Ray_W

Also, no issue with the Tamiya Lacquer Thinner. I think the OP was referring to the Gunze Product Mr Color Rapid Thinner. I could find not advantage with the latter and happy to be corrected. Ray

Yes, current build on the bench Arma 1/48 Hurricane Mk IIC Night underside. The base coat Mr Finishing Surfacer 1500 Black is as shown and to be left as the main colour. Weathering to come. The Mr Finishing Surfacer Black and White are slightly off-black and off-white so I tend to not respray. Use it for things such as props, spinners, and invasion stripes etc.etc. Note I use the finer 1500 Grade, Ray

Not much more to add that hasn't been covered by @cpoud117. I tend to find I thin a little more (maybe 1:2) but it all gets down to experimentation. What works on the day. I have also tried Gunze Rapid Thinner and could not find what improvement, if any, it provided. In the end I just used it for airbrush cleaning and kept using MCLT. The point I would emphasise again is the base surface finish. No short cuts there. Please come back on this thread with your experiences. What worked. What didn't, Ray

The wonders of thinned Tamiya XF-55 Deck Tan. When I want to thin Tamiya XF paints for such purposes, I switch from Mr. Color Leveling Thinner (MCLT) and use their X-20A thinner, along with a little bit of water and Tamiya Retarder. It sprays nicely. I used to find spraying the Tamiya XF paints through a small needle airbrush (0.2 mm and under) challenging unless I was using MCLT. The retarder was a game-changer. More weathering to come.

Thank you Mike. Email sent. Ray

Thanks Craig and Paul, Not too much done at this stage. Wheels are completed and on and now starting to assemble the track. I will post some pictures when that is complete. Couldn't resist ... looks better on wheels: I've been wanting to do one of these for a while. Their Valentine is excellent. Nice break from some of the more complex builds I have been doing in recent times. Ray

Pretty much building this one in the order of the Tamiya instructions. I did decide to do the painting of the lower hull and running gear now. Then I can add the tracks (link & length) and do some bulk weathering effects before the side skirts seal it up. Would of been good to have the driver's hatches open to give him some air like in the period images. I am trying to keep this one a simple build, avoiding enhancements such as building a driver's position. Rather, putting the effort into paint, finish and figures and finishing within time. Wheels ready to be weathered. You may of noticed a colour change - Desert Pink ZI and Dark Olive Green S.C.C. 7 as applicable to a 1943 Tunisia Valentine . Thanks to @KRK4m and @JackG for their input and correction on the scheme. The Desert Pink is Mike Starmer's Tamiya mix. Ray

Should be good Stix, one to follow. Ray

Thanks Bob, one of the easier ones. 😏 I like giving myself plenty of practice. I will be spraying the wing roundels on the next one. Nothing special at all. Just chrome and stuck in place. I did paint the boxing around it black to give the appearance you're looking into the wing. Seeing you asked, I thought I'd pull the masking off and take a look. I might flush it in a little more with black Milliput and hand paint the surround. Not a lot of progress this week although one thing was done that I was happy to get out of the way in reasonable shape. I wanted to get the background colour down for the aircraft banner. My plan being to paint the yellow surround and lettering in Vallejo Model Color as one of the last jobs. One advantage of getting a nice robust background in lacquer is you can easily remove the Vallejo if unhappy with the result, or have an inadvertent brush stroke or three. This will form a good background to work with. A little tidy hand painting and it should be passable. Ray

I use Tamiya polishing compounds Coarse, Fine and Finish. Works very well. I first use Tamiya sanding sponges down to 3000 if needed at all and have Micromesh cloths although I rarely use the latter. I suppose the more you polish the better they will look. I have plenty of examples as I polish most kit canopies, so most aircraft posted here have been treated that way. This thread was also recently posted with some alternate ideas: https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235128285-canopy-polishing-problems/ I still use Future (I still have bottles of the original) for small clear parts like gunsight glass. HTH Ray

It might work. I have not tried it. These days I tend to polish canopies so rarely use "Future" type stuff. By the way, do not stir/shake the orange jar. Just dip into the mix as is, otherwise the bubbles transfer to you canopy.

Gauzy "Intermediate Agent" in the green skirt bottle is a clear gloss coat for spraying direct from the bottle. "Glass Coat Agent" in the orange dipping jar is for dipping clear canopies. Both products working similar to Future. Similar but not the same. I found Future better, thinner, tougher, clearer. Ray

Thanks Jack. Seems a very reasonable argument for the feasibility of the Desert Pink / Dark Olive Green scheme. The image, though it is another very worn Valentine, has less contrast than I would expect for the dark greys and blacks. Seems Olive Green is the go. Ray

That's it. Thank you for the colour correction. Still plenty to do. Looking forward to getting back into it later this week - weathering and details. Wonderful kit. Well done to yourself and the team at Arma. Ray

