parsifal
Colonel
Very impressive John
**** DONE: GB-36 1/32 Bf109G-10 Erla - Axis Manufactured Aircraft of WWII
- Thread starter JKim
- Start date
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Crimea_River
Marshal
Sure is.
turbo
Staff Sergeant
Me three 
Airframes
Benevolens Magister
I agree with all - nice detail work.
- Thread starter
- #85
JKim
Senior Master Sergeant
The revised legs have been painted as well as the inside of the gear doors.
I've added some dry pigments on the wear portion of the tires. Does anyone have a good way of fixing the pigments in place without losing the effect, which happens when I spray a flat coat on?
The fuse joint has been lightly re-scribed as a panel line and I've added the rivets.
Ok... I've finally done it. The AMUR Reaver gun breech cover has been GLUED into place. Part of the delay was getting some fresh CA glue. I didn't want to chance a bad connection with my old CA glue.
While I work to fair in the gun breech cover with putty, I am looking ahead to the AMUR Reaver engine cowling. The fit up top... resin to resin... is perfect but down below there will be issues.
Before I glue the engine cowling into place, I am going to try and finish the gun breech fit as much as possible. I like restricting the corrective/transition areas as much as possible so that I don't rush or get lazy or careless with this.
I've added some dry pigments on the wear portion of the tires. Does anyone have a good way of fixing the pigments in place without losing the effect, which happens when I spray a flat coat on?
The fuse joint has been lightly re-scribed as a panel line and I've added the rivets.
Ok... I've finally done it. The AMUR Reaver gun breech cover has been GLUED into place. Part of the delay was getting some fresh CA glue. I didn't want to chance a bad connection with my old CA glue.
While I work to fair in the gun breech cover with putty, I am looking ahead to the AMUR Reaver engine cowling. The fit up top... resin to resin... is perfect but down below there will be issues.
Before I glue the engine cowling into place, I am going to try and finish the gun breech fit as much as possible. I like restricting the corrective/transition areas as much as possible so that I don't rush or get lazy or careless with this.
Crimea_River
Marshal
Fixing that cowl fit isn't going to be pretty. Maybe push out the fuselage halves with some internal struts?
turbo
Staff Sergeant
Coming along very nicely John, the landing gear is looking great. Although looks as though the engine cowl will be a bit of a wrestle.
I sometimes use this
Although more frequently if I have an acrylic basecoat I use Tamiya enamel thinner or mineral turpentine. These don't fix quite as strongly as the Mig product, but allow you to work the pigment a bit after drying which I find useful. I never spray a varnish coat over pigments as I find it attenuates the effect, so pigment work is generally the last thing I do in the finishing process.
I sometimes use this
Although more frequently if I have an acrylic basecoat I use Tamiya enamel thinner or mineral turpentine. These don't fix quite as strongly as the Mig product, but allow you to work the pigment a bit after drying which I find useful. I never spray a varnish coat over pigments as I find it attenuates the effect, so pigment work is generally the last thing I do in the finishing process.
- Thread starter
- #89
JKim
Senior Master Sergeant
Thanks Kirby! Any idea what that Pigment Fixer is? I'd hate to buy a bottle and find out that it is some simple household liquid.
Yes, the resin cowling is going to be a pain. But hopefully, I'm attacking it in a logical, systematic way that eliminates some of the foreseeable headaches ahead of time. The iterative work of puttying, sanding and checking continues on the Reaver gun breech attachment. The goal is to integrate the resin parts into the build seamlessly. Or at least as close as I can muster. The trickier blending will be with the engine cowling so who knows how that is going to go.
The first primer coat reveals lots of good and a few bad. But thankfully, the bad seems to be very minor and easily correctable. I've scribed panel lines and added rivets to the gun breech part to help divert the eyes away from the join.
I've weathered the metal wheel wells but the wings have not been glued together yet. Build order is yet to be determined since I have to trap the wing spar between the top and bottom wing parts. I may opt to attach the engine cowling with the wings off since the majority of the blending work will be at the wings and above. This would give me more room to putty and sand in the always awkward wing root area.
The prop blades have been given a coat of RLM 70 Black Green and chipped using the hairspray method. The chipping is a bit heavier than I like but we can make adjustments later if necessary.
After a few rounds of salt fading, the props are given a more worn look. I may still remove some chipping... haven't made up my mind.
Yes, the resin cowling is going to be a pain. But hopefully, I'm attacking it in a logical, systematic way that eliminates some of the foreseeable headaches ahead of time. The iterative work of puttying, sanding and checking continues on the Reaver gun breech attachment. The goal is to integrate the resin parts into the build seamlessly. Or at least as close as I can muster. The trickier blending will be with the engine cowling so who knows how that is going to go.
The first primer coat reveals lots of good and a few bad. But thankfully, the bad seems to be very minor and easily correctable. I've scribed panel lines and added rivets to the gun breech part to help divert the eyes away from the join.
I've weathered the metal wheel wells but the wings have not been glued together yet. Build order is yet to be determined since I have to trap the wing spar between the top and bottom wing parts. I may opt to attach the engine cowling with the wings off since the majority of the blending work will be at the wings and above. This would give me more room to putty and sand in the always awkward wing root area.
The prop blades have been given a coat of RLM 70 Black Green and chipped using the hairspray method. The chipping is a bit heavier than I like but we can make adjustments later if necessary.
