonight as I am very tired and the puppy had no plans of letting me have a quick nap when I came home...

Rick - ooooohhh now THAT would be nice! (a Hasegawa mold of the Do-17)

Tanky, best not to use the old decals. They were poor quality when new, can't imagine how bad they would be now.

Regards, Rick

Yeah it does seem state of the art when it was released. The raised panel lines are numerous and nicely done, and the exterior detail is quite nice. You're right, the outline looks dead on when I compared it with some pics. I wish I could buy the Eduard PE detail set for the cockpit but ahhh well... Interestingly enough the decals look VERY VERY old, but they have not yellowed yet. The whit is just kinda greyish.

Tanky, the Monogram Do-17Z was a state of the art kit when it first came out. It is very accurate in outline, just lacking interior detail, and raised panel lines were all the rage when the kit was tooled. I am amazed that no one has yet to do a modern tooled version, but Rumours are ( I love Rumours, especially starting them) that Hasegawa will release a new tool kit in 1/72 sometime this year.

Regards, Rick

darren problem is i am not sure which i want to do yet. as soon as i decide i will post it.



joe

QUOTE: Originally posted by Tankmaster7 OK so in the box of my dornier, not great to say the least. Raised panel lines, (but to give them credit they are very nicely and deliocately raised) barely any cockpit detail ( the instrument panel is a flat piece of plastic with a PAPER cutout to glue on). Being strapped for cash right now (allowance and all you know) I plan on building it out of the box anyway. It may not be great, but I hope I can make it look halfway decent at least...

Tanky don't sweat the quality of the kit you're building, the point of this GB was to get together build some models and have a bit of fun. Oh and I'm still looking forward to seeing your build!!

Cheers
Darren

Joe, no problems at all, the build has a long time left to go and you can join in anytime you like. If you want to nominate your build I can add you to the front page.

Tom, the Martlet is looking very impressive and almost done!!!! Thanks again for the Future.

Tanky, another reason I Future over the top of my decals is to protect them from the panel line washes and weathering process.

Cheers
Darren

OK so in the box of my dornier, not great to say the least. Raised panel lines, (but to give them credit they are very nicely and deliocately raised) barely any cockpit detail ( the instrument panel is a flat piece of plastic with a PAPER cutout to glue on). Being strapped for cash right now (allowance and all you know) I plan on building it out of the box anyway. It may not be great, but I hope I can make it look halfway decent at least...

oh yeah to clarify for Rick on what I posted yesterday... no prob with tip dry, the worse I have had happen is once in a great while I have to give it a little "extra heavy shot" of paint on a slip of paper to keep it flowing well... but I have looked at the tip and seen no paint build up there... and there's not any paint on the neddle itself really when I take the needle out for the nightly cleaning before I put it all up...

QUOTE: Originally posted by KINGTHAD Tom your bird looks good from here. Hey I use the Vallejo paints myself but I thin it with dist. water when I (ab), dose the Vallejo thinner make a big difference? Thad

Thad, I think it does.. on the side it lists "does not reduce adhesion or speed drying of acrylic paint" so I think it has some kind of adhesive additive as well as a retarder. (Just the fact they list is as NOT doing those things) I've mostly used it since the guy at the LHS recommended it... his stuff is real high quality so I took his word for it and can't argue to say the least! Plus at 3 to 10 drops being the most I have used so far each time I paint, it really hasn't used much at all!!!

Fightnjoe Who ?? Don't worry Joe, we wont forget you. Leave you standing in the dust maybe, but not forgotten .

Regards, Rick

Tom your bird looks good from here. Hey I use the Vallejo paints myself but I thin it with dist. water when I (ab), dose the Vallejo thinner make a big difference?

Thad

Rick, I have no problems at all with it (dry tip), but I use the Vallejo thinner as well... And needle lube as well.

ok guys dont forget about me. i am still going to do this just waiting on the kit now. actually rather anxious to do this. i have never done a british plane and i have three on the way.


joe

I must recommend Vallejo as well, they rank right there with Polyscale in my opinion.

cheers

Mike

Thanks Tom, I have the links OK. How about tip dry problems with Vallejo ? That's always been a problem for me when I try to AB Acrylics,

Regards, Rick

Rick -

actually it is the "Color of Eagles" set made for a company of the same name out of Miami I use mostly (supplied by Vallejo)... the rest are the Air colors by Vallejo.. I DO use the Vallejo thinner with them... and for airbrushing it works like a charm.. 3 parts paint, 1 part thinner.. so for the Sky underneath of my Martlet I used 30 drops of color, 10 drops of thinner and it covered the entire thing!... so you can see why I like the bottles in dropper style... none of the three main colors look like they have been touched! unlike the 1/3 or so bottle of blue/gray I have left over from my SBD which was MM... it took all of that in coating and the little left over each coat wasnt worth putting back in the bottle... no waste with Vallejo!

