desmojen

Thanks peeps I should have said in the words, the silver is Alclad White Aluminium. The paintwork is meant to represent a silver painted finish, but if you use a normal silver paint it would look too grainy in this scale. The Alclad is applied over a coat of grey Mr Surfacer. I only used a primer because I could see swirls in the plastic and sometimes Aclad will pick those up. Once the Alclad was on, the model received one coat of Klear applied with a brush (that's one of those stick things with hairs in the end). The decals were applied over that, using more Klear as a setting agent. The final finish is acheived with one further coat of Klear, again using a brush. Hope that helps. Jen.

Just finished this one for Vince. He asked me on Thursday if I thought I could build it in time for his stand at Telford. I wasn't sure, but accepted the challenge. The model is the 1/72 Fujimi MkXIV Spitfire in 41 Sqn colours. It arrived Monday morning in the post and I've been fitting it in around the Harrier since. The kit is really nice, I was pretty impressed with it throughout although there are inconsistencies. Some of the detail parts are really finely moulded , while others are very poor. The cockpit interior includes a proper rounded bottom piece (surely unique among 1/72 Spitfires?) but lacks detail otherwise which is a shame. The fit was beautiful all round with the single exception of the rear deck part which wasn't great. The scheme included is for an 'Air Race' Spitfire of 41 Sqn. I might be confused, but I thought the aircraft in question was actually a Mk21 Either way, the finished model is a little gem, and would look good in any Spitfire collection. Lets hope it helps Vince sell a few at the weekend! Jen.

I have a vacforming contact who do my canopies for me. Don't know if they do female stuff, but I would imagine they can. I'll PM you the details at some point today. Jen.

It's ok, I'm getting a new one at the weekend That's exactly 1 years worth of crud, as I bought it at last years show. And when you use your table, and mat, for actual modelling, they do tend to get mucky! Jen.

Brilliant stuff Derek. What isn't clear in your sequence is just how hard it is to sand things to shape and get them right, and the same as each other! It takes a lot of skill and expereince to do that Jen.

Thanks guys! I've been beavering away like a busy beaver and have now got the beast into paint. I could go into great detail etc, but suffice to say, it was primed and sanded bla bla. Anyway, the underneath was painted in H166 initially, but when I compared it to my already painted drop tanks (Gunze was used on those) the H166 looked really yellow, like the model had been hanging in a pub for a while. So I oversprayed it with Xtraxrylix LAG, much better and a good match with the tanks. Once that was Kleared, dry and masked I added the top colours, BS638 Dark Sea Grey and BS241 Dark Green. I had bought these in specially, from Bill, in Xtracrylix because I knew I didn't have enough Gunze left to do the job. Once I finished rubbing the top and rescribing etc, the grey went on, I sat and looked at this and the desire to Arctic camo it was strong! That was then masked to receive the green. I guess in a perfect world I could have freehanded the green on, certainly would have been quicker, but I was not confident with the Xtracrylix and felt masking and getting it right first time was bound to be quicker! As it is, a few small bits of grey have been lifted but no more than minor touch ups are needed. That's how I left it last night. Today, I have to do the touch ups, then Klear it. Hopefully I'll start getting the decals on later. Jen. P.S. I'd like to point out that the cutting mat the model is sitting on is A4 sized, it's a fairly big model!

Lovely job Dick, and exactly what I'll do with mine too! Are you the Dick I met at Yeovilton in feb by any chance? On the RNHF tour? Jen.

Mostly the hooks are on a spring, so when the catch is released they come down fairly sharply! I've heard some scary tales of Tonka one taking chunks out of the floor, and anyone who happened to be nearby. The point of them is that if the jet has a brake or other failure which may affect its ability to stop on the runway, the hook can be deployed and the RHAG used to stop the plane safely. I'm sure they do add weight, but they are not nearly as big and strong as the hooks which are used on proper carrier aircraft. Nice job by the way, I'm impressed! Jen.

I do have a couple of others Steve. The aircraft is ZJ924. Do you want to PM me your e mail and I'll send you all of them? Jen.

I don't think I could fit in it to fly it in Mike, nice idea though! And a perfect excuse for... Thanks for the encouragement dudes, god knows I'm going to need it! Ok, it's moving along, not quickly enough I fear but here goes. I've rubbed down the Milliput around the wings. Unfortunately it needs a bit more work so more filler has been added. An unfortunate setback since there's no substitute for time when it comes to filler work I'm filling some of the waiting with working on sub assemblies. I finished and painted the pylons and weapons yesterday, they may get decalled and Kleared today. I've also started to work on the undercarriage parts. The nose leg is a completely new part from the Flightpath set, all made from white metal and etch. There are three metal pieces that they would have you glue together. I drilled through them and have added some wirelocking wire through all the joints, since this model is nearly as heavy as a real Harrier! I added some wiring from lead wire and here is the result. Not comprehensive, but busy enough to look decent. I've since started work on the mainwheels. The Flightpath set includes 3 resin nosewheels and etch parts to convert 2 of them into mainwheels. I also cleaned up the mainleg (from the kit) and have drilled through the spindles on it for a nice lockwire axle. If I only had the Harrier to get ready I think I would be justified in starting to feel quietly confident, but I've actually got two 1/32 cars, a classic sailing ship and a 1/72 Spitfire to do as well! Jen.

