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Revell 1/144 A350-900 - Cathay Pacific (WIP)


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So I'm starting Revell's relatively new A350-900 kit and painting it in Cathay Pacific colors. I'm coming to it after a year or so of the kit sitting in my stash while I (kind of?) planned how to go about it. I'm still unsure about a lot of my paint choices and the like, but I'll get to it as I go. I've heard mostly good things about this kit, so I'm reasonably confident with how it will go together. Hopefully I'll be able to deal with some of the mistakes I used to make with these big projects better.


So here's the obligatory box shot, I got the boxing with the Lufthansa decals. I might be using some of the kit decals like the raccoon windows and window linings. They look great and are printed by Cartograf (I think?) so that's nice.

spacer.png

The box looks sliced up and all but that's cause I wanted to get around the atrocious side-opening design. If you're reading this, Revell.. No one likes it when you do that 

 

So here are the decals, from F-DCAL. 

 

bK0WzDC.jpg

 

I plan to depict B-LRM, one of CX's particular A350s which I've been on twice now (but, on the contrary have relatively few pictures of.) 

 

OxfaKNp.jpg

 

One of the few pictures I took of it in HKIA. I know, I know, that picture has so much grain that it looks like it was from the 1960s or something. But hey, a reference is a reference.

 

Anyways, so I started with the cockpit. I'm pleasantly surprised Revell put a bunch of detail with that, even if the detail is vague.

 

FwivUb7.jpg

 

Not the best job, but in the end it's barely going to be seen, so it should be fine.

 

I also painted the fuselage black since, ideally, I'll be using the clear window strips. Still not 100% sure on how I'll mask it or put it on near the end of a build, though. I might just glaze it with Bondo or X-22, but the former I have very little of while X-22 is messy.

 

irrIDwf.jpg

 

I decided to test fit the fuselage. The result was good everywhere else except for the nose, though. Which has a really bad fit for some reason. Warping maybe?

 

H2kich8.jpg

 

The rest of the fuselage is aligned, but the nose isn't. If I align the nose, it's the cockpit that gets misaligned. I'm hoping that the cockpit parts might help negate some of the warping, but I'm not really counting on it.

 

So, next up is painting the landing gear parts (Somehow, the nose gear requires being attached at the start of the build) and fuselage cementing. Ooh, boy. That's gonna be fun. 

 

On a sidenote, how do you guys keep fuselages from cracking with a seam that long and with flimsy plastic? I'm considering adding some kind of plastic reinforcement or card under the seam or on the fuselage so that it wouldn't bend and reopen after every fill. 

 

Thanks for reading!

Edited by Columbia20713
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Hi,

If it's not too late I'd recommend filling the windows with Milliput and using these instead

https://www.authentic-airliner-decals.de/epages/17895661.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/17895661/Products/D144-A5

 

I would strengthen the fuselage joint with strips or tabs of plastic sheet if I were you, it can only help make the join more sturdy. There's nothing more annoying than a seam which keeps popping open!

 

Looking forward to seeing this progress.

 

Cheers,

Ian

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I built one of these a couple of years back in Finnair colours, unfortunately, my build thread is missing images thanks to the Photobucket 'purge' of 2016.

 

I did not reinforce the fuselage seams with my build.

 

36836720735_eb67c5b8d8_b.jpg

 

Here is a suggested method to leave the nose gear out and add it later

 

Also, I managed to break the nose gear and then put it on a stand. I have another in the stash and am still thinking about which livery to build it in.

 

Good luck with the rest of your build.

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Will follow this one, mine arrived yesterday and pleased they now included cabin windows. Noted that the fuselage panel lines are extremely faint. Good luck with the build.

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I recently finished one in Air China "Beijing Expo" livery.

 

It's a fantastic kit and great fun to build. I didn't have any problems with the fit around the nose, certainly nothing that a Berna clamp couldn't cope with. Maybe yours is slightly warped.  I didn't think it was necessary to reinforce the fuselage joint and so far I haven't had any problems.

 

I agree with Ian about filling the windows and using Authentic Airliners decals. The Authentic Airliners sheet also gives you landing lights which are very effective. You can see the result on my model.

 

You might also be interested in how I protected the nosewheel leg - see the photos at the bottom of the first post in my thread.

