Crimea_River
Marshal
Never thought of using Milliput for that. I use lead wire for that application.
Airfix 1/48 P-51D
- Thread starter Luftace43
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Airframes
Benevolens Magister
Same here. If the lead wire is attached before painting, there shouldn't be a problem with marks from glue etc.
Just a note concerning the wheel bay - somewhere, I have the painting specs for the P-51D, which, from memory, state that the wheel bay, including the inner faces of the gear doors, was bare alloy, but coated in a clear lacquer, with the exception of the rear wall (which was the front face of the main spar), which was in zinc chromate. This can be seen on period photos, not to be confused with current restorations and airworthy examples, where the bays are mainly either painted or in ZC.
Just a note concerning the wheel bay - somewhere, I have the painting specs for the P-51D, which, from memory, state that the wheel bay, including the inner faces of the gear doors, was bare alloy, but coated in a clear lacquer, with the exception of the rear wall (which was the front face of the main spar), which was in zinc chromate. This can be seen on period photos, not to be confused with current restorations and airworthy examples, where the bays are mainly either painted or in ZC.
- Thread starter
- #23
Right, I usually use lead or copper wire as well, but saw the milliput thing and just had to try it for myself. As for the glue marks, usually do all of my glueing/assembling first so it will be covered by painting. This time though the added wires were an after thought though as I wasn't even gonna bother this time around, but the new technique was too tempting not to try. 
I have begun painting the wheel wells and will have pictures up later once I have it to a stage I feel is presentable. Been doing some digging around the web and found that for the P-51D-20NA block my aircraft will be from, yellow zinc chromate or tinted (green) zinc chromate could have been used for any of the primered assemblies throughout construction, so rather than stripping and repainting the whole thing, i just masked off the appropriate areas and sprayed alclad aluminum on the areas the would be the under surface of the wing skin. Gonna do some more research to see what plumbing I'm going to put in and what I will leave out. Not going all in with detailing here, but I do want to busy it up slightly. Stay tuned, more progress pics soon.
I have begun painting the wheel wells and will have pictures up later once I have it to a stage I feel is presentable. Been doing some digging around the web and found that for the P-51D-20NA block my aircraft will be from, yellow zinc chromate or tinted (green) zinc chromate could have been used for any of the primered assemblies throughout construction, so rather than stripping and repainting the whole thing, i just masked off the appropriate areas and sprayed alclad aluminum on the areas the would be the under surface of the wing skin. Gonna do some more research to see what plumbing I'm going to put in and what I will leave out. Not going all in with detailing here, but I do want to busy it up slightly. Stay tuned, more progress pics soon.
Crimea_River
Marshal
The Mustang's wheel wells are a detailer's dilemma.
- Thread starter
- #25
Indeed! I did read through your build a while back on the Monogram p-51. Very nice and I will be referring back to it soon for inspiration if that is ok.
Crimea_River
Marshal
Of course it's OK. That was the first model I did after many years away form the hobby. I cringe when I look at it now as a lot of it wasn't very good but thanks for the nod.
- Thread starter
- #27
Alright guys, here's where I'm at right now.
I had painted the inner gear doors previously with chromate green before it was brought to my attention as to what Colors they should actually be. Luckily this was done before I had gotten my alclad primer, so I was able to take most of the paint off with masking tape and cleaned up the rest I couldn't reach with lacquer thinner and a paper towel. I was able to leave the inner bay framing green and masked it off. I then shot the pieces with alclad black primer/microfiller followed by a coat of alc101 aluminum. I then masked off the center panel on the doors and sprayed them alclad airframe aluminum. The effect is hard to capture on camera, but has a very pleasing difference in tone.
Here are the parts after painting. I didn't take any pictures of the main well being masked and painted up last night, but I basically cut thin strips of tamiya tape to cover the stringers and ribs. This was followed by a coat of black primer and alc101 aluminum. Again, because this was painted without primer, I had some paint lift off with the tape and this along with some overspray was duley touched up with mm acryl chromate green and a brush. I picked out some details on the main spar and one of the inner gear doors with tamiya flat aluminum. Also, even though it cannot not be seen much in these pictures, I drilled out the lightening holes in the front of the main well. This area may need to be painted chromate as well, but I will have to do some more research. Next I need to add some plumbing and wiring, then finish up the painting which will then be followed by some washes and dry brushing after a coat of clear gloss.
