WIP Tamiya Japanese Type 90

3 things come to mind.

1st is "Tiny Bubbles" by Don Ho

2nd is when Bugs would try to make Daffy think he was sick and seeing spots by painting them in a room

ans 3rd.  that is FREAKIN" AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!

Then it was on to the tough part....replicating the white spots. The route I decided to go down (which ended up working like a charm, as you'll see shortly) was to start by printing out one of the reference pics for this scheme in as close to 1/35 scale as I could manage. Didn't hit it exactly, but close enough for government work!

From the printout, I cut a couple of repetitions of the scheme I would need to make my template. Took my scrap sheet of styrene from the back of my spray booth and cut a piece off that was about the right width, with enough left over to use as a handle, and to cut down on the amount of overspray. Laid one of the cutouts on top of it to use as a guide to punch out all of the holes.

Turns out that a hole punch was almost exactly the right size for the medium circles so those were very simple to lay in. All of the smaller ones were matched up with different sized bits that I ran through with my Dremel, continuing to hold the paper in place over the styrene sheet. The largest one was too big for any of my bits, so I ended up using the hole punch 6 or 7 times, then smoothing out the edges with a sanding bit in the Dremel as well as some old fashioned 400 grit sandpaper. It isn't perfectly round, but will have to do.

A quick test shot of how the scale looks - again, not perfect, but pretty darn close!

Mixed up some thin flat white - about 30%/70% paint to thinner. Needed to keep it flowing very easily, and judging by the photos (especially over the markings) didn't want it to be too opaque. The process was remarkably fast, 30-40 minutes tops of spraying through the template. There were a few places where there were obstructions that didn't allow the template to get as close to the model's surface as I would have liked, but the results overall were more than satisfactory:

A good bit of detail painting to get to tonight, as well as starting to play around with the sheet/tarp materials. After that it's off to the weathering races - all suggestions will be happily accepted!

It was a busy weekend for me at the bench...probably would have gotten even more done had there not been two great football games, and had Walmart not had a sale on DVD box sets of Battlestar Galactica.

Saturday night I sprayed the second of the two camo colors. I did end up going with just straight Flat Earth (XF-52), giving the parts of the lower hull that had already been basecoated a quick overspray. Freehanded this just like the green, and tried to put less paint onto the edges of the panels to keep a bit of the pre-shade caused by the black primer coat. After an hour or so, got to here:

Sunday morning saw a couple of touchups for places that I missed (mostly nooks and crannies) before spot-coating the areas that would receive decal markings with Future. Allowed it to dry for an hour or so before applying them. With a bit of Micro-Sol to lay them into, they all went down with no issues despite being typical "Tamiya thick".

Marc: Maybe we could sign a petition??...lol  

You know, the funny thing is that I have those...must have picked them up from Squadron or Great Models or something. Heh. His paint rack looks like vintage 1989 or so - not sure I'll be able to talk him into ponying up for a new one!

dupes

Phil - I'm pretty surprised myself, especially since I didn't know Tamiya made those colors! Went down to the LHS, and sure enough, his rack stops at XF-66...which would explain me not knowing about those. Huh. I'm guessing they're recent releases, and the instructions are just outdated. They must have used whatever they had kicking around for the 61/74 (35164+168 I think), come up with a better formula for the later kits like the Type 90 (35230 or somewhere in that region), and then just decided to make a line of Japanese-specific colors.

At least I know what to do next time.

LOL - sounds like your LHS needs a new paint rack, as XF's 67, 68 and 69 are the 3 NATO cam colours, which I'm sure you're going to need at some stage.

Mr.Leg, Nate, Wingy - thanks for looking in! I have a largish update coming this morning once I can get all of my pics dialup-ed into PhotoBucket. Stay tuned.

