ScottsGT

This one was on my “bench” last Friday. It’s one of those outdoor projects that requires perfect weather, no wind and no one around to pester me into going somewhere, doing something else or a distraction of any kind. My old F-250 once had a camper shell on it. The seal on the door had worn through the paint. Rust was taking over quickly. Grabbed the old Bosch DA, some 80 and 220 grit and cleaned it up. Squirted on some Rustoleum primer I had and then got the interruption phone call. Retired guys lunch date was still on. Cool. Primer needs to dry hood anyway. Went to get in the Mustang and the cover was still on it. Easier to pull the paper off the truck. LOL! Got home and re-papered, sanded and primed once again. Scuffed with 400 and broke out the rattle cans of matching white and clear. Done! Oh yea, and new headlights last Wednesday too. Old Marge the garbage barge is getting younger by the day. Next up is a new stereo with Bluetooth because every time I get in commercials are playing from my house all the way to the dump and back. I might hear one song in route.

Aackk!! Another Tomcat!

Waited a while on building this one, but when the Air Force announced the splinter paint job, I knew that was a must have. Took a while, but aftermarket caught up. I bought the Kopecky exhaust back in 2020. No instructions included, but digging through the original post on LSP, I found where Jan posted them. Im building this one clean. No open missile bays, etc. Gear down of course. Here’s the bare cockpit in progress before the Quinta set applied. Engine modded for the aftermarket exhaust All the gear bays with the white applied, struts built. Now I’ve got to paint all the many hydraulic lines and wiring running everywhere.

Nostalgia is what drives my syfi builds. I’m mainly a Trekki, to a point. I was there on opening day for Star Wars, worked a theater where Empire Strikes Back for a solid year. I had every line in the movie memorized. But Star Wars never did it for me the way Trek did. I also have a few Lost In Space kits to build as well as the 1960’s War Of The Worlds space ship. Although the remake with Tom Cruise was more accurate to the book. Grew up watching Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea and Disney’s 20,000 Leagues….that’s why I picked that subject for my group wet build.

K’Tinga is completely different markings. At this point my plan is to find some regular small scale decals and get my daughter to cut me some stencils on her Ciricut machine. Here’s a photo of the studio model. Very simple markings.

Now you’re just trying to egg me on! I have both kits. TOS and the refit. And a rare 1/350 resin Klingon D7 battle cruiser. Just cannot find decals for it.

I’m going to add one. It’s not a Fisher kit, but corrected using a Fisher wing and prop. All Fisher parts donated to me by other modelers.

I bought the MRP HG paint sets to use on my B and C kits. I’ve yet to try them out. Cool thing about the splinter is no have glass!

I read the history of the prop. Quite interesting how it wound up in some guys back yard for his kids to play in it for many years and then on to a junk yard. My understanding is that is was so far gone, it was more like a restoration of a warbird pulled out of the ocean. Yea, it’s the same plane…just the builders tag.

I know the great car customizer Gene Winfield built the Shuttlecraft. I’m guessing he probably delivered it in primer, which is pretty close. I do know that greens were added to the color, and actually sections of the Enterprise were painted a light shade of green due to the use of tungsten lighting and the film affects using certain lighting of certain colors. But you’ll never see those greens on film. It’s interesting to read about Enterprise builds how they either built it for a replica of the filming model or how your eye saw it on TV.

Thanks! I was kind of anal about getting the colors right. Gary Kerr is the renowned expert of Star Trek colors and restoration of the 12’ filming model that’s on display at the Smithsonian. He published a mix of Model Master enamels to get the correct hues. Of course with MM gone and me dedicated to lacquers now I started looking at all online color charts for model paint I could find. my formula was a bit simpler and when my model was held up against the kit box, it was a dead ringer! light gray was 10:1 ratio of FS16440 and RAF Sky I just used on the Sea Fury Dark gray was also a 10:1 but using Mr. Color C13-neutral gray and C318-radome tan. ….Just if anyone is curious.

Up next! A long awaited build. Just discovered Aero Masks last month and ordered their Splinter masks and decals. Yea, I know. It’s not a ‘66 Mustang. But this one might take some time since it’s that time of the year again when the weather is changing and I can get out and do some yard work and home improvement projects that need to be done.

Ok, might be a stretch putting this here. But it flies, it’s 1/32 so it fits the LSM requirement. Besides…. But it was a quick build while I waited on aftermarket for my next build. Wrapped it up last night. And I’m going to say, Woody V from Archer Transfers post a tip online that saved my Sea Fury build as well as this one. Spraying straight Leveling Thinner from an airbrush on top of dry silvered decals will melt them into the paint. These decals were thick and liked to silver badly even with my slick surface I painted on. Those huge side decals looked bad until I airbrushed on Leveling Thinner.

That might explain a lot of us here. Too many dead brain cells at too early of an age.

I just foiled this strut. Used BMF.

On my wish list at Sprue. I’ll be ordering a set next time I place an order. Yea, I guess I’ll have to get the kit to go with them too.

California is working hard to do the same with the vintage car culture. Just an announcement they are looking into how much these cars are driven per year. Sending out questionnaires to registered owners of cars around 1974 and older. Pretty damned sad when you think of it. The place the American car culture was born and nurtured is now trying to kill it off. Of course we all know those billionaire car guys at places like Pebble Beach Concourse de Elegance shows and Jay Leno will get exceptions while the guy working his ass off to pay his bills and spending late nights and weekends in his garage will be the ones to get shafted.

This. Comes from many sources. I’ve read you should do this to all new cars since they are delivered by rail. Trains throw up all kinds of tiny iron dust particles just from iron wheels riding on iron rails. But you spray it on and let it stand for 5-8 min and it will turn purple from the iron dissolving. Of course it was impossible to see on my almost purple car. I was amazed at how much of the tiny grit I was feeling in the paint surface was iron deposits. Even after washing, clay rag and iron dissolver, my dry compound was coming off the car black on the microfiber rags. I’m going to buff it again this spring.

It’s good to read about others that share my pains.

Done!

I’m a poor though. Gotta stick to my HK kit. ☹️

My B-24 and Lanc might get relegated to ceiling duty. The 17’s should fit.

OMG!! That’s about my size and I think the last ones I bought were $125 or $150.

Just telling my wife the other night I need to build more shelf brackets and buy more plate glass to add four or six more shelves to my case. I dread pricing out the glass now. (She was looking at the huge Seaview diorama I built and wanted me to put it in the bottom of my display case.)

So a few weeks back my son came to town and took a look at the paint condition on my 2015 Mustang and shamed me. Yea, it’s been looking rough. Slight oxidation on the clear. Since the weather has changed from “go outside and die” heat to “ok, you’re gonna get swampass but you’ll live to talk about it” heat, I decided it was time to do something. Went to a gun store that also sells car detailing chemicals. Guy looked at my car and made some recommendations to the tune of $100. And told me if the clay rag won’t clean the surface, get some iron deposit remover. Yep. Back at the store today getting iron remover. So far I’ve spent the day washing, iron removal and clay ragging it. Planning on starting the buffing tomorrow. Then I noticed something falling on the car and could smell smoke in the air. Yep. One of my distant neighbors is burning yard debris and it’s falling out of the sky on my freshly washed car. 😡 Car cover on for the night. I’ll post up pics after I get all the polishing done.