[What is on your bench right now ? Share a picture :)]

Well, I started my first Gundam kit, the perfect grade Unicorn (1/60 scale). I thought it would be tons of parts, but easy goin, but it is not that simple and you have to adopt from classical plastic modelling to assemble delicate intersecting parts in multiple layers without glue. It doesn´t help, that either the Unicorns manual or the one for the Kosmos LED kit isn´t in English. Sure a translator helps, but it´s a bit inconvenient. 
Anyhow, I managed to build up the torso, making and correcting a few errors. The torso includes the pilots cockpit and is build up until the LED unit comes into play. As you can see, there are some body panels movable, they are opened on the left side. I also used some panel liner.

 



...and it was light, at least for testing:





Cheers Rob

[What is on your bench right now ? Share a picture :)]

2 hours ago, FullArmor said:

BMP-3 turret.

Looks very good.

Cheers Rob

[So...which chrome paint is best ?]

Like PW, I would recommend Alclad chrome, with my experiences it is the most realistic looking chrome. It´s very fragile though and needs proper priming. You said, you strip the chrome off the plastic first, that is definitely the way to go. After that, prime with gloss black, Tamiya LP-1 gloss black thinned with leveling thinner is best. Both black primers for metallics from AK or Alclad are terrible and never dry properly.
The best results you achieve, while layering very thin layers of Alclad chrome onto the primer and build up until the blackness completely vanishes.
You shouldn´t clear coat afterwards or mask over, as it will ruin the finish.

For parts like exhausts, there is AK´s super chrome maybe another option. Other than Alclad or AK´s Extreme Metallics, you need to flood it onto the part. The chrome looks extremely good, but it is also very fragile and I have used it only sometimes now and don´t have enough experience for a clear recommendation.

AK Extreme Metallics are great to work with and more durable than Alclad, but their chrome and polished aluminum have less shine than Alclad.

Cheers Rob

[Soo.... What did you just get???]

9 hours ago, belugawhaleman said:

From Dspiae, their ORBIT ELECTRIC DRILL (AT-EDO1).

I thought about this one too, Paul. I would be interested, how useful it is. How fast is the change of bits and things like this. I like the low revolution modus, as my Proxxon is to fast for many things. There are hundreds of holes to be drilled in metal or resin with every MFH build and I mainly hand drill, which is time consuming and sometimes finger cramping, but better to control. This thing could be helpful. 

Cheers Rob

[Soo.... What did you just get???]

5 hours ago, BlrwestSiR said:

I was thinking about you're not painting it and then I looked at the Gundam kit my son just built. It's from the standard HG series in 1/144. It's much smaller and less detailed and he didn't paint it either, just used a Gundam marker to do some panel lining.  It still looks good though. 

 

Nice one, I may paint another one later, when I have a feeling for abrasion due to articulation, but will do panel lining as well and paint some details with the Unicorn.

Cheers Rob

[Soo.... What did you just get???]

16 minutes ago, BlrwestSiR said:

Rob, I can't wait to see you work your magic on the Unicorn Gundam. 

The only thing to watch out for is that some parts are ABS plastic (mostly the inner frame) and supposedly they don't like lacquer too much. I haven't experienced any issues but I've heard it mentioned several times by reviewers. 

Thanks Carl, but no real magic this time,  I plan to build the Unicorn straight from the box, only with the added lighting set. No paint no glue  and I even read somewhere, that cleanup is minimal, because the sprue connectors are hidden and don´t need a lot of attention.

Cheers Rob 

[Soo.... What did you just get???]

Finally something other from Japan than sophisticated car kits, my first Gundam kit arrived some weeks ago, but I had to wait for the Kosmos LED lighting kit for almost two months. Initially, I wanted to start the project as a relaxing easter time build, but due to the late arriving of the LED´s, I´m not sur, if  I start immediately or not. It´s a ton of plastic in a huge box, but no drilling, excessive sanding, etc. As far, as I know, there isn´t even glue needed and the large perfect grade Gundam kits from Bandai are said to be of extremely high quality.





Cheers Rob

 

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

Nice and shiny, as I like it. After putting some hours of elbow grease into the polishing job, the BT52b looks like this. I used Tamiya polishing compounds, first "coarse", than "fine" and finally "finish". I polished by hand with a lint free cloth. I don´t use my Proxxon for the job, too easy it catches an edge and sends the part airborne. 
After the final assembly, I will clean the body parts again and use some polish wax, to get the last out of my work.