 

Dave G

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Goodo - another civil to keep me interested and checking back into the forum. Maybe not my favourite of airframes but looking forward to watching this Cathay widebody long hauler come together. Good luck with the masking around the nose area for that lighter tone green bar strip - but at least it isn't going to be a decal wrap as that could have been a tricky one considering the A350 has a sharp pointed nose like the children catcher!!!

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On 5/3/2019 at 5:34 AM, Turbofan said:

Hi,

If it's not too late I'd recommend filling the windows with Milliput and using these instead

https://www.authentic-airliner-decals.de/epages/17895661.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/17895661/Products/D144-A5

 

I would strengthen the fuselage joint with strips or tabs of plastic sheet if I were you, it can only help make the join more sturdy. There's nothing more annoying than a seam which keeps popping open!

 

Looking forward to seeing this progress.

 

Cheers,

Ian

 

The Authentic Airliners decals look great! I'll forgo buying them for this build, though; Shipping going here is usually expensive and takes a while, and I feel like I'm in a better position to use clear windows. I'll definitely use them for one of my future builds though (If I can shell out enough for the price..)

 

On 5/3/2019 at 6:31 AM, Romeo Alpha Yankee said:

I built one of these a couple of years back in Finnair colours, unfortunately, my build thread is missing images thanks to the Photobucket 'purge' of 2016.

 

I did not reinforce the fuselage seams with my build.

 

 

Here is a suggested method to leave the nose gear out and add it later

 

Also, I managed to break the nose gear and then put it on a stand. I have another in the stash and am still thinking about which livery to build it in.

 

Good luck with the rest of your build.

Thanks for the link! Shame about those lost photos, though. I was able to incorporate one of the suggestions in the thread (Or at least what I understood of it) on attaching the nose gear later in the build. The Finnair livery looks really clean on the A350..

 

On 5/3/2019 at 7:58 AM, Skodadriver said:

I recently finished one in Air China "Beijing Expo" livery.

 

It's a fantastic kit and great fun to build. I didn't have any problems with the fit around the nose, certainly nothing that a Berna clamp couldn't cope with. Maybe yours is slightly warped.  I didn't think it was necessary to reinforce the fuselage joint and so far I haven't had any problems.

 

I agree with Ian about filling the windows and using Authentic Airliners decals. The Authentic Airliners sheet also gives you landing lights which are very effective. You can see the result on my model.

 

You might also be interested in how I protected the nosewheel leg - see the photos at the bottom of the first post in my thread.

 

Dave G

That build looks stunning! Really impressive and clean, and flawless execution. The AA decals complement it well too. 

 

I'm starting to believe that my case with the bad fit is just an unlucky boxing or the box has gone through a lot. Most of the build experiences I'm reading about do also say the kit's fit is flawless.

 

On 5/3/2019 at 5:08 PM, Gimme Shelter said:

Goodo - another civil to keep me interested and checking back into the forum. Maybe not my favourite of airframes but looking forward to watching this Cathay widebody long hauler come together. Good luck with the masking around the nose area for that lighter tone green bar strip - but at least it isn't going to be a decal wrap as that could have been a tricky one considering the A350 has a sharp pointed nose like the children catcher!!!

 

Yeah, thanks! That stripe does look intimidating to recreate, but nothing that can't be done without a really wise use of tape. The A350's nose does have a really odd look to it but somehow I like that unique appearance. 

On 5/3/2019 at 7:38 AM, baldwin8 said:

Will follow this one, mine arrived yesterday and pleased they now included cabin windows. Noted that the fuselage panel lines are extremely faint. Good luck with the build.

Thanks, I appreciate it! I can see what you're saying about the faint panel lines; They're barely visible. That shouldn't be too much of a problem though, since in real life you can really only see the panel lines of an airliner up close anyway. Or at least, that's how I'd rather think about it. 