Phil - I'm pretty surprised myself, especially since I didn't know Tamiya made those colors! Went down to the LHS, and sure enough, his rack stops at XF-66...which would explain me not knowing about those. Huh. I'm guessing they're recent releases, and the instructions are just outdated. They must have used whatever they had kicking around for the 61/74 (35164+168 I think), come up with a better formula for the later kits like the Type 90 (35230 or somewhere in that region), and then just decided to make a line of Japanese-specific colors.

At least I know what to do next time.

dupes

Up later tonight will be color two to fill in the remaining black areas...although I wish I could leave it that way! Looks sinister! After reviewing the instructions from the T61 and T74, am wondering if I should just spray Flat Earth for the second color - it's what Tamiya used to recommend for Japanese tanks rather than the 49/51/64 blend. Certainly would produce much more consistent color if I had to make any changes. Hmmm.

Hey Dupes, she's looking good so far. I'm surprised Tamiya didn't recommend their own JGSDF colours - XF-72 Brown (JGSDF)  and XF-73  Dark Green (JGSDF)

Moving with speed and efficiency....waiting to see spots!!

Rounds Complete!!

Looking good Dupes! Looking forward to seeing the winter camo on it.........that's gonna look awesome!

Nate

Dude you are really ripping through this build. Lovin' it so far.

Left off with the lower part of the hull getting done. Since then, I haven't been able to sit down for any long periods, so I did a bit of work on the stowage and figs. Scrounged through my Type 61 and Type 74 kits to come up with any more applicable stowage. Did find the aforementioned set of skis, as well as the winter-clad crew:

Did a bunch of cleanup work on them, as well as the resin set I had kicking around, plus the guys that came with the ammo-loading set. Not sure if they'll be included or not, but figured they could get primed with everyone else.

Finally today I was able to get the hull halves buttoned up. Slight warpage issue (in a Tamiya? surprising), but some judicious use of clamps seems to have straightened that out a bit. After that, proceeded on to spray the first of the two camo colors! Followed the Tamiya instructions - which differed significantly from the box art - to freehand the green.

Up later tonight will be color two to fill in the remaining black areas...although I wish I could leave it that way! Looks sinister! After reviewing the instructions from the T61 and T74, am wondering if I should just spray Flat Earth for the second color - it's what Tamiya used to recommend for Japanese tanks rather than the 49/51/64 blend. Certainly would produce much more consistent color if I had to make any changes. Hmmm.

No internet on Sundays for me (I keep trying to talk the coffee shop into opening), so hopefully a solid update on Monday!

A couple of weeks eh, should be no problem since the building part is done and the fun has started. I'll keep watching. Hope to see this baby at Valleycon in March   !!!!

Rob

www.scratchmod.com

Hey Rob! Thanks for checking in!

I'll do my best to keep cranking out the pics...I'd like to have this done in a couple of weeks for my modeling club's monthly meeting.

Hey Dupes, I just did a bit of catching up on this model of yours. Very nice build and the painting is going to be some thing else buddy, I can't wait. Keep the pics and up dates coming.

Rob

http://site.scratchmod.com/

Thanks, Bill! I'm hoping it adds some sort of depth, indicating that there's something else kicking around inside that turret instead of...nothing.

While waiting for washes to dry, I started working on stowage, and even the figures that will may be going along with the build.

Pics tomorrow!

Looking good Marc, the added detail with the auto-loader and the paint work is sharp.

MaDeuce - I haven't attached any of the confetti yet - managed to leave all of the parts that will hold it removable, or at the very least accessible. Will put in all the pieces very close to the end of the build.

Coming along very nice, I use the confetti whenever I can looks very real, you might already know this but if you want to keep that shiny reflection on it make sure you keep the mask on when applying dullcoat/glosscoats, I learned the hard way. cheers

Got a bit done last night, only one pic from the end of the evening. Fired up the airbrush and grabbed the circle template to paint all of the roadwheels (yes, both sides!) in short order. Also painted the entire lower hull half as this will all be unreachable after the top is attached and the skirts cover up most everything.

