DocRob

She's shaping up beautifully. The primed plane looks smooth as silk and your repairs of the cowling area proved successful. It's a bit of of a downer, not to finish her on the good wave you caught lately. Cheers Rob

Some more weathering done. I've seen many corsair builds, where the whingroots were weathered and chipped like hell and the fuselage, nada, not a bit. I did some brush chipping with interior green and then added a variety of other stuff, to let especially the top color look a bit more interesting. I used AK's pencils in different grey and blue shades, creating chips and various dots everywhere. I used an old brush and dry brushed some of the intermediate blue for highlighting onto the darker blue. Then I used Tamiya's weathering pastels in different light colors and dabbed these onto the rivet lines and then brushed them smooth. This simulates an oil canning effect a bit and can best be seen in the spine section of the plane. I dabbed more pastels onto the upper parts of the fuselage to resemble sun bleached parts. Fine sandpaper was carefully used for some abrasion effects. I like the result now and will wait for a day or two and decide then, if I find something is left out. Weathering has to be logical and well believable distributed, where it helps to lean back and evaluate a bit. The results show better to the real eye than on the photos, but I will show some anyway. Cheers Rob

Thanks Martin, I tried all my chrome colors and found them not qualified for the job and remembered then, that I bought a roll of chrome tape lately. What better moment to check it out. The dull assembly will receive furthr love with some chipping and some oil dots. Cheers Rob

Sorry, double post due to failing internet connection. Cheers Rob

Thank you amigos, I do like the Flory washes for everything, except a completely clean aircraft with only some panel lines and rivets to pronounce. But they are good for all grades of dirtyness. In the moment, I ponder, how to continue. I will apply some chipping to the fuselage, oil leaking, exhaust smoke, some mud splatters around the wheels, but maybe, I start with some more post shading with oils for the darker sections, to create more depth to the surfaces. Cheers Rob

Today, I muddied my Corsair up with Flory's dark grime wash, a clay based liquid, which I applied over the whole airframe, after adding a drop of soap for better distribution, with a flat brush and let dry for about half an hour. The stuff is dried by then and looks totally grimy and dead flat. Then, I wiped the excess away with a dry piece of cotton cloth in the direction of the airflow and the very fine clay stays in all the panel lines and other crevices. The best part about this wash, you determine the grade of dirt or you can remove it completely wiped down with water, if something went wrong. It's clearly more visible on the lighter underside, but also noticeable on the darker upper side. The good think, my pre shading is still full visible. As a break, I made some detail painting on the landing gear, adding the brake lines and other tiny bits and pieces (not shown) and chromed the cylinders with AK's chrome tape for the first time. It worked ok, a bit more adhesion would have been great on these parts with small diameters, but it looks chrome to me, so thumbs up. Cheers Rob

Muchas gracias amigos, but the next step will be not so clean, in some minutes, I will apply Flory's clay wash onto it, a messy affair, hopefully with a convincing outcome. Cheers Rob

Thanks Carl, that helps indeed. I wouldn't have thought, that the ingenious American engineers where in need of high tech solutions, like applying tape, to get their crates sealed . Sounds that the Corsairs where leaking like British motorcycles of the sixties. It's interesting though, why it's only the Corsair, where the tape is so often applied, but that's maybe caused by the positioning of the oil tank. Cheers Rob

Good to see you back on the Würger. What's not to like about the rivets Harv, maybe except the slightly off orientation . Cheers Rob

The Falcon is looking great, but the ME-109 is no match or have I missed something about it entering hyperspace ? Cheers Rob

Thanks guys, I was considering to do more chipping but made a compromise, as I didn't want to use the same hairspray technique on the fuselage, I have to do the chipping there by brush and it has to fit the wing chipping, not so easy to do. Obviously these land based Corsairs were heavily weathered, giving the conditions they flew in. I want to have a worn look, but not too heavy. In 32 scale overboarding weathering can look a bit strange, when there is no denting or oil canning or whatever superficial damages would appear to go with the chipping. @BlrwestSiR, Carl, do you know what the white tape is applied for? All pictures of my crate don't show any, but others have them applied. Cheers Rob

Sorry to hear that, but I made that memo to myself long time ago with Montex masks and vinyl masks in general. The stuff shrinks, has to much flex, when applying and they don't stick in tight corners. I had no issues with residues though. Vinyl is good for records but not as a masking material. Maketar, 1ManArmy, Eduard and sometimes HGW kabuki mask are very good and trouble free. Cheers Rob

Nice Phil, you obviously don't need a lot of paint for this one. Cheers Rob

Your Schwalbe is a beauty, Chris. I like the subtle, blended in look of the painting and weathering and there are lots of details to catch the eye. Cheers Rob