 

So progress is kind of slow, but I'm at least getting somewhere. Here's where I'm at:

 

Since AM decals aren't an option for me and I'd honestly prefer clear windows to the monotonous black windows provided by F-DCAL, my options are to use the clear window strips or to glaze the windows from the outside before overlaying them with the kit-provided window decal strips. For the glazing, I've been experimenting with using Bondic/UV Glue;

eHTKLyl.jpg

 

The windows look somewhat concave and the results look similar to how it would look if i used Micro Kristal Klear, but UV Glue can be cured immediately with, you guessed it, UV light. It also cures solid so applying multiple layers should be easy and I can lay decals over them without any problems of it reactivating. It's also rock hard to an extent so knocking/poking it accidentally is less of a possibility. At the moment, though, I'm concerned with the quantity I have and its tendency not to cure fully sometimes (which can result in some of it being easily tainted with fingerprints, etc). My alternative is painting the window area with my white paint (in this case Mr. Finishing Surfacer 1500 White), putting the clear window strips in and sealing the fuselage, and making sure to stay away from the window strips during painting. I'm not sure that's ideal though; Test fitting of the fuselage shows that I'll be forced to fill, sand and prime over and over so being able to stay away from the clear parts might be a little difficult.

 

On another note, I painted and attached the bay parts. 

S4sLArl.jpg

 

Yeah, it looks like a mess; Evaluating the fuselage halves I realized that it was this half that probably had the nose misalignment and ended up fighting with the nose parts with a hairdryer and way too much thin CA to get them in place. Not the best way to start off a build, but it at least still fits.

 

I might as well mention the arrangement I made to put the nose gear parts in at the end of the build. Building off of what I understood from Ray's build thread I cut off one of the pegs attaching of the gear bay on the nose gear leg so that I can maneuver it into the gear bay. I put the triangular shaped.. thing on the gear bay so that when the time comes, I can swing that part open, put the remaining peg in its corresponding gear bay hole, apply glue on the other and attach the gear legs to the rest of the gear bay assembly. I have no idea how much of that makes sense. But the arrangement does seem to work (and is admittedly difficult to work with, what with the constrained space of the gear bay.)

 

eRxocmH.jpg

aKFcKyH.jpg

 

While I tried to determine whether Bondic or clear window strips were better for the windows, I decided to remove the wings from their sprues and do a test fit. To my relief, they fit so perfectly that it's surprising. After my experience with the fuselage I was worried that some kind of distortion might've happened to the wings as well but they do fit well enough to be attached into the fuselage with no glue, as other build reports also state. 

 

EJJy7Xv.jpg

 

One of the A350's winglet tips has been chipped off though. I don't know what kind of sutff this box has gone through for the fuselage to be bent out of fitting properly and for the wing to chip off slightly (I think its more of poor sprue gating design on Revell's part though) but it's nothing that can't be fixed with some plasticard or Apoxie Sculpt.

 

I also bought a bottle of Mr. Color 314 for the Cathay scheme's fuselage stripe and for the engines;

 

w1gPZRU.jpg

 

I'm a bit skeptical about it though. In terms of lightness it seems close enough but it kind of has a greenish tint to it while in real life it just seems to be a really really light blue. Thankfully though the green hue isn't very noticeable so I'd likely still be able to use this.

 

Depending on what I choose to do for the windows, I'll either get the fuselage sealed and go for the fill-sand process God I hate that part  or lay down a coat of paint on the fuselage halves and then fit them together. I should also be starting soon on finding a mix for the wing color.

 

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So after a chaotic 2-hour ordeal of trying to get a heavy weight to stay within the fuselage, draping Extra Thin on a long seam, and fighting with the nose of the fuselage with thin CA and a hairdryer in hand, I got the fuselage together. 

1g2SGWB.jpg

 

 

The fit was good in some places and completely messy in others, but at least it's done. Time to fill, sand and prime the fuselage repeatedly. Oh, yeah, on another note, don't mess with thin CA. It really gets everywhere, even with just a small amount..

 

I've also been looking at the windscreen fit, which was not very good:

 

yLJqZ2b.jpg

TLg6Xr0.jpg

 

In trying to get the piece to conform, I cracked it and had to make a repair with Extra Thin. After sanding and dipping the thing in Aqua Gloss to remove the scratches, it.. definitely does not look as good as it did before, but it's at least enough that I can lay a decal over it and hide the mistake somewhat. I'm lucky that it cracked over one of the areas that wouldn't be seen once laid over by a decal or painted. Worst case scenario, I'll either paint the area black and lay the decal over it or custom print an A350 window interior myself in the style of Authentic Airliners' decals. But I'll take care of the gaps around the windscreen once filling and sanding of the fuselage is done. It's not gonna be a quick process, but the gaps definitely look possible to handle.

