denders

Thanks guys!

Thanks guys.

I finally took time to take some RFI photos. My usual photo taking spot has been in use by the other half, so I took it outside.

I picked this up last fall at the Murfreesboro IPMS show. Thought I'd check them out to see what they are and whether they might be suitable for the grandsons. Hobby Nut vends at that show. Upon opening the box, I found the engineering amazing with the multicolored injection molding. These are the sprues after assembling it, but you get the idea if you've never looked at one of these. Yeah, one corner is clear parts. Also, this sprue is a different material and there are ball joints molded in. I found it amazing. The upper right corner are the hands. There is a ball joint for the thumb, the index finger, and then the other three fingers together. One of the drawbacks, I think, related to the grandsons working on this, is that the instructions tell you to pull some of those ball joints apart to add pieces. I actually had to go through the replacement part process because I broke one of them. That took about 10 weeks. Then, there's all the STICKERS. But, it's done now. Nothing is glued, it's all just pushed together. All the joints move and can be posed. I'll think about it, perhaps I'll go for a larger one. I'll definitely have a closer look at the Gundams on the display table at the next show.

Okay, I think I'm going to call this one done. I'll see when I get to 'good' photos.

For anyone who would like the Studio3 file for the masks, I've uploaded them here. Dave

Hobby Nut HobbyNut Models is where I purchased mine. He doesn't have all the colors. It's not all that long ago that he posted adding the line, so I'm assuming others have purchased from him and that's why he doesn't have all of the colors at the moment.

Wow,

Thanks, Peter. Yeah, a glossy surface is always better for using this type of wash unless you really want to have a little of it stay behind. It is less "smelly" than using the enamel-based panel line washes. Onward, lots of surface to cover and I prefer doing different areas at a time and not all of it at once. And that's probably related to using the enamel-based PLW.

I figured I would try this out. Small area first.

Okay, last pieces of masking placed and painted. Next I have to look at the canopy parts. Then a clear coat and something for all the panel lines.

Okay, first part of the masks on. Paint on. I'm using a Creos 771 (0.18mm) with pressure set to 10 psi and the needle adjustment set at 2. Setting 0 won't allow the needle to move. And masking off. Looks pretty good to me. Just 4 more mask pieces to go.

Actually, when I weeded out the unnecessary pieces, I realized there was a mistake. So, these are the mask pieces, let's see how loony I can drive myself getting them in place.

A picture of the masks, it's a screen capture from the Silhouette Studio software. This is the largest set of masks that I've done. It's raining here, so I'll have to wait a couple of days. I want to paint if it goes on well and not have it sitting around for a bit. It should be interesting.

Thanks, Peter. Now to get back at it after spending a week in Florida getting my wife her "spring training baseball fix". I'm thinking it shouldn't be a big deal, just patience. The yellow parts will be the 'holes' in the mask, I just have to work at making the cutting marks for the cutter.

Actually, if I scan my decals, I should be able to make my own. I guess I'm going to experiment with one of the chipping methods too.

Thanks, I'll check it out.

It might be interesting figuring out what the yellow stripes actually looked like when new.

That might work. I've never tried the hairspray method. I do have a bottle of someone's chipping fluid but I've not tried it either. Hmmm.

Thanks, Peter. That would be easy except....... There's a lot of wear on the stripes. Lots of masking painting too.

She's got legs. I'll have about 10 days or so to contemplate whether I'm going to use the decals for the yellow stripes or the more tortuous route of masking and painting them. The small decals that I did use in the cockpit were hard to get to settle down into the raised detail in the cockpit. But the stripes are worn and that has to be a lot of work to duplicate in a mask. I'll think about it. I may have to rewatch an episode or two to see about other weathering effects that I may want to duplicate. The front of the right engine has a panel missing, so I may want to add some scorch marks in that area.

Perhaps that's where they got the idea. It's said that the cockpit for the Millenium Falcon came from a B-29.

More progress.

Thanks for the suggestion, PW, I had wanted to try that, so I've ordered some from a local online seller. He's about an hour away but doesn't have a physical store front. I could arrange to pick it up, I think, but it's still ~an hour away. I've masked and painted some varied panels with different metals. The base color is SMS Aluminum, and the other colors are various MRP metal colors. The landing gear wells are blue and when I was pulling the masking off, I realized that I forgot about masking and painting the nose gear well.

Thanks guys! Here's a quick way to use 2/3 of a bottle of aluminum paint. Some other colors mixed in too. Now I need to do some research about possibly changing up some of the panels. Perhaps a few scorch marks too.