**** DONE: GB-54 1:48 Kawasaki Ki-61 Hien - Pacific Theatre

[Crimea_River]

Thanks guys.

Great Job! Since I know the exact size of the model, yours looks like 1:24 or bigger on the photos. In fact the real mottling is much smaller.
How exactly do you do it: do you first make a "cloud" with the airbrush and then fill it with paint or do you start with a "scribble" and then make it bigger to its outside borders?
Cheers!

I start with a small dot and then go in a circular pattern that both fills and defines the shape. These mottles are mostly too small to create an outer boundary to fill in. The largest solid one is maybe the size of my small fingernail. Others are larger in overall area but are more like connected worms rather than solid shapes.

I'm getting there but still perfecting the technique. There's still too much splatter around the edges so I'm either using too thick a mixture, not going in tight enough, or both. There's also a chance that I have a slightly damaged needle tip which of course doesn't help.

 

[Vic Balshaw]

I take my hat of to you Andy, that is amazing.

 

[rochie]

looks amazing Andy, well done

 

[fubar57]

With all. Something for me to strive for

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks again all.

It's a day for reporting small screw ups. I mentioned yesterday that the flattened tires don't sit on the ground properly. Kinda hard to see here but it's true. This is a result of the detail where the wheel is keyed to the strut and so can only fit in one way, supposedly to line up the little nipple for the brake. That forces you to get the flattening accurate which is tough.

Here's the other one. I painted the inner gear doors while they were attached to the sprue. Numpty got them mixed up and painted the yellow marks on the wrong end. I only noticed this after I glued them in place.

The fixes will follow later in the weekend. Thanks again for looking in.

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Oh my! Easy done though, we've all been down that track. You may recall my JU52 Andy and its top loading hatch the wrong way round, you know, the model that lit up like a Christmas tree.

 

[Bustedwing]

That is looking so good !! Nice paint work !!

 

[Wurger]

Looking good though.

 

[le_steph40]

Fantastic work Andy !

 

[Wayne Little]

Agreed, well done Andy.

 

[Gnomey]

Lovely work so far Andy!

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks for the comments and likes everyone. On the base leg now.

The victory tally decal has been applied and matte coated. The canopy masks are removed and the sliding canopy stuck in place. I also chipped some of the mottles in the walk areas, though I think I'll do a little more.

Some builders replace the exhaust stacks with aftermarket ones but I went ahead and used the kit ones, which I think look fine. Note that the reversed yellow markings on the inner gear doors have been fixed and the little cooler (not sure for what) was added under the fuselage.

Looking outboard a bit you can see that the drop tanks have been added. The landing light lens did need a bit of cleanup as paint got under the curled up mask. This was easily removed with a sharpened toothpick. The flat marks on the tires were filed a little more and they do sit a lot better, though this pic doesn't show that.

That's all for today. Left to do: finish the prop/spinner, add the fuselage guns, do some exhaust staining and misc. weathering, add the radio mast and string some wires. Thanks again for following along.

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Really nice Andy.

 

[Wurger]

 

[Airframes]

Good work Andy.

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks friends. Ticking off the punch list....

The prop has been added after a couple of different shots of brown XF-64 an XF-68. I used the salt technique to weather the spinner and blades but the effect was too stark so I sprayed another thin coat of XF-64 over it all. As it is, one can see a very slight variation in colours but this doesn't show up well in the pic. All this was followed up with a bit of chipping with a silver pencil. The blades had been thinned a bit but are still a bit chunky looking so purists may want to consider resin blades as a substitute. On top of the cowl you can see the cannon barrels which have been added after drilling out the muzzles and painting.

Further back, there was a bit more chipping done on the walkways and around the gun servicing hatches. Chipping can be taken literally as I scraped the green away with the end of a file as the underlying Alclad paint is very durable. Also, exhaust stains were sprayed on with very thin brown and black and the antenna mast was painted and plugged in.

Thanks again for stopping by.

 

[rochie]

looks better all the time

 

[Wurger]

 

[Wayne Little]

Scrubbing up real Nice Andy.

 

[Vic Balshaw]

It certainly looks good.