The vallejo thinner I bought came in a 1 oz bottle and again, it's hard to tell I've used any!!!

Only thing to note... with Color of Eagles the colors are named standardly.. with Vallejo Air colors you have to get a conversion chart... i.e the color they call Sand Yellow in Vallejo doesn't quite match Sandgelb in Color of Eagles or Model Master... it's another color that does.. kinda confusing... There's a couple of online vendors for Color of Eagles out there if you are interested I can get them to you. They are also "Toned down" which means they are lightened a bit for the "scale effect" of models... some people complain they don't match the FS equiv exactly... but once they are on a 1/48 or ESPECIALLY a 1/72 model I think they do! (I think using the exact FS equiv makes them too dark)

I have used Vallejo for brush painting for a few years, but haven't tried airbrushing it. Are you using the standard Vallejo or the new Aircraft Colors line designed for airbrushing ?

Regards, Rick

Thanks Rick... there's a few things I wanna work on but overall it came out ok for the masking dillema I had.. (first time masking Vallejo) .. which by the way had no trouble whatsoever... in fact less trouble than I have had with MM in the past..

I really am contemplating spending the $167.00 or so and just buy the complete line... there is NO waste with these... everything is metered out in drops so no overfilling the AB and losing some of the paint because of it... no pull up on masking whatsoever, and they just look good! Good bye to all my other colors when I get the money and the urge to do it! And the complete line is something like 134 colors... so I don't think I would be at a loss for accurate camo patterns!

Tom, excellent job on the Martlett so far. Looks really good. I agree with you on the topcoat after decals. Adds a lot to the longevity of the model.

Regards, Rick

a lot of decals tend to shrivel like you haven't seen when you dullcoat on top of them Tanky... I mean they look like a Sharpei in December in Gander, Newfoundland.. when you decal over them no chemicals, or whatnot can get to the decal or the underlying paint so it keeps on looking nice! It also helps prevent/slow yellowing and silvering of the decals over time...

So I always future after painting now... (I learned the hard way )

What exactly is the point of futruing OVER the decals again before dullcoating? is it okay to future then decals and the dullcoaty directly?

QUOTE: Originally posted by Tankmaster7 [brThat's because I didn't want to have to eat the soup after what I did to it!!

[:0][:0][:0] That was you?????? I thought Sean... er.... wow.... ::shaking head:: good thing I looked in the pot first...

HEre's a poor shot of my build so far... note the interesting way the slate grey camo strip ends at the wing root on this scheme.. the decal painting sheet had this on here - just like this, so I left it.. and if you look at it from directly above it does form a "y" on the starboard wing... so I guess it works out... just not used to them not wrapping around like this... there was so little research material on the Martlet I decided to stick with this, as it looks like the reference on the FAA website...

she'll look better when she is dullcoated, and the smoke is going to get feathered later with a charcoal dabber (don't know what you call it) the paper pencil thing the artists use to smudge charcoal... ok I got up and looked.. "Blending stumps..." sounds like what old lady Kravitt does before she makes possom leg stew!

now all is left is for the undercarraige to dry so I can glue it in, have to cement the prop in (it is kinda just handing there for effect right now) future, dullcoat and then glue the canopy on... WOOHOO!!! of course there are probably half a dozen touch ups I wanna do before futuring but nothing major, a dab of paint here or there...

and of course I will get out all the lamps and the white paper to photo the finished product... just giving sneak peaks for now...

QUOTE: Originally posted by tho9900 cool Tanky! I was wanting to do one of those but they are hard to come by... finally it's starting to sound like a more rounded build... a little of everything... Good luck and can't wait to see pics! On a side note Lunchalot noticed you were missing at breakfast today.... better avaoid the old windbag like the plague!

That's because I didn't want to have to eat the soup after what I did to it!!

Tom, looking forward to looking at the pics.

Jay, I have about 400 finished models, mostly 1/48, and they do use up a lot of storage space. I can display about 80, the rest are carefully packed away in storage.

Regards, Rick

Great, natural metal it is, thanks guys.

Say, what happens if you run out of room for all the finished models, the way it sounds, some you can build like 10 or more a year!? I need to get some shelves for my new ones, the old ones I unpacked and set out. It is really neat to see the progression of skills and techniques picked up over time.

Well I got a lot done today.. I am down to gluing in the landing carraige, putting the gun sight on waiting for decals to cure, future and dull coat! I'll post some pics tonight... gotta go feed the dogs and take a nap. (been a long day and have been nursing a sinus headache...) hmmm nursing... Kremps.... nevermind...

It looks good, the sqn insignia look like they are in a different alignment than the decal placement sheet shows... however because of the body shape they had to go there... also they look like other RAF/FAA craft I have seen with the letters on one side of the roundel slightly higher or lower than the other side...

Been a good build! I am thinking of doing my Aussie GB kit next then back to another BoB subject...