 

I also cemented the wings together: 

 

ikhSzhy.jpg

 

(Those aren't cemented to the fuselage. They just fit snug) 

 

The fit of the wings being really good is a breather from fighting with the fuselage. If the fill-sand process gets really repetitive I might end up laying the final gloss coats of the wings long before the fuselage is done..

 

Hopefully the repetition of eliminating fuselage gaps would grant me time to start working on the engines and the smaller parts so that I won't have to worry about them as much later in the build..

Edited by Columbia20713
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good progress there - brave you sticking with a clear front set of glazing given the filling and fitting challenges while trying to keep the clear piece clean during the fitting and onward build - I usually use the cockpit decal option myself as I have learned the hard way time and time before. keep up the good work

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On 5/7/2019 at 10:26 PM, Gimme Shelter said:

good progress there - brave you sticking with a clear front set of glazing given the filling and fitting challenges while trying to keep the clear piece clean during the fitting and onward build - I usually use the cockpit decal option myself as I have learned the hard way time and time before. keep up the good work

Thanks! Actually, I left off the underside piece for now, hoping that if I decide on using clear strips for the windows I can insert it from underneath beforehand. I'm really leaning towards the glazing option now though as more and more gaps and fit issues reveal themselves along the fuselage and underside.

 

As for the cockpit, well.. I might as well get on to that. Suffice to say I cracked the piece again and after another repair the part was looking too scratched up and the fit just didn't seem to work, so I bit the bullet and decided to abandon my original plan of leaving it as clear, sanded and painted it on to the fuselage with the intention of painting and decaling over it without the transparencies being left as, well, transparent. I was about to order the cockpit decals from Authentic Airliners but they don't ship here, so I'm kind of stuck with making my own and having it printed if I have any chance of making it look like a good replacement for the clear parts. 

 

tvtWoSr.jpg

 

Gap filling work on the fuselage continues, using sprue melted in Tamiya Extra Thin, Tamiya Fine Surface Primer (in the bottle, without thinning it makes a good gap filler) and Bondo Glazing and Spot Putty. I've applied Finishing Surfacer 1500 White over and under it for two rounds now, trying to iron out the gaps. I'm not gonna lie, the tiny ones are more infuriating to deal with than the major gaps. Filling them in isn't as straightforward and sometimes whatever filler you use might not be effective enough in filling the tiny gap. There's gonna be a lot of this going on for a while, especially after I attach the underside piece.

 

llw1xoW.jpg 

 

(Also I apologize for the blurry out-of-focus bokeh type pictures; higher apertures don't bode so well for bench shots with a handheld DSLR.)

 

I also put the wings together, with very minor gap-filling involved;

 

P2TgajH.jpg

 

I also decided to start planning on how I'll go about making the Ku-Band dome on the top of the fuselage since CX A350s have them. I'll be scratchbuilding them with epoxy putty, but at the moment I don't have a lot of references to go by. Anything that could help would be appreciated. I laid down some Tamiya tape to mark approximately where it would go based on the pictures and profiles I've seen.

 

NS712hb.jpg

 

So hopefully I could get the cockpit decals done and printed soon enough for the decalling phase. Aside from the cockpit decals, I may also have to print some new decals that replace some of the ones F-DCAL provided in their sheet. Some of the fonts and the brushwing mark on the nose seem to be off proportion but I'll be going over that more, since I'm not too sure about it yet. I'll go into that in more detail on my next build log update.

 

 

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2 hours ago, Columbia20713 said:

I also decided to start planning on how I'll go about making the Ku-Band dome on the top of the fuselage since CX A350s have them. I'll be scratchbuilding them with epoxy putty, but at the moment I don't have a lot of references to go by. Anything that could help would be appreciated. I laid down some Tamiya tape to mark approximately where it would go based on the pictures and profiles I've seen.

 

Are you referring to this? Found on a Twitter feed, view looking from the front.

 

gg03GlZ.jpg

 

CArZG0R.jpg

 

I'm enjoying your progress.

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On 5/12/2019 at 12:54 AM, baldwin8 said:

 

Are you referring to this? Found on a Twitter feed, view looking from the front.

 

I'm enjoying your progress.

