DocRob

There goes the Kabuki . I´m the same Gus, I´m a coward, when it comes to large area masking jobs and can´t bring myself to add a stencil with the airbrush, without masking half a square meter around. Cheers Rob

The cabin painting came out great, Jeff, I love the slightly weathered, bit sun bleached appearance. Tyres and rims look great too. By accident, I have seen a Peterbilt resin engine some minutes ago. It might not be for this build, but... GPmodeling DD60: Engine 1/24 scale - Peterbilt Detroit Diesel Series 60 - for Italeri references 3857, 3894, 740 and 746, or Revell references REV07527 and 7527 (ref. DD60) | SpotModel Cheers Rob

You´ll love the oil colors, Peter. They are perfect for replicating wood or leather as they cover well, blend perfectly and can be applied without leaving brushstrokes. The downside is the long drying time, but that can be reduced with fast drying thinner. There is also a matte thinner, which reduces the shine a bit, so you can play a bit with the reflectivity of materials. For weathering, you can use the oil dot technique which allows for easy controllable tinted, irregular effects on painted surfaces. Lastly you can make your own washes and panel liners with oils, which are great to use and very controllable. Cheers Rob

The beast got teeth, literally I mean. After installing the bomb racks, I added the bomb load. Again, I used CA to glue the parts in place, which I prefer with painted parts. There is less risk of damaging the paint and applied with a tooth pick, it´s a very fine method. I will add some holding belts later, which I will make from fine Kabuki strips. The tailskid fits into a massive part inside the fuselage, but lasts only on a tiny plastic peg on the rear end. As this was damaged while handling the AEG, I replaced it with a 1mm brass rod for some extra strength. The fuselage window was very dirty from the inside, possibly due to lacquer fumes, but I could reach the inside from above and clean the panes I removed the masks from the cockpit openings and painted the paddings with oil colors and matte medium thinner. I used a dark brown base color, which I darkened for crevices and shadows with dark blue and lightened with some vanilla yellow for highlighting. I really like oil colors for replicating leather, you get great coverage, easy modulation and about the right shine. Cheers Rob

Wait with your jealousy, until it´s started. The build will be a challenge I guess. Many new things to learn, specially how to work with white metal best. Speaking of, I still try to find a way to get a magnetic tumbler polisher to my island, but no cookies. Seems to be a bigger problem, as I want to use it for cleaning and refining the white metal parts. I hope, I will start my MFH builds very soon, but the Cobra Coupe will not be the first. It´s either the Crocker motorcycle or another one. Cheers Rob

My second Model Factory Hiro kit arrived today. It´s the 1/12 Cobra Coupe, which won Le Mans as the first American car. Only six were build. I´m looking forward to tackle this piece of muscle. Again, no customs need to be paid for whatever reason and the pricing from Hiro direct from Japan is very reasonable and shipping is ultra fast. The following pictures were borrowed from the MFH homepage, to show the beast in it´s full beauty. Cheers Rob

Nice pics, señhores. On my island in the Atlantic, they claimed the start of the eclipse might be visible, but nope, only dramatic sun/cloud pics to show. Cheers Rob

Sharp looking camo, Scott, it´s weird, how Revell messed up the scheme in their manual. Cheers Rob

Not an easy build, it seems, Mike. I like how you address one obstacle after the other and the fuselage looks the part now. Wouldn´t it be helpful to use some small brass rod pieces as connecting points for the struts? Cheers Rob

Ahh, nothing for me, Carl, no resin updates no hundred part PE burner cans. Cheers Rob

Nice work on the paintjob Mark, I like how the pre shading works and gives enhanced contrast to the grey. Cheers Rob

Today, I added some multi color sponge ´chipping´ onto the non lozenged areas. I considered brown Flory clay wash, but decided against, as there are not many panel lines or similar on the fuselage. Then the bat got wheels - Does it make it a Batmobile? The undercarriage is very robust luckily and I added the first rigging through the beforehand glued in eyebolts. I used Infini flexible thread here, which was great to work with, elastic and therefore easy to tauten, but stiff enough to fiddle through the aluminum tubes, even for the second time. On with the wheels, wich are luckily included in two versions, weighted and normal. I chose the weighted ones for the heavy bird. Hard to imagine landing this huge bat on an improved airfield with four wheels the size of my mountainbike´s. Cheers Rob

Here you go, Peter, I hope, the picture shows the progress a bit clearer. Cheers Rob

Thank you Mike, honestly, you can´t beat Aviattic lozenge decals, period. They have the best color rendition to my eye and they are superb to work with. Another advantage is the possibility of pre shading with the clear backed sheets and the woven linen effect. For the AEG, I liked the colors of the WNW supplied sheet better than with some of their day camo sheets and costs and the need to cut all the lozenge decals to fit precisely let me use the kit supplied ones. You need huge amounts, if you cut them from sheets and you have to cut them, that the lozenge pattern fits on the borders, which can be hard to achieve, a thing I learned with the naval hex, I used on my Hansa Brandenburg build. I feel with you considering the Staaken, she is a big bird and needs a lot of sheets, even in 1/72. I have an Aviattic distributed Gotha kit in 1/48 with cookie cut Aviattic night lozenge decals. I wonder, how they look compared with WNW. It seems, the night lozenge was often overpainted with a dar yellow translucent varnish. I applied something like it here and together with the matte coating, it took away a bit of the edge in the lozenge, contrast wise. Cheers Rob