Great work on the Jug, John, I love the scheme and the way yours came out with these great looking invasion stripes. I built mine as Dottie Mae some years ago, but it was a very close competition between the schemes. One critical point in the otherwise trouble free build, I found was the cowling to fuselage fit, which looked a bit strange. I did some surgery there to make it look right, especially in the side view. Cheers Rob

Thanks Peter, it might look a bit too harsh now, but that will be blended with washes and further weathering. The good thing with masking is, you can weather through the walkways, insignia and stencils. That's more difficult with decals. Cheers Rob

Do you remember the hairspray? I covered the chipped primer with a coat of clear and applied hairspray onto it, before I airbrushed the wing color, walkways, insignia and stencils. Now was the exiting moment to see, if it still works after so many layers of paint. I dampened the areas with water and a drop of soap and let it soak for half an hour. The paint was a bit more resistant, than the primer chipping, but it worked. Using different tools, like toothpicks, a stiff brushes and some tweezers, I got what I wanted. Now the whole plane was covered with a clear coat as preparation for further weathering. Cheers Rob

Thank you guys, stenciling with masks is a lot of work, but as you mentioned, rewarding and free of the typical decal issues. If you thin the color properly and spray thin layers, to prevent bleeding, after pushing on the masks, you will have decent results. Placement needs some patience. On most of the stencils I used my odd eyeballs for placement. It helps to keep some distance to the plane, to see the alignment better. Where placement proved difficult, I used some tape as reference. Cheers Rob

The P-40 looks 'dirty' for your usual extremely clean work Peter. That's no critique, only a sign, how hard you had to fight against the fit issues. Luckily the problematic area got solved and I can hear from your reporting, you are still really in it. It looks more and more like the original and the hard work is seemingly close to an end and than the fun begins . Cheers Rob

... and now to something completely different, but firs a short story. Two years ago, I entered a toy shop on my little island, I guess the only one in the search for kits and stuff. I found a miniature section of plastic kits there, Airfix starter kits, some obscure Chinese Jets from trumpeter, in all maybe ten kits. When I left the shop, I saw some more wooden model planes in the corner of my eye but took no further notice. Today I reentered the shop and found the plastic model section even smaller . Interesting to see, that the models changed, there had been buyers . When I inspected the wooden kits, I found two Occre ship kits and some plane kits , mainly gliders and a few RC-planes. To my further astonishment, the owner showed me some tools, glues, even an airbrush and a little stock of wood and RC-equipment. On top of the planes stood one large box from the modelling company Svenson. I think the company is now defunct, after some production in Belgium. My interest arose, a huge biplane, A Bristol Scout in 1/6 scale, man that's LS. I checked the box and there were lots of pre- cut balsa and plywood, aluminum cowlings, a vac formed pilot figure, steel rod struts for the wheels and wings, relatively detailed plastic hubs with rubber tyres and a lot more. This thing is huge, the wingspan is 125 cm and it's prepared for RC. Somehow, I felt in love with the kit and the owner made a good price and I left the store with a huge smile on my face. I have not decided, If it will be a decorative model, or if I build the Scout to fly, lets see. Sidenote: I have always complained not to have a LHS near me. Now I have one, yeah, with only a tiny bit of stock, but better than none .

Yesterday, I finished to apply all the stencils on the wings, that were covered by other masks before. ...and while having the Nato black in the airbrush, I added the stencils on the wheel covers. ... and then I realised, my god, I had completely forgotten to apply the 883's to the side of the fuselage. No big deal, except for covering the whole plane again, with different materials, in case of some white color bubbling somewhere unwanted. I also made the corrections to the stars and bars, while being on it. I think, the airbrushing phase is done so far, except for clear coats. Cheers Rob

Thank you John, it's a great compliment to hear it from his Corsairness himself . The kit is of so great quality, that you can fully concentrate on painting and weathering. Cheers Rob

How true, the first insignia, I tried to get the star aligned properly into the outline mask and gave up after a while and used the tape method, as I never have gotten it on along the bars mask. It's only fractions of a millimeter, but with parallel lines or stars inside circles, you see every fault.. I will buy some of this transfer film for future projects. I had a roll back in Berlin, where I started to airbrush on paper and made my own masks out of it. Cheers Rob

Thank you friend, the stencils look like the scale rendition of the real thing, easily, because they are . The path is challenging, but the results speak for themselves. I would have wished for a bit better, error free application of the strs and bars. I sealed them under a coat of flat in the morning, to make the corrections. This was all my fault in not taking the manual too serious about mask placement. Cheers Rob

Proof provided, Gary, this kit is buildable and you have done wonders with the painting and finishing. There are not so many builds, where you have the 'everything clicks' feeling. Painting and riveting blend perfectly, as do the figures. The recliner will be your signature item soon . Cheers Rob