After a few rounds of salt fading, the props are given a more worn look. I may still remove some chipping... haven't made up my mind.
- Thread starter
- #90
JKim
Senior Master Sergeant
The AMUR Reaver spinner is given a mottle preshade. Whether or not this will even make a difference on a black/white spinner remains to be seen but I did it anyway.
The white is applied in highly thinned layers. The resulting effect is very subtle and will probably get tone-crushed by the black and/or eradicated by subsequent repairs to the spiral masking that I will have lots of trouble with in the near future.
The second round of primer on the fuselage shows the gun breech/fuselage joint cleaned up a little at a time. Most of the work involved refining the panel lines and re-establishing the wing root joint using a scriber.
Pulling back to a full view of the fuselage shows that we are in good shape so far and almost ready for the engine cowling addition.
The white is applied in highly thinned layers. The resulting effect is very subtle and will probably get tone-crushed by the black and/or eradicated by subsequent repairs to the spiral masking that I will have lots of trouble with in the near future.
The second round of primer on the fuselage shows the gun breech/fuselage joint cleaned up a little at a time. Most of the work involved refining the panel lines and re-establishing the wing root joint using a scriber.
Pulling back to a full view of the fuselage shows that we are in good shape so far and almost ready for the engine cowling addition.
lookin' pretty damn good....
turbo
Staff Sergeant
Coming along very nicely indeed John! Just my personal opinion, but I'm not a big fan of hairspray chipping on props - never looks quite right to me. I generally prefer sponge chipping which can be augmented with pencils if necessary - but that's just me.
It smells like turps or white spirit John, but there's something else in there which I can't quite put my finger on. It claims to be a special formulation and it certainly seems to be a stronger fixative than plain turps, so I guess it is. But as I said above, I'm generally happy just using enamel thinner or turps so perhaps give those a go before shelling out for the fixer.
It smells like turps or white spirit John, but there's something else in there which I can't quite put my finger on. It claims to be a special formulation and it certainly seems to be a stronger fixative than plain turps, so I guess it is. But as I said above, I'm generally happy just using enamel thinner or turps so perhaps give those a go before shelling out for the fixer.
Airframes
Benevolens Magister
Nice work with the resin parts fitting so far John - hope you can get the main cowl sorted.
Crimea_River
Marshal
Doing great so far.
- Thread starter
- #96
JKim
Senior Master Sergeant
Thanks for the comments guys! Kirby, I know what you mean about the hairspray technique. I don't get very consistent results with it but sometimes it works just well enough for me to use. The chipping came out a little too strongly but I am going to cover up some of it. The chips themselves are small enough that I found to be acceptable.
Upon fitting the canopy parts to the fuselage, I found that I needed to use a shim to fill a gap between the windscreen and the gun breech cover. A starboard side panel line that I erroneously scribed got filled in... better this way since I was having trouble getting a clean panel line there.
I took a stab at trying to get a spiral onto the spinner. I don't like to use decals, even if they fit. Aftermarket spinners such as the Reaver and H. Daehne's usually have some nice rivet detail that might get covered up by a decal. So I usually paint my spinner spirals using masks. My current technique is to use a photocopy of the spiral decal (if available) to cut a mask. It's hard to cut a compound curve smoothly so it usually takes me several attempts.
Once the mask is applied, I try to tamp it down as much as I can but inevitably some creases develop.
The creases in the mask let paint in and as a result, the spiral looks a bit rough. I use to start over when I saw results like this but I've learned that I can usually smooth out any kinks and undersprays one section at a time with flexible white Tamiya tape and using my airbrush at its finest setting (low pressure with very watery paint).
It's very exacting work and the spraying is performed under magnification (I use a pair of visor magnifiers). After the paint touch-ups, the spinner looks much better!
I've given the spinner a gloss coat to seal the spiral.
Upon fitting the canopy parts to the fuselage, I found that I needed to use a shim to fill a gap between the windscreen and the gun breech cover. A starboard side panel line that I erroneously scribed got filled in... better this way since I was having trouble getting a clean panel line there.
I took a stab at trying to get a spiral onto the spinner. I don't like to use decals, even if they fit. Aftermarket spinners such as the Reaver and H. Daehne's usually have some nice rivet detail that might get covered up by a decal. So I usually paint my spinner spirals using masks. My current technique is to use a photocopy of the spiral decal (if available) to cut a mask. It's hard to cut a compound curve smoothly so it usually takes me several attempts.
Once the mask is applied, I try to tamp it down as much as I can but inevitably some creases develop.
The creases in the mask let paint in and as a result, the spiral looks a bit rough. I use to start over when I saw results like this but I've learned that I can usually smooth out any kinks and undersprays one section at a time with flexible white Tamiya tape and using my airbrush at its finest setting (low pressure with very watery paint).
It's very exacting work and the spraying is performed under magnification (I use a pair of visor magnifiers). After the paint touch-ups, the spinner looks much better!
I've given the spinner a gloss coat to seal the spiral.
NICE...!
Crimea_River
Marshal
Spiral looks great John. Always a hurdle and a relief when done.
Just a small nit pick but I noticed on your windscreen that you rounded the corners of the masking tape. The 109's frames at this location had sharp edges though.
Just a small nit pick but I noticed on your windscreen that you rounded the corners of the masking tape. The 109's frames at this location had sharp edges though.
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