Yup, that's the part I'm referring to. Thanks for the photos! They really give an idea of the overall shape and profile of the dome.

 

So far, I've started work on the engines and am close to finishing: 

 

WokXxFW.jpg

FBWuX5p.jpg

 

Rear of the engines were painted with Alclad II, painted and drybrushed over with brown oil paints over and over then sealed in with Aqua Gloss. I'm considering going over the foremost portion of the hot section (Is that what it's called?) with matt brown paint to match the real Trent XWB appearance more.

 

82KW8X5.jpg

Y4jVEkB.jpg

 

The work remaining on the engines is concentrated on seam-filling (Fit's almost there but not quite) and the painting, which is the hard part. I need to prepare paint mixes for the engine/fuselage stripe color (very light blue, according to other threads FS25550?) and the wing color (much much lighter than the standard Airbus/Boeing gray with a difference from white that's subtle but noticeable nonetheless)

 

The fuselage seam-filling process is close to being done. One or two more coats of primer and a bit more work on the Wi-Fi dome and it should be finished, the clear windows applied, then work can start on the undercarriage segment.

 

5mKefsM.jpg

 

For the Wi-Fi dome, I gathered an album of references that could at least approximate the profile of the dome and scaled it to size according to side-view photos I've looked at and scaled accordingly. I'm also going to be printing a set of new decals for the insides of the winglets. From what I've looked at, the decals that the F-DCAL sheet provides has the brushwing logo to be too big. I'm also in the process of checking how the brushwing logo on the nose scales up to the real thing; It looks off to my eye but I think I'm nitpicking a little too much here..

 

NwN4exC.png 

 

The dome is about 1.64 cm long from what I've measured.

 

So i scaled it, cut it out, glued it on to a thin piece of plastic card, cut it out and glued it to the model at the approximate location where it should be. 

 

OVDqlWR.jpg

 

I then surrounded that with Apoxie Sculpt, which I'm giving a day or two to dry then I'll start layering and sanding it appropriately.

 

n0rMoW3.jpg

 

Hopefully I'll be able to complete the engines soon and put on the windows. That's the part that'll take a while though..

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Good progress! Looking great so far! I really like your ingenuity and inventiveness (is that a word?). When you don't have, make it up! Then get some putty and mold it out, sand it fine, and there you have it! The engines are looking fine, too. I've been thinking about adding this model to my stash...looks like it might be a bear, even though Revell is doing a nice job these days with detail and accuracy. But a good challenge makes for greater skill! Keep up the good work! :penguin:

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 5/18/2019 at 11:26 PM, Challenger350Pilot said:

Good progress! Looking great so far! I really like your ingenuity and inventiveness (is that a word?). When you don't have, make it up! Then get some putty and mold it out, sand it fine, and there you have it! The engines are looking fine, too. I've been thinking about adding this model to my stash...looks like it might be a bear, even though Revell is doing a nice job these days with detail and accuracy. But a good challenge makes for greater skill! Keep up the good work! :penguin:

Thanks a lot! In fairness to Revell, for all the issues the kit has it's a much better build experience compared to most airliner kits I've tried. It's probably as good as you can get as far as airliners go, and I think it's worth the troubles that come with any airliner kit. It's not always easy to find an airliner kit that's up to today's standards of fit and engineering.

 

Anyway, progress this week has been slow but steady. Firstly, with sticky fingers and a mess of water, epoxy putty bits and sanding, I managed to get the Wi-Fi dome smooth and prime it:

 

IMG_6895

 

 

Epoxy putty sounds nice when you hear about how it works, but it's messy, sticky and difficult to work with. But it fills a niche that makes up for all the trouble of it.

 

I also printed a copy of the F-DCAL nose decals and the decals I'm making for the cockpit and applied it:

 

IMG_6864

 

 

The F-DCAL brushwing logo looks a little oversized so I'll be making new decals to correct that. Thing is, it's not easy to precisely measure that either since it's on a curved surface, so being able to do anything precise would be difficult. The cockpit decals look good enough for now.

 

Fuselage work has been a one step forward, two steps back kind of affair; In my first round of actual painting with white I knocked it on the table during the spray session, knocking off the weight inside and reopening a seam. I managed to get all that repaired though, and replaced the weight with plasticine, and the fuselage was painted up, which I used Mr. Surfacer 1500 White for. I know it's a strange decision to use primer as paint, but it seems to do the job; I feel like the durability's necessary for a model I'll be handling as much as this one. Tamiya Gloss White (TS-26 and X-2) still seemed prone to fingerprints months after painting with them. 