 









Cheers Rob

[ANIMALS IN OUR LIVES :)]

It´s so hard to loose a four legged family member Kevin. I have been there over a year ago, and I´m still sad. I think it´s our responsibility to lighten the burden of an ill pet, as soon, as live doesn´t seem livable for them anymore. To me, it was a hard decision, but I´m still convinced, it was the best, as my dog had pancreas cancer and he deserved a dignified life and a dignified death.
I hope, Anna will help you and your wife. We have only some cats now, which happened to intrude our garden, after the dog was gone. I love them as well, but dogs are different.

Cheers Rob  

[Soo.... What did you just get???]

On 4/6/2026 at 9:06 PM, BlrwestSiR said:

Lastly, the Bandai light kit for the PGU Nu Gundam. I was a bit on the fence on this one as it seems a bit overpriced for what you get. Most shops were sold out as well. Then I found it for close to the JDM price and decided to just get it and not worry about it.

Yo lighted up your monster squirrel, Carl, good choice. I still wait for my Unicorns lighting kit. It is on my island since one and a half week, but they don´t get it delivered, it´s crazy. I initially wanted to start building it as a relaxed easter build, but nope, no chance.

Cheers Rob

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

7 hours ago, KevinM said:

Nice work Rob really looks sweet and the part

 

1 hour ago, belugawhaleman said:

Looks Great Rob😀

Thank you Kevin and Paul. I´m happy to got the decaling and clear coating done, always a do or die part of a car build.

Cheers Rob 

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

14 hours ago, BlrwestSiR said:

Phenomenal paint and decal work there Rob. 

I'm still messing with the carbon decals on my HP4 kit and decalling is my least favourite part of building.

Thank you Carl, the decaling was not the easiest part of the build. There are not only curvy shapes to master, but you also need to get different decals to fit to the others. I wasn´t sure about my approach, Decaling one, let dry and then the next or all at the same time, which I did. There are some tiny wrinkles visible in some places, but I can´t do anything about it.
Decaling for me is always a love and hate job. Results are often great, specially carbon fiber decals, but there are so many trouble spots to master.

Cheers Rob 

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

9 minutes ago, PanzerWomble said:

Can I ask 

Big needle & low pressure for the lacquer ? 0.5

Sure PW, I use my H&S Infinity Giraldez with 0,4 mm needle and nozzle with a bit under 1 bar of pressure.

Cheers Rob 

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

Rainy days, what better thing to do than gloss coating. I finished decaling the body parts before and cleaned all the parts with warm soapy water from decaling residues. The large white decals gave me some worries, as the surfaces where marred visibly, despite them having protective paper on top, like you can see on the following pics.





For gloss coating, I used my trusty combo of Zero lacquer clear coat and leveling thinner. First, I sprayed the clear un thinned on, to protect the decals, ensure a fast drying time, as to hinder the paint to react with the decals. The result doesn´t look appealing, but that´s no problem.

The next coat is thinned with about 30 percent of leveling thinner, after maybe 15 minutes of drying time. This coat leveled a bit better, but the following coats, each thinned a bit more with levelling thinner, always after 15 minutes of drying time levelled near perfect in the end, each coat "eating" in the coat before. The last coat (#5) was sprayed with about 70 percent of thinner. Luckily I had no runners, but tried to let the parts dry "flat".
Now I leave the body parts in peace for two days to dry through before I start polishing.









Cheers Rob

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

My ranting time continues. This time it´s about Number 5 colors, specially mixed for the Bt52. The blue is near enough but doesn´t fit 100% to the blue of the decals, but the white is way off. It has a warm tint and doesn´t fit to the decals cool white at all, like seen on the next picture.



I carefully masked the blue side with the decals on (sweat) with de-tacked Kabuki tape and resprayed the white, this time with Number 5 MP4 white. Much better and luckily the decals stuck to the wing, while removing the mask tape.



Cheers Rob

[Huge Huey .....get yer 'Nam on]

Like Kevin said, nice painting and weathering. Looks like a workhorse.