This is my first attempt using alclad finishes and so far I am rather pleased. They are super easy to use and dry quickly. I need to practice a bit more with the primer though as I am not getting a completely smooth finish as I would like with it. I suspect tinkering with my air pressure will be a good place to start, as it is possible it may be drying slightly before it hits the surface. Anyway, gonna look into some tutorials on the stuff and some hands-on practice. See you guys again soon!
I had painted the inner gear doors previously with chromate green before it was brought to my attention as to what Colors they should actually be. Luckily this was done before I had gotten my alclad primer, so I was able to take most of the paint off with masking tape and cleaned up the rest I couldn't reach with lacquer thinner and a paper towel. I was able to leave the inner bay framing green and masked it off. I then shot the pieces with alclad black primer/microfiller followed by a coat of alc101 aluminum. I then masked off the center panel on the doors and sprayed them alclad airframe aluminum. The effect is hard to capture on camera, but has a very pleasing difference in tone.
This is my first attempt using alclad finishes and so far I am rather pleased. They are super easy to use and dry quickly. I need to practice a bit more with the primer though as I am not getting a completely smooth finish as I would like with it. I suspect tinkering with my air pressure will be a good place to start, as it is possible it may be drying slightly before it hits the surface. Anyway, gonna look into some tutorials on the stuff and some hands-on practice. See you guys again soon!
fubar57
General
Very nice.
at6
1st Sergeant
Nice work. I'm looking forward to when you have it finished.
Crimea_River
Marshal
Doing good.
SANCER
Senior Master Sergeant
Me gusta!! 
Looks good so far!
- Thread starter
- #34
First of all, thank you all for your kind words, they truly motivate me to keep going (not that I am ready to quit yet, lol).
So, progress is a little slow as I push through getting the wheel wells finished. The majority of my time is being consumed with research and figuring out how to plumb this thing. My area of expertise so to speak is usually Japanese aircraft with Luftwaffe a close second. This will be my first 1/48 American aircraft I have built since I was a kid, which is probably pretty close to twenty years now. That being said, a lot of areas that are common knowledge to me now in my preferred subjects is fairly new to me and sadly my library on allied aircraft is minimal in comparison. So, this is a learning experience for sure. Now, maybe some you have seen this gentleman's work before or maybe not, but I found his website last night and his build of the P-51, in 1/5 scale no less, has been invaluable for figuring out the construction and plumbing of the wheel wells. Here is the link.
P-51 Diary | Spitfire in my workshop | David Glen: model maker, journalist
Since you have been patient and humored me through my rambling, here are some pictures.
So, one area I tackled was the coolant line couplings. I did not want to paint these as the area was very small and I figured I would end up making a mess of everything. The first thing I tried after some head scratching was to cut some HVAC aluminum tape into a strip of the appropriate width I wanted the couplings. For the hose clamps, I thought I would cut even thinner strips of tamiya tape and mask the two edges of the aluminum tape and then paint flat black between the masks. Well, fail. When the masks were lifted, it took most of the paint with them, leaving them looking worse than if I had tried painting it all by hand. Not acceptable. Plan B. I basically reversed the concept. I cut a piece of tamiya tape the width of the couplings to be and painted it black. I then was able to cut small strips and apply them to the coolant lines and trim off the excess with a sharp knife. I still needed the bare metal clamps on them though. I cut a tiny strip of the aluminum tape and stuck it down to my cutting mat. I then cut it in half lengthwise to give me the width I was after. Next, I cut pieces off, applied them to the already attached masking tape couplings and trimmed off the excess. Success! Everything stayed put and while not perfect, looks a lot better than painting. The bottom picture is one of the aluminum strips on the tip of my xacto. Did I mention these are tiny?
I also added some electrical wires from milliput. I am really liking this technique! Note also I have painted the forward structure chromate green.