 

IMG_6886

 

 

I also trimmed off, glued together and sanded the flap track fairings. They'll be painted as separate entities from the wing so as to avoid the issues that come with painting in small corners and to make sanding and polishing easier. 

 

V9uMS5d.jpg

 

The progress rate on each of the engines have been completely different; The starboard engine is just about ready for painting while the port side engine hasn't had its front cowling attached yet with seam filling taking place. 

 

IMG_6891

 

And being able to finish the bulk of the seam filling and priming work means that I've been able to start attaching the window strips through the hole under the fuselage where the undercarriage will be attached. I wanted to recreate the look of shut and half-open window shades so I attached tiny bits of plasticard on the back end of the strips, shaped accordingly and glued with Bondic, then the strip is glued with Extra Thin from the inside. It's a small but satisfying addition to detail, visible here: 

 

IMG_6900

 

The window strips themselves don't fit 100% flush but it should be fixed somewhat with the silver window decals that will go over them during the decalling stage. Once this is up, it's attaching the undercarriage piece and filling and sanding that, then I can move on to the rest of the painting process.

 

Edited by Columbia20713
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8 hours ago, baldwin8 said:

Seems to be an issue with your images, they don't show up.

 

 

5 hours ago, Romeo Alpha Yankee said:

Yes, the last post in particular

Sorry about that, not sure what's wrong with Imgur but it should be fixed now.

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On 5/18/2019 at 10:26 AM, Columbia20713 said:

For the Wi-Fi dome, I gathered an album of references that could at least approximate the profile of the dome and scaled it to size according to side-view photos I've looked at and scaled accordingly.

The drawing looks good, I'll use it for my A350. Great work overall.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 5/29/2019 at 10:08 PM, baldwin8 said:

The drawing looks good, I'll use it for my A350. Great work overall.

Thanks, I'm glad that you found it useful.

 

Progress has been a bit slow as of late; I got the decals I wanted to correct done:

 

VmQiTkI.png

 

 

It took a while and honestly there's no real way to tell how correct it is to the real thing other than eyeballing it until it looks "right", especially for the decals on the curved surfaces, as is the case with the brushwing logos on the nose and winglets. That's about as close as I'm willing to get, I think.. 

 

On passing the local hobby shop I also got myself a bottle of Tamiya LP-35 Insignia White, a color from their new Lacquer Paint line, which I presume is just the colors that already exist in the cans but in bottle form. I had a mix of 1 part X-2 10 parts XF-19 prepared for the wings beforehand but that turned out to be almost exactly the same shade. 

E3gvlNe.jpg

 

Turns out it's right in the middle ground between Boeing Gray and pure white which was exactly what I was looking for. Here's how its shade looks next to Gunze C338 which is seen as one of the close matches to Boeing Gray out of a bottle and a bottle of X-2, which is just white.

 

5Wq5rIn.jpg

 

Aside from the close color match, the Tamiya Lacquer Paints are also pretty durable and spray easy, and I painted the wings and pylons as such:

 

NPcTIyW.jpg

 

So, yeah, if you're looking for an out-of-the-bottle paint match for the A350's "Matterhorn White", I think Tamiya's LP-35 is the way to go that is still somewhat easily accessible. If I'm wrong though I'd be happy to be corrected. 

 

I finished the window strip attachment on the fuselage, and so that's all closed up now with the insertion of the undercarriage piece:

Mc94iZz.jpg

 

 

Which in itself needs many rounds of sanding, filling and primer to fill the gaps of. Styrene melted in Tamiya Extra Thin then applied as filler works well for this as I find that it feathers and blends with the plastic much better. I've been using it for most of the filling on this project, and for all the troubles it brings along with it it does its job well:

kDZPYzL.jpg

 

 

 I got the bulk of filling and sanding on the engines done with some really small gaps to fill. There were also some issues that cropped up; Peeling off the masking from the cowl ring peeled away the Alclad II metal paint under it as well. I don't know if the paint just doesn't hold as well as I thought it would or the Tamiya Curved Masking Tape I used has an adhesive that's harsh; It's kind of close to electric tape, after all. So I'll have to deal with that for the meantime. I also have to mix a fresh batch of light blue for the engines and fuselage stripe. I always used a mix of 1 part XF-23 to 10 parts X-2; I might lighten that mix further this time around. 

