**** DONE: GB-35 1/72 A-4B Skyhawk - Vietnam French/American War 1950-1975

[Crimea_River]

Thanks guys. Kirby I have never found Mr. Surface locally so have never used it. Tamiya's primer is a lacquer based paint that I have used successfully for this purpose. It sometimes takes a couple of applications to fill, especially when fresh, but it thickens with age and does a good job. I often use it to fill unwanted panel lines and small sink marks.

 

[Airframes]

Good stuff Andy.

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks Terry.

To bring us up to date, I've been working on cleaning up seams, masking and adding the canopy, and spraying on a coat of primer to see how it all looks.

I tend to paint my models with the canopy attached so that I can deal with any misalignments without risking damage to the final finish. To enable the canopy to be glued on, I had to start by painting the instrument coaming in flat black which I cut with a bit of light grey.

With the left over paint in the airbrush. I sprayed the wheel wells for a preshading effect under the final coat which will be white.

The tail pipe which had been thinned earlier was attached and also got a shot of black up its arse.

The tiny canopy received a brushed on coat of grey on the inside framing so that the view from the outside won't reveal the Light Gull Grey exterior paint. I was frankly too lazy to mask the inside as I didn't think that I would need to be too accurate with the lines.

The masks were cut using caliper and Mk I eyeball measurements and the canopy was glued in place with Testors Clear Parts Cement. The fit is excellent but some minor filing and sanding was necessary.

The primer was sprayed on and the various areas that I worked on were checked. A pretty good, though not perfect result keping in mind that the model is only about 6 inches long!

And there you have it. I likely won't be able to work on the model until Sunday as I'll be attending full day conferences tomorrow and Saturday. Thanks again for the great comments.

 

[turbo]

Well done on the construction phase Andy and looking forward to the paint...

 

[parsifal]

I'm learning a heap watching this. spraying the black, masking then spraying the primer is so obvious, yet ive always done that the other way around and had difficulties galore around the canopy areas. how you've done the tailpipe is very cool as well.

Getting a lot out of watching this build

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks Kirby. Michael, glad you are finding some useful info here and thanks for the note.

 

[Wurger]

 

[Wayne Little]

Nice.....

 

[Airframes]

Looking good Andy.

 

[Gnomey]

Great work so far Andy!

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks guys. Hard to tell but the white has been sprayed on the underside and control surfaces. The underside also got a coat of Future which has been curing for a day. A little work has been done around the canopy fit as there was a small step.

 

[Wurger]

 

[parsifal]

FWIW colour looks fine to me so far.

 

[turbo]

Nice one Andy. Why did you spray Future on the underside now as opposed to all over once the whole paint job is finished?

 

[Crimea_River]

Mostly to protect the white when I set the model down Kirby. I find the flat white mars very easily.

 

[turbo]

 

[Crimea_River]

A bit discouraged this morning on two fronts - colour and application quality.

I started a session last night by masking the control surfaces and the demarcation lines between top and bottom. The latter, based on pics I've studied, appear to be soft edged and a bit wavy so I used rolled up Blu-tak. In this small scale, I had little confidence that I would be able to replicate such an edge using my usual free-hand technique.

Not being too well versed in post war camo colours, all I knew is that the top colour was a light grey. A couple of references on the net advised the colour to be Light Gull Grey, FS26440. One reference went so far as to suggest the paint mix for Tamiya as a 50/50 mix of XF-20 Medium Grey and XF-2 White so I went with that and here's how that first coat turned out:

Looking at XF-20, I always thought that it looked a little brown and my first impression was just that - too brown. So I whipped out my Federal Standard colour fan and laid FS26440 up to the finish and it's actually a very good match, though to me it still looks a wrong somehow. Opinions please!

My second issue is one that I've actually experienced often and I appeal to the group for suggestions on how to avoid this. If you look closely at the severe close-up below, you will notice that the paint has "powdered" where the fuselage and wing meet and especially under the intake duct. However, everywhere else, the paint has gone on nice and smoothly. My theory is that spraying into areas where there is a right angle creates vortices and that some of the paint swirls around and dries before landing on the surface. This happens to me quite often and I have yet to figure out how to avoid it. Thoughts and advice would be appreciated.

 

[parsifal]

ive struck that problem as well . I firstly would like to state that I believe your knowledge and experience to be far greater than mine, but my comments are just what ive noticed in my own experience,

I think you are onto something with your theory. ive usually put it down to insufficient driving pressure in the airbrush. I can sometimes overcome this by turning up the regulator on the compressor a bit. if you are running 20psi, turning it up to 25 psi should be more than enough.

If the venturi in the airbrush has become partially obstructed by thick acrylic paint the gun might still work but the pressure pushing the paint out might not be sufficient to get it onto the surface quick enough. Acylics ive found, especially if its thick or been standing a while dries quickly. If your ambient temperature is high that can make it play up as well.

I would try the simple fixes first and work up slowly, eliminating each one as you go. try turning the regulator up. Try cleaning the needle and seat. Try thinning your paint a bit.

I'm wondering about things also that are outside my experience. Could the futures yove applied have affected the adhesion of ne paint in some way?

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks for the feedback Michael, I appreciate it. I'm actually thinking that a higher pressure will exacerbate the issue since a higher pressure means the stream will blow harder, increasing the turbulence in the area. I thin my paint with 1 to 1.5 times thinner but I know some guys thin more. I personally think that going 4 thinners to 1 paint like John (JKim) does is too much and that it creates adhesion issues but would love to hear what others think. Maybe I need to increase the thinners. I usually shoot at about 22 psi.

It's not attributable to the Future as I only applied this to the white surfaces on the bottom so the grey went straight onto the primer.

 

[Wurger]

Andy you are right with the "powdering" thinking it is the result of drying of paint before hitting the surface. The reason for that is the mix of the air and the paint while there is quite much of a thinner in the mixture. The thinner just "evaporates" quickly because of the strong air stream leaving almost dry colour grains that "sticking" together with other ones and the dust So .. adding of more thinner to the mixture won't help. If you use the double action airbrush , try to get less of the air while painting a such area.