After some research, I went back and repainted the inner well structure chromate green again, over painting my previous silver detailing. I had used tamiya flat aluminum to pick out details previously and was not happy with the way it looked. The metallic flakes in the paint are too large for detail painting. It just looks gritty and sloppy to me. This time, I painted all details flat black. I left a few hoses and such black as references indicated. For the other details that needed to be silver, I used silver rub and buff diluted slightly with lacquer thinner and a pointed brush. This allowed me to paint the larger details with the tip and the tip side in a sort of dry brush type stroke to catch the smallest detail. I also used this to touch up the bottom of the inner gear doors and their hinges. I was pleased that the pigment is fine enough and of a similar luster as to blend this with the previously applied alclad nicely. The hydraulic accumulator was painted Polly scale chromate yellow and securing clamps added with flat black. Still awaiting gloss, washes and maybe some dry brushing. The detail should really pop then, but not quite there yet.
So these are the final pictures of where everything is at right now. They also show off the milliput wiring and coolant line couplings a little better. I painted the skin under the coolant lines and the cut out just behind them chromate yellow. I had read that the two colors could be seen being used interchangeably on various structures, even on the same aircraft, so chose yellow instead of green to add interest. Again, since this assembly was started before I knew the correct colors of this area, and before I decided I was going to add extra detail after all, I found myself working very differently than I normally do things. To paint the chromate yellow without covering the other already painted details, I tried applying colors in washes instead of painting conventionally. I first did washes of flat black, and after several layers had a mostly opaque black in only the areas I wanted. Using acrylic paints, I first wet just the areas I wanted painted with clean water, then dipped the brush tip in black paint and touched it to the damp surface. Capillary action pulled the pigment into the corners. After doing this a couple times, the edges were fairly opaque, but the center areas were still pretty translucent. To remedy this, when the outer edges were almost dry, I applied thicker paint to the center area. Moistening the brush a little more with water, I pulled the thicker paint to the edges where there was still just a bit of wet paint in the recesses. This caused everything to spread out evenly via capillary action, leaving enough paint to cover the previously sparsely covered center areas. This was left to dry and then chromate yellow applied the in same manner as described for the black. The black base allowed for a bit of depth to be achieved when applying the yellow. This is not how I ideally would have liked to paint these small areas, but I am happy with the results, and hopefully the detailed explanation will help someone else who find themselves in a similar awkward predicament.
Notice on the wing spar either side of where the inner doors will be I have added some scratchbuilt elements on angled brackets. As seen in the last picture, the piece to the right is where some of the hydraulic lines will connect to and the one to the left is going to be the fuel selector valve where the fuel lines will connect to. The only other details of mention are brackets attached, one on each side behind the smaller cutout in the wing. These appear to hold pulleys that have a line running to each of the inner gear doors and presumably are part of the retraction system.
That's it for now, hope you enjoyed this update. See you next time!
So, progress is a little slow as I push through getting the wheel wells finished. The majority of my time is being consumed with research and figuring out how to plumb this thing. My area of expertise so to speak is usually Japanese aircraft with Luftwaffe a close second. This will be my first 1/48 American aircraft I have built since I was a kid, which is probably pretty close to twenty years now. That being said, a lot of areas that are common knowledge to me now in my preferred subjects is fairly new to me and sadly my library on allied aircraft is minimal in comparison. So, this is a learning experience for sure. Now, maybe some you have seen this gentleman's work before or maybe not, but I found his website last night and his build of the P-51, in 1/5 scale no less, has been invaluable for figuring out the construction and plumbing of the wheel wells. Here is the link.
P-51 Diary | Spitfire in my workshop | David Glen: model maker, journalist
Since you have been patient and humored me through my rambling, here are some pictures.
So, one area I tackled was the coolant line couplings. I did not want to paint these as the area was very small and I figured I would end up making a mess of everything. The first thing I tried after some head scratching was to cut some HVAC aluminum tape into a strip of the appropriate width I wanted the couplings. For the hose clamps, I thought I would cut even thinner strips of tamiya tape and mask the two edges of the aluminum tape and then paint flat black between the masks. Well, fail. When the masks were lifted, it took most of the paint with them, leaving them looking worse than if I had tried painting it all by hand. Not acceptable. Plan B. I basically reversed the concept. I cut a piece of tamiya tape the width of the couplings to be and painted it black. I then was able to cut small strips and apply them to the coolant lines and trim off the excess with a sharp knife. I still needed the bare metal clamps on them though. I cut a tiny strip of the aluminum tape and stuck it down to my cutting mat. I then cut it in half lengthwise to give me the width I was after. Next, I cut pieces off, applied them to the already attached masking tape couplings and trimmed off the excess. Success! Everything stayed put and while not perfect, looks a lot better than painting. The bottom picture is one of the aluminum strips on the tip of my xacto. Did I mention these are tiny?