 

s0cBt5c.jpg

 

I decided to start masking off the cheatline as well. It's safer to have the windows covered while rounds of primer are being sprayed on the undercarriage, to prevent any of the paint from being sprayed on the windows, and the cheatline made masking the windows off possible. Fortunately, the tape I was using was about the width from the top of each window aperture to where the cheatline is approximately supposed to be so I could use the windows as a guide to keep it straight. 

 

95KonMi.jpg

 

Fortunately, the undercarriage piece is the last major hurdle before fuselage painting comes up, then it gets exciting..

 

Edited by Columbia20713
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  • 2 weeks later...
On 6/8/2019 at 10:11 PM, baldwin8 said:

I like your cockpit window decals, you modified the colours? I would like something similar for mine.

Thanks! The decal was made from photocopying the window decal that came with the kit decals, and cropping and fitting a few photos wherein the A350's windshields were clearly shown from the outside, so a composite of sorts. 

 

Progress this week was a little better despite life getting a little busier; I prepared a mix for the Cathay light blue which was approximately 1 part XF-23 to 15 parts X-2, which I ended up using one and a half bottles of Tamiya X-2 for. Even then, it still looked a little dark to my eye, but I can only go so far before I run out of white paint. It looks close enough I think. I painted up the engines with that mix:

 

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I also painted the metallic cowling lips on them:

 

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The metallic leading edges of the wings were also painted like so:

 

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These were painted with Tamiya's LP-11, which I think blows Alclad II's regular shades in terms of performance and durability. A lot cheaper too, and the paint application is really smooth; It's the perfect go-to for duller metals or for hairspray chipping applications. For the engines the pylon painting, decals and clearcoating's all that's left.

 

I was also able to take the major step of wrapping up priming on the underside and painting the cheatline across the fuselage. 

 

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It's hard to tell at this point where it's going to go but I'm pleased with how everything's progressing so far. For now while I wait for the decals I had printed, I'll attend to the smaller parts of the build such as the landing gear or jet engines; I can't really progress much on the rest of it besides applying the decals I do have while I don't have the custom ones yet. If the decal printing service is unable to print it, I'll have to use custom decal paper (which I've honestly had poor experiences with). I'll see, though.

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Coming together very nicely. Mine is a few days behind your work. I like the way the wings fit, so I will paint separately as well. Really looking forward to your progress, great inspiration.

 

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 6/18/2019 at 12:24 AM, baldwin8 said:

Coming together very nicely. Mine is a few days behind your work. I like the way the wings fit, so I will paint separately as well. Really looking forward to your progress, great inspiration.

 

Thanks! I'm excited to see how yours turns out.

 

Sorry for the lack of updates recently, things have gotten busier as of late and I'm not able to work on the model as much as I want to. 

 

Also, I ended up spilling odorless mineral spirits on the crucial kit decals (of all things it could have spilled on). The mineral spirits seemed to dissolve the carrier film rendering the decals unusable. F-DCAL provided most of the stencils and the like with their sheet but I'll have to order something to replace the window frames and the like. I'm looking at the Generic A350 set offered by Rocastmodels, but it's a lot to shell out for that, especially given that I already have most of what that set provides. Until I manage to procure a replacement, this model might not see the finish line for a while.

 

In the meantime, though, I've started working on what I can. The fuselage stencils (or at least the ones not on the bottom) have had decals applied:

 

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And the engines have their painting almost done. As I mentioned, the initial kit decals were ruined so I had to paint the spirals with yellow paint and a black pen. (Ink isn't going to be the same as paint, but there's not much of an alternative.)

 

mByVgMK.jpg

 

It's not a lot of progress to be making but it's going somewhere. 

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1 hour ago, Columbia20713 said:

It's not a lot of progress to be making but it's going somewhere. 

 

Still good to see you are carrying on with it. Sorry about the spill issue.

 

Here is pic of mine, %98 complete, now just antennas, gloss coat a few pieces. Just noticed I hadn't painted the APU exhaust yet.

 

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