fewr9fkr9595

It most certainly does! Plus you don't get any dry gritty/rough overspray areas like you can with lacquer types that dry too soon in the air. Stynylrez almost always lands 'wet' and then self levels. I don't use anything else to prime with now 👍🏿

Thats just how that stuff is. Not really a 'workable' primer the way that people think primers should be. The vallejo stuff in my opinion is best for armour or figures, stuff that won't need masking, or to provide a uniform base colour over different components (resin/metal/plastic) before the main paintjob starts. If you want a workable and tough acrylic primer - get some stynylrez instead 👍🏿

I found the intake (shape aside) to be well engineered design wise and fit well. Too late now obviously but to help others - The inner white trunking needs to be recessed in a touch (yours looks flush with the outer shell) to allow the rigde on back of the intake lip to fit in it. Perhaps thats what led to problems? I found the kit overall (shapes aside) to be well detailed and some clever solutions to joins. Worst bit as you say is the gun muzzle part. Hole is too deep and part too thin. So i shimmed it so it sits more level with surrounding surface and thus less to fill 👍🏿

This is true of the decals. Just put them on my KF-16. Not added any pics on my build thread of it as too busy with the lonestar. They are very good quality and settled down well into the rivets. I agree about the contrast being very slight. I went free hand and couldn't see the difference so made the contrast stronger by lightning and darkening the colours respectively. 👍🏿

Hmmm perhaps ammend the title as its not the grey 36170 itself but a metalic varnish to 'have-glasserize' your colours that are already applied. Good idea though. Will be easy now, Like paint the normal 3 or 2 tone greys then add the metal effect or the later all over dark grey then add varnish. 👍🏿

Thought it looked warm/creamy like gull grey, but your text said light & dark ghost IIRC... Hopefully that's now all cleared up for @xristosxt 👍🏿

Cheers for the love Dave 👍🏿

See this build by @DaveJL here, its a UAE plane. 36375 & 36320 is what he used according to his WIP

Looking good! Keep it up mate 🤘🏿

I found that the Xtracrylics varnishes spray best for me when thnned with water. Thin them enough to get a 'wet' coat and reduce air pressure to avoid tip dry and a rough finish 👍🏿

.

Here's something I've had a problem with past couple of builds... Almost junked (under a swift heel) my vf32 swordsmen F14 because of it. So this is what AK interactive gauzy intermediate is doing - crazing on decals when its dry. This makes for a nightmare when applying a panel wash, especially on a light gull grey tomcat. I thought at first with the above mentioned builds is was because I was flashing it off with a hairdrier. As in it was cracking and shrinking back because it was drying too fast. This appears not to be the case because the picture below of my f-16 spine was left to dry overnight naturally. Still cracked. Its almost like it cant grip to the smooth decals and 'slips' off of them? Because the surrounding paint is covered fine... I didn't flood them either, misted the first coats on to give it something to grip. This might not be an issue with matt or satin decals but can't be bothered to test. Gonna bin the bottle I think. Main thing is to make people aware of this potential problem... Never had this problem with aquagloss. Which I think I will revert back to.

Cutting stars and using spare decals for numbers to tart up fod cover 👍🏿

Decals going on. Despite matching to the blue when on the sheet, they have gone lighter on the grey. Nevermind. Couple other niggles with this build was never going to be perfect anyways. Decals settled down very well though. Need to cut out a star for belly tank as need another large one. Sheet 4 large ones for wing tanks then has smaller ones for baggage pods. Could do with 5 of the large tank stars. And then one for the fod cover I made. Will need to brush paint a 255 on cover too. What the kit lacks and I didn't realise till it was too late as mentioned earlier is the little square canopy rescue panel. This is the point where all the colours convene on the side of the nose. If they are off then the rescue data is off. Which then pushes the stars out of kilter. Everything needs to fall into place. Cause the point of the star fits between the rescue arrow and the grey bump. This side (starboard - no pun intended) is best, other not so good. Guess which side will feature the most in photos! Alot to learn If i build this again or do it in 48th. As I said Turned out ok but could be alot better.

Good recovery! However is the angle of the seat wrong? Doesnt like ok like much room to climb in between it and the front windshield... The pic on the mat with the scalpel in front of it - perhaps cause its a front 3/4-ish rather than full side-on? tony

Thats sweet 👍🏿

Looking good Dave 👍🏿 Very fast work!

Well I guess that's answered the question for me... Theses a few of these 25's being done now so I'll do something different and not on here yet(?) When/if I finally get around to my 25, what I may do is try to add the bump to the kit's nose. If it doesn't work I can fall back on the resin one. Ps sorry to hijack your thread Craig... Tony

Have glass final assy while lonestar's gloss dries and the kf-16c tries to catch up...

I love the way gloss coats blend and smooth everything out 👍🏿

Looking crisp Alex!

Lonestar shiny bits. As mission models paint dont cover metals yet, I am using ak exteme. For the brushing of metal areas eg all the silver bits on UC struts etc I will use AK/meng acrylics. Plane is Going to get a gloss coat today after sticking all the fins on etc ready for decals 👍🏿

How tough was it to add the nose bumps Craig? As I have an RBT planned for the '...with love' group build. The coldwar nose set turned up yesterday but the panel lines and hatch details are a bit soft/wonky. They will look inconsistent with the rest of the kit. Another worry I have just thought about it getting a strong join. Dont want a heavy resin nose snapping off... If people want to see what the nose looks like - pics in here, page 7, about 2/3rds of the way down. So its either fill and rescribe the resin nose or add the bump to the kit nose? Lesser of two evils... Or sack it all together and do the hobbyboss mig-31 as not seen one on here yet...?

Thanks Rich. Sadly I can't take all the credit and claim to be some sort of ninja with it... Its really foolproof as mentioned a few posts back. It reminds me alot of stynylrez, in the way that you can be as heavy handed as you like, it may look lumpy at first and floods all the details, but then when it dries it shrinks back nice and tight. Being water type based and as its cold at the minute in the garage where I paint I use the hairdrier (low setting) to speed up all my paintwork. Just like with stynylrez you can see the paint dry and the little puddles evaporate, details reappear and then you are left with the lovely smooth finish 👍🏿

Very interesting paint scheme mate, and a good job of it too!