I also added some electrical wires from milliput. I am really liking this technique! Note also I have painted the forward structure chromate green.
After some research, I went back and repainted the inner well structure chromate green again, over painting my previous silver detailing. I had used tamiya flat aluminum to pick out details previously and was not happy with the way it looked. The metallic flakes in the paint are too large for detail painting. It just looks gritty and sloppy to me. This time, I painted all details flat black. I left a few hoses and such black as references indicated. For the other details that needed to be silver, I used silver rub and buff diluted slightly with lacquer thinner and a pointed brush. This allowed me to paint the larger details with the tip and the tip side in a sort of dry brush type stroke to catch the smallest detail. I also used this to touch up the bottom of the inner gear doors and their hinges. I was pleased that the pigment is fine enough and of a similar luster as to blend this with the previously applied alclad nicely. The hydraulic accumulator was painted Polly scale chromate yellow and securing clamps added with flat black. Still awaiting gloss, washes and maybe some dry brushing. The detail should really pop then, but not quite there yet.
So these are the final pictures of where everything is at right now. They also show off the milliput wiring and coolant line couplings a little better. I painted the skin under the coolant lines and the cut out just behind them chromate yellow. I had read that the two colors could be seen being used interchangeably on various structures, even on the same aircraft, so chose yellow instead of green to add interest. Again, since this assembly was started before I knew the correct colors of this area, and before I decided I was going to add extra detail after all, I found myself working very differently than I normally do things. To paint the chromate yellow without covering the other already painted details, I tried applying colors in washes instead of painting conventionally. I first did washes of flat black, and after several layers had a mostly opaque black in only the areas I wanted. Using acrylic paints, I first wet just the areas I wanted painted with clean water, then dipped the brush tip in black paint and touched it to the damp surface. Capillary action pulled the pigment into the corners. After doing this a couple times, the edges were fairly opaque, but the center areas were still pretty translucent. To remedy this, when the outer edges were almost dry, I applied thicker paint to the center area. Moistening the brush a little more with water, I pulled the thicker paint to the edges where there was still just a bit of wet paint in the recesses. This caused everything to spread out evenly via capillary action, leaving enough paint to cover the previously sparsely covered center areas. This was left to dry and then chromate yellow applied the in same manner as described for the black. The black base allowed for a bit of depth to be achieved when applying the yellow. This is not how I ideally would have liked to paint these small areas, but I am happy with the results, and hopefully the detailed explanation will help someone else who find themselves in a similar awkward predicament.
Notice on the wing spar either side of where the inner doors will be I have added some scratchbuilt elements on angled brackets. As seen in the last picture, the piece to the right is where some of the hydraulic lines will connect to and the one to the left is going to be the fuel selector valve where the fuel lines will connect to. The only other details of mention are brackets attached, one on each side behind the smaller cutout in the wing. These appear to hold pulleys that have a line running to each of the inner gear doors and presumably are part of the retraction system.
That's it for now, hope you enjoyed this update. See you next time!
Attachments
Last edited:
fubar57
General
Very nice
SANCER
Senior Master Sergeant
What explanation you have just offered, ... I am clear about your interest in the details.
I'll have to try some of those techniques. For now the wiring with milliput is very convincing.
Best regards.
I'll have to try some of those techniques. For now the wiring with milliput is very convincing.
Best regards.
Crimea_River
Marshal
Very nice work and thanks for taking the time to explain your methods. One thing you might want to address is the raised strip in the center of the inner gear doors. I lost the reason but these were, I think, steel but in any event a darker metallic colour.
Of course with all this fine work, you will have to model the inner gear doors fully down. In reality, the inner doors were left closed but slowly dropped to the open position as the hydraulic pressure came down.
Of course with all this fine work, you will have to model the inner gear doors fully down. In reality, the inner doors were left closed but slowly dropped to the open position as the hydraulic pressure came down.
Airframes
Benevolens Magister
Nice work on those fiddly bits.