That´s what the camo is for, Peter, a night stalker in it´s cloak . I will add one or two ´after´ pics from a bit closer. What I tried to replicate was a yellow tinted varnish, often applied over the printed lozenge camo of the original, which in my case gives a slight sepia toned look, like in old photos. Cheers Rob

Not a lot of difference between these two pics, at least at first sight. What I tried to achieve, is to make the huge wings a little bit more interesting. First, I used a sharpened AK weathering pencil blue green and rubbed the tip over all the seams on the wing spars, quite tedious to do, but did a bit of highlighting. Then, I mixed Tamiya smoke with some drops of Tamiya clear yellow and sprayed it in slightly irregular patterns over the plane in the direction of the airflow. This tinted everything a bit and blended in the decals even better. Next was a matte coat, but the Tamiya LP matte clear was not matte enough for my liking. Therefore, I used Pledge with about 25 percent of Tamiya flat base mixed in. I would have liked it a bit more matte, but didn´t dare to add more flat base, as there is a risk at about thirty percent, that the mix sprays with a frosty surface. On the lower wing, I had some decal lifting on the trailing edge. I ´glued´ these in place with decal adhesive, but this will be a weak spot until finishing the build. Cheers Rob

Great work on the -E, Chris. I really like ,how you dig through that array of obstacles. Your cockpit looks great and thankfully the -E, -EJ, -EJ Kai questions were dealt with, at least in theory. I feel your pain in advance concerning the stenciling. When I built my Kai Phantom, it settled the fate for other modern jet builds for me . Cheers Rob

Looking great Peter and absolutely dynamic. I didn´t wonder at all, when you described, there were only a very few blemishes after priming. I had a huge reload of Tamiya Kabuki tape lately, as some builds require virtually square meters. If you want some relaxation from the Kabuki burden, build a WNW AEG. There is nearly no masking involved, if only because you don´t dare to put tape onto the overall lozenge decals . Cheers Rob

My wife returned yesterday from her Berlin trip and brought back some goodies for me. You wouldn´t think it special, but where I life, it´s nearly impossible to get Tamiya cement anymore. It´s in 40ml jars and only 30 ml are allowed to be shipped internationally, so I´m glad these will last for a while now. I added some Tamiya lacquer flat and semi flat clears - and- The Proxxon foot pedal. It´s pure genius, if you often use your Proxxon for drilling, polishing or routing. Have you ever experienced, drilling a 0,5 mm hole and finding the right spot with the rotating drill bit. Not anymore, set it in place and tap, why haven´t I seen this before. Lots of polishing bits for my Model Factory Hiro´s white metal preparation. Yes, it´s plural, there will not only my Crocker motorcycle from MFH, but another one is on it´s way. Some thin copper wire for producing my own eyelets and other causes and finally some Gaspatch resin eyelets, where I hope they take the strain of fishing line riggging. The metal ones were nearly completely spent on the WNW AEG lately. Cheers Rob

I like it as it is Ernie, gives some depth to the paintjob. I guess these planes weren´t polished after every turn. Cheers Rob

The struts are really the only very fragile parts, especially these for the nacelles. They have fair sized connecting points, but directly behind, they are extremely thin and fragile. Not to forget, that some of these points need to be rigged and therefore drilled. Cheers Rob

Ooops, these gear bay doors look really ugly, hope you can fix that, Gus. The good thing with the splinter camo, as extensive the application is, it will hide the little bumps here and there for sure. Cheers Rob

Some years ago, I mad this little stand for Set and Sol. The Mossie is looking absolutely fantastic, Phil. Thanks for the info about the barrels. I will substitute them with Brassin, but may will have the same problems. Will you weather her or leave her factory fresh? Cheer Rob

Some kits arrived after a long trip from Japan, the packet including my eagerly awaited Infini 0,135 mm flexible rigging line. A Tamiya P-47, for which I have to wait for a special decal set. Would be the perfect in between build. I like the Cosmo and the resin figure is way too cool, to let it pass. I´ve never seen the Japanese TV show, but anyway... Last but not leas, my first Dinosaur kit from X-Plus in 1/35. Do I hear ´build a weird dio´? Cheers Rob

Today, my long awaited parcel from Japan arrived, which included my Infini 0,135 mm aero flexible rigging thread. I never used the stuff and was eager to see, if it is suitable for the classic ´ thread through tube - then through the eyelet - and back a second time through the tube ´rigging and it worked. So this will be my method of rigging the nacelles, which are very delicate with their struts. The outer wings will be made with the same process, but with mor rigid fishing line instead for extra stability. Cheers Rob