Cheers Rob

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

53 minutes ago, Nick70 said:

Hi Rob, I have the B version, which appears to only have the decals for the smaller wing! I hadn’t noticed until now. 
What on earth were MFH thinking? 

Thanks for looking into your kit, Nick. Good for you, that you plan to build the smaller rear wing. I will use the decals for the large wing and cut away the red pinstripe. I thought about contacting MFH, but it would take some time to get replacements and I don´t want to wait.

Cheers Rob

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

8 hours ago, Nick70 said:

I will be also be doing the smaller rear wing - I looked at the bigger one and thought ‘he’ll no’ - far too fiddly for me!

Thank you Nick, I would like to know, which version your BT52b kit is, A or B and which rear wing decals are included? There is one main sheet for the white areas and sponsors and in my kit there is one smaller sheet for the rear wing of version A (large wing). I know from pictures of the MFH website, that two different small sheets exist, but mine had only one in the box.
The bigger wing looks like it would be sufficient for one or more planes, esthetically not my cup of tea.

Cheers Rob

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

17 hours ago, DocRob said:

One headscratcher I found with the rear wing decals. There are two options for the rear wing. I will use the smaller one. The other is huge and has even more side wings added. The decals are supplied only for the larger wing supports and you have to somehow cut the decal, which doesn´t even perfectly fit and try to use the red pinstripe from the remains, to let it look right. MFH, this is embarrassing.

I have to take back some I´ve said. It seems, there were two options for the kit, A: with a large rear wing and B: with the smaller rear wing, like I will build. 
The manual is for both versions and there are all the parts included for both options except the decals, which are on a small extra sheet. 
I stay with embarrassing and head scratching though, For a 500$ kit, MFH should have included both decal options .

Cheers Rob

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

11 hours ago, GusMac said:

The bodywork is looking great with the decals on.

Thank you Gus, I was very happy to see the decals fit and ability to smooth themselves out around curved shapes. The decal on the front body part was propably the largest, I ever applied.
I have to re-think the rear wing decals though. I think I cut away all of the red pinstripe around, as it would look silly, when it doesn´t match the contour.

Cheers Rob

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

I managed some more important steps after painting the blue base color. I decided the finish is smooth enough to decal directly onto the blue paint and the decals were very good to work with and very opaque luckily. Some contour around wild body shapes, which they did well with the help of a hairdryer. For application, I used only warm water with a drop of detergent mixed in. 
Strangely, there are two different decal sheets supplied, one with and one without a protective clear foil on top (typical for MFH kits with non Cartograph decals)
The larger sheet has some tiny imperfections all over the surface and I hope, This will be invisible after clear coating. 
Initially, I found the blue tone a bit too light, but the appearance changed with all the white decals and I think, it looks good now.



One headscratcher I found with the rear wing decals. There are two options for the rear wing. I will use the smaller one. The other is huge and has even more side wings added. The decals are supplied only for the larger wing supports and you have to somehow cut the decal, which doesn´t even perfectly fit and try to use the red pinstripe from the remains, to let it look right. MFH, this is embarrassing.

 

Cheers Rob

[What is on your bench right now ? Share a picture :)]

6 hours ago, BlrwestSiR said:

Watching @DocRob work his magic on his various F1 builds, I got up the courage to try and apply some carbon decals.

That looks awesome Carl, I don´t know if I had the courage for decaling the wheel, but experience shows, that carbon decals are easier to apply than one thinks. Which bike is that?

Cheers Rob

[Brabham BT52b - The Guided Missile - Model Factory Hiro - 1/12]

42 minutes ago, Nick70 said:

Which paint brand are you using for the blue? Looks good!

Like I said, it is Number 5 BT52 blue paint. To me it looks a tad to light, for a second one, god beware, I would try Zero Paints BT52 blue.

Cheers Rob

[Soo.... What did you just get???]

1 hour ago, FullArmor said:

Something different this time🙂

Kitbash ?

Cheers Rob

[Soo.... What did you just get???]

12 hours ago, belugawhaleman said:

This came today.....It's Tamiya's  Honda CB 750F in 1/6 scale. (16020)😀

I drove on one of these sometimes in the time, it was owned by a friend of mine. Nice bike, a bit on the heavy side, like most of these Japanese naked bikes. Never liked the Comstar wheels though. I owned a Suzuki GSX750 for some years, which is not completely unsimilar.

Cheers Rob