As far as I remember, that 'plate' on the main doors was a reinforcing 'stiffener' plate, a later addition and often retro-fitted to earlier aircraft. The darker colour is more than likely ZC, as seen in some other colour pics, but could be Interior or Bronze green, and has also been seen in 'yellow' ZC.
As far as I remember, that 'plate' on the main doors was a reinforcing 'stiffener' plate, a later addition and often retro-fitted to earlier aircraft. The darker colour is more than likely ZC, as seen in some other colour pics, but could be Interior or Bronze green, and has also been seen in 'yellow' ZC.
- Thread starter
- #40
Thank you all!
SANCER
Thank you very much, I hope the explanations are clear enough. I am usually very much a detail guy most of the time, hence why I usually don't get things finished. Glad to hear you are inspired to try some of these techniques. As a side note, I have looked into coloring the white milliput using acrylic artist's paints and it seems very possible. Would come in very handy for Luftwaffe subjects with predominantly yellow wiring especially in weapons bays where it is quite a mess of spaghetti, though somewhat tamed with wire ties of course. The mg131 bays on my yet to be finished Revell (Eduard) 1/48 Fw-190D-9 comes to mind.
Crimea_River
And
Airframes
She is certainly going to be depicted as having been shut down for at least a little while so I can have the excuse to have them down (and not to have to do any modifications to the kit in this regard, lol)
The center panels on the inner doors were stainless steel. For the later block mustang such as the one I will be doing, P-51D-20NA 44-63xxx (haven't settled on a specific tail number yet, pending my still MIA book that is in the mail for more research) these appear to be standard implementation at the Inglewood plant at this time and pictures of aircraft from this block seem to show them unpainted. It is hard to notice in the pictures, but there is a distinction in contrast between it and the surrounding door surface when viewed in person. When it comes time to painting the overall airframe, I may change it to a slightly different tone, as the effect now is pleasing, albeit somewhat subtle. We shall see. Also, in the pic you posted Andy, I notice that some interior bits can be seen through the rear wing fairing with the flaps dropped. Tempting as it may be, I think I'm gonna leave that alone this time around.
Fun fact: the panel around the exhaust (from what I have read so far anyways) was also stainless steel to be able to withstand the extreme temperatures in that immediate area as opposed to using aluminum, hence why it is much darker than surrounding panels once it has been exposed to high heat. The reason as to why the discoloration was different other than the obvious of being exposed to extreme temperatures was news to me. No updates yet, the encouragement and discussions are much appreciated!
SANCER
Thank you very much, I hope the explanations are clear enough. I am usually very much a detail guy most of the time, hence why I usually don't get things finished. Glad to hear you are inspired to try some of these techniques. As a side note, I have looked into coloring the white milliput using acrylic artist's paints and it seems very possible. Would come in very handy for Luftwaffe subjects with predominantly yellow wiring especially in weapons bays where it is quite a mess of spaghetti, though somewhat tamed with wire ties of course. The mg131 bays on my yet to be finished Revell (Eduard) 1/48 Fw-190D-9 comes to mind.
Crimea_River
And
Airframes
She is certainly going to be depicted as having been shut down for at least a little while so I can have the excuse to have them down (and not to have to do any modifications to the kit in this regard, lol)
The center panels on the inner doors were stainless steel. For the later block mustang such as the one I will be doing, P-51D-20NA 44-63xxx (haven't settled on a specific tail number yet, pending my still MIA book that is in the mail for more research) these appear to be standard implementation at the Inglewood plant at this time and pictures of aircraft from this block seem to show them unpainted. It is hard to notice in the pictures, but there is a distinction in contrast between it and the surrounding door surface when viewed in person. When it comes time to painting the overall airframe, I may change it to a slightly different tone, as the effect now is pleasing, albeit somewhat subtle. We shall see. Also, in the pic you posted Andy, I notice that some interior bits can be seen through the rear wing fairing with the flaps dropped. Tempting as it may be, I think I'm gonna leave that alone this time around.
Fun fact: the panel around the exhaust (from what I have read so far anyways) was also stainless steel to be able to withstand the extreme temperatures in that immediate area as opposed to using aluminum, hence why it is much darker than surrounding panels once it has been exposed to high heat. The reason as to why the discoloration was different other than the obvious of being exposed to extreme temperatures was news to me. No updates yet, the encouragement and discussions are much appreciated!
