Here's the result of 3 days of struggles.
The decals went on fine but then when doing some touch up painting I picked it up not realizing my finger was wet with brush cleaner and wrecked the paint on the side of the fuselage in two panels of two different shades of silver. Mask, paint, let dry, mask, paint, let dry.
Then there were the wings.
I did not like the texture on them so I masked them off again and sprayed then with Dull Coat. Really didn't like the look of them now and clear the decal film was somewhat visible on the under wing U.S. ARMY decals, so I brushed on a two coats of Future. I liked it better but the brush left streaks that were pretty visible so I pulled out the airbrush and sprayed another three coats of Future.
After letting it dry a bit I decided that it was as good as it was going to get and pealed off all the remaining masking and it actually looked a lot better than I thought it would and I am now happy with it.
The tape on the bottom of the fuselage in one of the pictures isn't for masking, its there to protect the paint until I get it on its landing gear.
It still needs a dab of paint here and there and the number and Wright arrowhead decals still need to go on, then the panel line work and its on to the breakable bits.
I should make the deadline Ok.
Fingers crossed