**** DONE: GB-61 1/48 FM-1 Wildcat - Carrier and Maritime Aircraft

[A4K]

'Bit of a' trial Andy, but really hope it works for you.

 

[N4521U]

Dab Silver over the cracks and gaps of the declas............
it's called weathering and wear.......

I'll leave now

 

[Crimea_River]

Dab Silver over the cracks and gaps of the declas............
it's called weathering and wear.......

I'll leave now

Yeahhhh...NO!

 

[MIflyer]

Lesson learned

Yep, you've invented a new form of weathering.

 

[T Bolt]

The decal peel-off looks wonderful when it works but maybe not think its worth all hassle you has to go through.

 

[Crimea_River]

Took a breath and fixed the peel-off this morning.

A couple of days ago, I sprayed a clear coat over the area because I planned to lightly mask the white star and red outline. That's where I started today.

Next, I mixed up a thin paint recipe to match the blue on the decal:

I then carefully sprayed on the blue. It does look like I added a bit too much black but I think it will work.

Despite the clear coat, some more of the decal pulled away but it's no big deal. I had painted the missing white section on the star by hand before masking.

This is how I'll leave it.

In other news, the wheels have been flattened, painted, and installed but I added the brake lines beforehand.

Onward and upwards.....

 

[rochie]

nice save Andy

 

[A4K]

With Karl, turned out great Andy

 

[Wurger]

Joining the gang above.

 

[Gnomey]

Nicely done Andy!

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Good workmanship Andy and I do like the brake lines.

 

[Wayne Little]

A great save Andy.

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks all.

Well, I knew going in that I could be asking for trouble doing this:

Still figure it was worth painting the walkways rather than using the stark black decals. In the end, it worked out on this side:

The other side, not so much:

The repair was made using a drop of Future applied under the torn decal followed by careful repainting of the damaged area using a fine brush:

With that decal...um...experience behind me, a quick oil wash was done to highlight the panel lines and next it will be on to applying a matte coat and more weathering.

Thanks again for joining me on this trek.

 

[Wurger]

 

[rochie]

nicely done

 

[T Bolt]

Well done Andy

 

[A4K]

Still throwing challenges at you Andy, but you're dealing with them nicely (no doubt with some choice language in between! )

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Agree with you re the walkways, much better painted than decalled and a good repair fix.

 

[Grant Barr]

Nice work Andy - really hate it when decals don't behave themselves! Do you think a clear coat immediately after peeling off the decal carrier might have made a difference? I have a couple of new Eduard kits coming up in the build list and any thoughts on how to avoid this would be valuable. Cheers!

 

[Crimea_River]

Grant Barr , the clear coat was applied over the sections that I didn't peel the carrier film from but it still didn't work. For my comments on the carrier film removal, see posts 162 and 167 of this thread. The issue with applying a clear coat in hopes that it will give better resistance to decal tears is, in my opinion, a false hope. Yes, it might help A BIT but doing this does nothing to fix the poor bond that is the cause of the tear-off. That poor bond will always be there unless you can find a way to get to that layer and inject some kind of binder any force that pulls that weak bond apart will do so, and take the clear coat with it.

So now for more trials. Thinking that the decal issue was behind me, I sprayed a matte coat tonight and then applied another thin coat tinted with a touch of flat white to get some fading going. I like how the finish turned out.

But alas....one of the decals that I didn't remove the carrier film from (because they didn't stick to the decal underneath) decided to debond itself at one corner. So, here's me thinking that it was a small piece that I forgot to remove so I got the tweezers out and gave it a small tug. Shouldn't have done that.....

What now? To minimize the ugliness, I took a scalpel and cut up to the edge of the yellow 2 and peeled the film back to that. You can see that the piece on the lower left corner of the A is still there - that's where I repaired the earlier tear with Future and it's now stuck on.

This problem will be tackled tomorrow when I'm in a better mood. I now have to carefully feather the paint edge at the left side of the A and then match the faded clear coat. So maybe we can start GB 62 now?