Hi all. I hope I've got this linking stuff right. I've just spent a month building an old Heller 1:72 Super Constellation in the livery of the "Connie" that lives south of Sydney Australia at the HARS Aviation Museum. The kit only came with TWA decals but being a Graphic Designer I used my drawing programs (and some vernier calipers) and lots of images for reference to create scale waterslide decals and print them off at home using the home inkjet printer. They work well, but if you have white in your decal artwork, it will come out as transparent on the decal which requires some workarounds. The kit itself was quite basic with some inaccuracies and lack of detail, and I only discovered late in the piece that you could buy extra detail packs for the engines and landing gear and landing gear bays. I made a fatal mistake of using the wrong type of paint on the upper fuselage, and the Humbrol paint used for the red flash trim markings (between the grey and white) did not cure. I waited days, but it was no good, so I stripped it all off and started again. The model is tail heavy and requires lots of forward weight to keep it on its wheels. Hidden in the engine nascelles are 4x 18mm round lead sinkers and there is lead in the front wheel well.
I'm really pleased with the final results, and would do some things differently if I had to do it again. (buy an airbrush). I spent a ton of money on Tamiya spray cans and small pots of paint to get the right shade of grey on the fuselage, but the basic light grey flat Tamiya spray primer was the closest I could find. The rest of the build photos are on Flickr. Just search Timothy Pryor. My photostream should come up.