Thank you Michael. It was Mike Starmer and Mike Cooper's work, as published on the MAFVA site, which really got me thinking. https://mafva.co.uk/?p=2607 And I quote: October 1942 – M.E.G.O.1650 cancels all previous patterns and substitutes standardised drawings for certain A.F.V. types and vehicle classes issued by the Camouflage Directorate of GHQ Middle East. Not all vehicles required disruptive painting. Colours stated are: Basic tone of Desert Pink ZI with a disruptive pattern in Dark Olive Green probably similar to S.C.C.11B and 7 respectively. Black, Very Dark Brown and Dark Slate are alternatives. These were probably similar to S.C.C.14, 1A and Slate 34. These designs are common on Shermans, Grants, Valentines, Crusaders, Stuarts. The 6 Churchill tanks of Kingforce, which were painted in UK with Light Stone No.61 carried a red-brown pattern over this in the Crusader pattern. As Desert Pink was a new colour, Light Stone continued in use on existing vehicles. Desert Pink occurs on its own as a single tone on vehicles of no tactical value and ACVs disguised as 10 ton trucks. Although M.T.P.46 had provision for M.E. colours the actual the use of this patterning has not been confirmed there although some official pictures taken in UK strongly suggest that this was done. From April 1943 – M.E.G.O. 1650 is cancelled and new designs issued by G(Cam.) with new colours for use in Tunisia, Sicily, Italy and all of Middle East. Base tone is S.C.C.5 “Light Mud” with Black or S.C.C.7 in bold patterns for camouflage. Lend Lease vehicles used Light Mud over No.9 Olive Drab as an alternative but applied according to the drawings. By 1944 European colours and schemes predominated. The wording "Basic tone of Desert Pink ZI with a disruptive pattern in Dark Olive Green probably similar to S.C.C.11B and 7 respectively." and with @Mike Starmer Mike's further input as you quote: "I have a confirmed example of the Desert Pink/Dark Olive Green Valentine from A Squadron, 50th Royal Tank Regiment, 23rd Armoured Brigade that fought at Mareth Line, Tunisia in March 1943" also suggest to me it is the best option, besides being an interesting and different scheme. Thanks again. Ray

I'm building the Tamiya 1/35 Valentine in the scheme for "RESPOND" as provided on the Echelon decal sheet. I was planning to paint the subject in Light Stone and S.C.C.14 Charcoal and then, doing some reading and considering the 1942-43 period, while assuming the claimed period is correct for the above image, started to wonder about other dark colour options (Slate, Tarmac, Brown, Green). Any thoughts? Further, what colour would the above subject be as delivered to the desert theatre? The Light Stone seems pretty tough paint, not a lot of base colour showing through, maybe some wear on the gun barrel and traffic areas (unseen). Ray

I was irritated by the error in the relationship between the port side squadron codes and the roundel following the excellent input from @Troy Smith and @JackG. Nothing for it but to apply my usual protocol - sleep on it. If it's still an irritation in the morning then we'll do something about it. Up early this morning to take a look and thought "Nah, let's fix it!" Somehow I had made an error positioning the port side roundel, setting it a little too far aft - 1.5 mm, this put everything out. If I crib a small amount, say move the roundel 2 mm forward, I think I can get the geometry right without a noticeable error in the side-to- side roundel positions. I sanded back the roundel and aircraft code "R". I did not need to remove them completely. Focused mostly on blending their edges. Then re-sprayed the area starting with black undercoat then the colour coats, applied a fresh decal and finally a new "R", all the time using Mr.Hyde masking as a bulk mask to ensure no paint went where I did not want it and before long voilà ... Glad I made the decision to fix it. Much better. For some reason Tamiya Dark Green always looks brown when I take the photos. I am sure the blue background does not help. And, yes, there is a little thinned Tamiya XF-55 Deck Tan post shading on the main plane traffic areas. Ray

Thanks for that Jack. Unfortunately, I set the roundel back too far. Probably a mm (scale 2") would of made a difference. A few things I could of changed but at least it's not too far from reality.

I agree. A little thinner and not as wide for each character would of been good. But, I did not adjust, I already had the fuselage roundel in place a little too much to the rear and then had to compensate. The right hand side images were again speculation based on other aircraft images from 87 Squadron around the same period like so: Ray

And a successful afternoon's scrambling. Cut the masks: Sprayed with my Tamiya XF-21 Sky mix (XF-21 with a small amount of white). And that will do nicely. Ray

Thanks Troy again for your insights. I have no problem converting imperial to metric and vice versa and scaling so at least that part makes that job easier. I settled on 27" high with 4" wide brush strokes and did a test to see what that looks like on the model starting with the easy one "L". Image of the aircraft. I think it is close. Possibly the lettering width could be a little under a scale 4" (2.1 mm) width maybe due to the repaint but it's not too bad. At least the geometry seems to work. Ray

Hi Craig, I'll also follow along with this one. Those drill holes are exceptionally clean. Ray

Excellent start. Very neat drilling on the exhaust manifold. What size drill and make? Must be ultra small and seems to have cut the material really well. Ray

And so it begins. Nothing much to report at this stage, really just Tamiya clip together and glue. Pushed the wheels on for the photo opportunity. Hassle free, relaxing build. Ray

I love my air brushes. Newcomers may be hesitant to take the plunge yet the skills are acquired quickly. Two biggest things to learn are trigger control (practice) and thinning ratios (experimentation and experience). The latter can be challenging with the plethora of different paints, different chemistries, and behavior. Thankfully, lots of good advice here on Britmodeller. Mistakes will be made, recoveries are half the fun. Ray