Did some preliminary weathering on the tracks in the form of diluted Flat Earth. It appears that I'll be able to (carefully) roll the tracks around the roadwheels to apply more during the normal dirtying phase. Need to add some washes under here before everything gets buttoned up, even though there won't be much to see unless you view this guy from underneath.

Current condition:

This shot is a bit washed out (poor workbench lighting), but it gives you some idea of what the camo colors will look like. Not nearly as contrasty as I thought they would be when compared to the box art, at least when using Tamiya's paint mix formula. They suggest XF-49, 51, and 64 if I remember correctly - Khaki, Khaki Drab, and Red-Brown in equal parts. Was unable to find any sort of FS number equivalent for Japanese paint so this will have to suffice.

AgentG - pretty interested to see how I pull it off myself.

A Bears fan, eh? How does that happen when one lives in Vegas? Can't believe there isn't an NFL franchise there...maybe the Jaguars will move. They appear to be pretty unhappy with Jacksonville right now. Oh, and GO JETS! btw.

Boyd (and everyone else) - I don't think I made myself clear about the hatch. It WILL be posed in the open position for display purposes, it just needed to be closed for the primer-ing of the entire vehicle. I had even considered cutting one of the adjacent doors open as well to give it a bit more viewing area, however the insert doesn't extend far enough in any direction to allow that without extensive scratching of more interior parts.

Hey Marc, and idea to maybe try for the stencils, 2 thoughts.. clear shelf paper, it comes with a grid on it, and you can trace your circles.. or cut a sheet to fit a normal 8x10 paper, then run it thru a photo copier or printer, then you transfer your pattern from the computer to  make how ever many of the templates you want.. or have it as one whole side of the tank.. the other idea is using parafilm.

Dupes:looking forward to seeing this with the bikini polka dots attached.

Nice progress.....the interior needs a good opening to see.....leave open as much as you can.

Ahhh....green next.....my favorite color!!!

Rounds Complete!!

to bbrowniii

Cheers

Dave

Dupes

Lookin' good!  Why not leave the reloading hatch open to make viewing the autoloader easier?  Or, if you insist on it being closed, could you rig it to it is removable?

Between my personal tech woes and the endless forum errors (at least on my end), there hasn't been much updating, but it's time that changed!

Left off working on the headlight covers which were upgraded with Tamiya PE parts. They're currently blu-tacked into place awaiting the MV Lenses which will go in after all the paint work is done.

After that I moved on to the interior upgrades in the form of the Tamiya autoloader set. This was obviously designed to be an easy drop-in for the kit, but I guess they decided to make it a separate purchase to rake in a few extra bucks. Can see where we start:

and where we finish after a couple of hours.

Unfortunately, you won't be able to see much of the work done here as it's only visible through one small hatch. Hoping that this at least gives the hint of more stuff packed inside the hull! Moved along through the steps putting the turret together. The radio antenna mounts received a bit of work, as Tamiya provides them with about a scale 1' nub sticking out, which is nothing like what my reference pics show. The nubs were removed, and both mounts were drilled out to accept guitar string antennae in the future.

The turret was then wrapped up, including the PE mesh that fits into the turret basket. Here you can see a bit of the autoloader:

After double checking to be sure I hadn't missed everything, I dragged a whole box of parts taped down to receive the black Wal-Mart rattlecan primer. 2-3 coats later, we're up to date with where I am right now:

Tonight the base green will get sprayed, and the tracks will get painted (and mostly weathered). This will allow me to attach all of the rest of the suspension/roadwheels so I can button up the upper and lower hull halves which will allow me to start in on the camo.

More soon!

Hehehehe...yeah. "Someone".

Was going to update the WIP today, but it turns out that my digital camera is SO old that the memory card reader is incompatible with Windows Vista...wow. Guess it's time to upgrade.

Will Photoshop the pics at home, then bring them to update tomorrow.