Not a great pic technically, but it will serve for what you want Steve. I've put it in my temporary file so it will get deleted sooner or later, save it to your hard drive so you don't lose it. Jen.

I know nothing about the proper load to put on, but I always think that loads and loads of Mk82's looks very cool on a Toom. Love the colours, they look spot on, all freehanded? You got a lovely neat edge if it is! Jen.

I think the differences are more than slight, but it is based on the F-16. Thing is, this isn't just another grey F-Teen, the colour schemes on these things rock! I bought a 1/72 F-2B in Hong Kong, the two tone blue one with a Samurai on the tail Nice one Nev, I'll be watching progress keenly. Jen.

Thanks Oliver As for coffee/Red Bull, I only use Red Bull when I'm riding my motorbike and I never drink coffee. Whatever talent I may have for speed building is purely down to a refusal to faff Latest instalment in the saga then, I've added the instrument panel and the shroud thing that goes over it. The Flightpath IP is lovely, one of the best bits of the set I think. Made up of 6 or so bits of etch, with a film between showing the instruments. The film is painted from behind and then I filled the front of each instrument with Micro Krystal Klear. On top of the shroud the HUD was added, made up of some kit parts, some etch and a piece of transparent plastic card. Once all that was on I fitted the windscreen with superglue. There was a nice big gap so I Milliputted it in. I also spent some time painting the seat. It isn't finished yet, but you get the idea (should have sent it to NeilFGR to do!) And then, finally, I fitted the wing. I fitted the lower one piece half first because test fitting had shown that I would need to press it down into the wing seat, as it was too flat. I couldn't have done this if I had fitted the wing halves together first. Once that was stuck I fitted the two top halves without any trouble. There is a nasty gap on one under wing root area but the other is quite good. When I came to fit the top part I discovered that the left wing was too flat on top as well as underneath and it left a massive gap where it didn't meet the top cover. I superglued some bits of cocktail stick inside to prop it up a bit and then fitted the top. So, that's been setting up overnight. Todays task, should I choose to accept it, will be to add Milliput to the join areas of the wing and sand down my windscreen. If all goes well I should be starting to get some paint on by the weekend! Jen. (buying more Milliput at the Nationals)

You mean it's not finished yet? Jen.

at David The colour looks right on Doc, I'm going to have to get that mixture off you when I do mine Jen.

Thanks guys, it's good to know I can use the C. Despite my best efforts I couldn't find a Hasegawa A anywhere. I'll look out for something at Telford though. Hannants had the Hobbyboss as coming soon, is it out yet? Jen.

Thanks peeps, I'll start looking around for an A. I'm assuming Hasegawa is the best bet, right? Jen.

In a fit of my legendary impulsiveness I just purcased these decals http://www.lemdecal.com/72.056%20page.html Can anyone tell me which is the right type of F-18 to put them on??? Thanks, Jen.

She is a beauty Mike, the display is going to look totally awesome with 5 of these monsters lined up! They are hard to photograph nicely aren't they? Jen.

I've mainly been sanding since you last heard from me! Rivet detail - everyone's favourite whinge it seems. I like the Airfix surface detail, it has one major advantage over everyone elses in so far as it accurately depicts a series of circles. Countersunk aircraft rivets don't look like holes (a la Trumpeter and everyone else) they look like a slight circle which is designed to disappear under paint. Unfortunately, the Airfix renderings on the Harrier are a bit overscale, to the point where some of them would be unacceptable on a real aeroplane! The combination of this with the fact that for some reason the wings have very few rivets (?) left me in a position where I felt I had no choice but to lose the rivets. I did this by covering the whole thing with a thick brushed on coat of Tamiya liquid filler. This was rubbed down and then the model got a good coat of aerosol primer which was also rubbed down. You can still see some of the rivets, but that's fine as I didn't want to lose them completely. I've rescribed the lost panel lines and done a heap of other stuff which you can't really see and/or I've forgotten about but the main thing for me is that I'm finally getting to the end of fuselage prep Once I'm happy with the main fuselage I can fit the wing, and once I've done that I'll start feeling more confident....... Jen.

I agree with Noydoneyet Doc, I don't think the peelbacks are silver at all. I think they are grey, with shading to make them look a bit 3d ish. Jen.

Gunze are great! So far I've thinned them with plain water, water + IPA, IPA on its own and Tamiya thinner and they work with all of them! Dunno about Humbrol though.... Jen.

I find a good cure for stodginess (I can't claim to have ever suffered from AMS) is to build a simple kit straight from the box. Everyones idea of simple is different but we're talking anything from a Hobbyboss £3.99er to a 1/48 Tamiya fighter. And you can appease the inner AMS that the practice you are getting with your painting and finishing techniques will help the perfect models out no end! Jen.

That looks pretty awesome Hector, nice job! Jen.