neilg

My decals had yellowed, so I left them in the window for weeks to de-yellow them - I wonder if that anything to do with it?

That's kind of you, thanks for the offer. I'm not sure I can save it:

You've demonstrated that this kit can be turned into something spectacular. It looks beautiful. The weathering gives a nice touch too. I have five of these to build, I'd love to attempt the weathering effects that you applied.

In the Humbrol video, he states: "clear is a very thin acrylic gloss varnish"

I've used Humbrol clear gloss for years as a base for decals, and as a protective coat over the top of them - and I've never had any issues. Indeed, it's a recommendation on their tutorial (see 2m:35s): But, I've never used Zvezda decals before - and clearly the ink doesn't like the solvent in this varnish. It surprised me because I've used third party decals that have been silk-screened and laser-printed, and never had this happen before. It's just the blue that this has happened to - the red on the flag is fine, and the black nose decal is fine.

This was a kit that I've had for a while, and decided to crack on with it last week. It's quite a simple kit, but has great detail. I was in the last stages of the build today - I left the decals drying overnight, and applied a gloss coat this afternoon. I used my regular gloss coat - Humbrol gloss varnish - applied with a brush, as usual. When I came back to the model, I found the blue ink on the decals has reacted with the varnish, and it's bled all over the model. By the time I noticed, the varnish had dried, so now, it's stuck like this. I've never had this happen before, but I was actually really pleased with this kit, and was looking forward to having it on display. Needless to say, I'm not going to take any more photos - but I'd be interested to hear if this has happened to anyone else:

The dihedral is not as pronounced as it is on the 1:72 kit. In fact, the wings look pretty flat:

Thanks, I'm not sure if there will be another one any time soon - is the Airfix one the only one on offer? I wasn't sure if the underside should be gloss or satin - but gloss looked better in my opinion. I used Humbrol satin varnish for the body, which I brushed on - I am really surprised how well it turned out.

It was mainly instructions around the engine that were difficult to interpret - in particular that long bar that runs along the top of the engine. I still don't know where it's supposed to go, and at the moment, it's only attached at the rear into the engine bulkhead. If you are planning on using the movable landing gear, they don't seem to fit without some rework, and I think the attachment point on one side is moulded slightly out of position, so it doesn't fit in the wheel well without a push - the other side is fine however. And the engine panels are push-fit pieces that don't hold very well.

That would be ideal, thanks!

Ahh the picture I took was of the 748 fan parts - they look like they're in the same condition as yours. The fan blades of the 788 and A359 were moulded well, a few came off the hub when I tried to cut the fans off the sprue.

I had to check, or I wasn't going to sleep tonight. I'm not sure if I'm going to sleep any better... both of the sprues look like this:

I built the Revell 748 back in 2013 and I didn't have this issue with the fan blades. They look appalling! I have another one boxed upstairs, but I'm worried about looking at it now! A few fan blades on the 788 and A359 that I built snapped off when I tried to remove the fans from the sprue.

Ahh I had ignored the bag with the stand in until just now, and it has moulded holders for the batteries. I like the stand, but it's a bit too short for the size of the kit I think. Does the motor replace the entire engine?

I was furious with myself! I noticed the gap before I started painting, but thought it was too small to really be a problem - plus, I wanted to paint the sides of the canopy. The center part slides, and I thought about stuffing the cockpit with kitchen paper or cotton wool to prevent paint going in... but I thought it would be ok. Then literally the last step was to remove the masking tape, and I thought all was well because I started with the rear windows, and there was no paint there. It was under the front windows, which was the last of the tape to peel off. I think with an airbrush, it would have been ok, but I used spray cans outside, which have a lot more force, more volume, and less control. I'm never going to risk it again!

Did you fit the motor? I'm really impressed by the detail and how well it went together considering the tooling's age. I've got the Hurricane to build and I'm tempted by the BF109!

I've finished this build and I am really pleased with how it turned out. I was debating which scheme to depict, and in the end, I flipped a coin which decided on the black-and-white underside (which deep down I preferred anyway). I have already built the 1:72 Spitfire in similar colours. A couple of minor issues - I couldn't understand how the propeller shaft fitted into the hub from inside the engine, as the shaft was oval shaped, and the related hole in the propeller hub was circular. I left the shaft out as suggested in the WIP thread, but the propeller fits tightly into the sleeve in the engine so it can turn without falling out. And my fault - I had some overspray inside the cockpit, which I only realised as I was removing the masking tape at the very end of the build. I used a cotton bud (dipped in thinner...) to remove it, and the clear plastic instantly became foggy. Lesson learned... After sending a sheepish email to Airfix, they sent me a replacement windscreen, which arrived two days later. The landing gear is designed to be retractable. The tops of the landing gear legs fit into downlock tangs on the underside of the wings, and into uplock tangs in the wing root. With the landing gear down, the tops of the legs are too long to move without pushing up on the inside of the upper wing. It's then impossible to move the landing gear when the upper and lower halves of the wings are cemented. I like moving parts on models, so I wanted to fix this. I trimmed the tops of the landing gear legs just above the pivot, but they are now still long enough to engage with the downlock tangs, but too short to engage with the uplock tangs. However, the angle of the wheels means that when the landing gear is retracted, they don't sit perfectly flush with the underside of the wings anyway. The tyres also rub inside the wheel wells, which holds them in place when the landing gear is up. I hope you like this build:

Green camouflage going on:

Radiators and bits fitted:

I haven't bought Draw Decals for a while, but I just read on the website: In order to comply with the new VAT, we will only ship orders with a value of £135 or greater to the UK, and ONLY ship via UPS.

Humbrol 29 dark brown applied: The propeller and engine panels are just pushed into place for now.

Moment of truth! Only a tiny amount of bleed:

The white on the underside is applied and masked - just applied the black on the other side. I'm always nervous peeling off the tape and seeing how much bleed there is...

I just remembered, the Draw Decals set has the Dreamflight logo, which I didn't use on my build. You can see it on the link to the decal set though.

Hi, Adrian. There are a few options for British Airways decals for the 747-400: https://www.f-dcal.fr/decals/index.php?id_product=985&controller=product&id_lang=1 https://www.shopdrawdecal.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=44-747-29 Both of them have options for multiple aircraft registrations. Here's how the F-DCAL decals look: These are the DRAW decals: