Builder 2010
Staff Sergeant
Grandson #1's been building the very fine Hasegawa F-22 (1:48) kit for several years. He bogged down on the decals. He likes building, he hates decals. I happen to really like decals and as a kid I used to buy kits based on how many decals they had. Finally he asked me to finish it up. He's in 10th grade and doesn't get much model-building time these days. I got all the decals done and decided to paint the canopy. The kit had two; a clear and a smoked version. I started with the smoked version. First I tried using Parafilm M, but it wasn't working as it should (probably since I don't know how to use it properly), then I thought of Press-n-Seal.
Here's the plane before clear flat is applied.
This post is about the results of that test. This was a tough kit. We used the Hasegawa PE accessory set with substituted PE for the clamshell weapons bay doors and liners for the exhaust diverters. Not yet installed are landing gear doors since they have very fragile attachment points.
The Press-n-Seal (hereafter known as PnS) left a gooey residue behind on the styrene. It was a mess. And it leaked. I attempted to remove the PnS residue with alcohol and it didn't get it off. Then I used Goo Gone which removed the sticky stuff and also attacked the paint. To make matters worse, I had hand brushed the light grey paint and I had touched it before it was completely dry. This pulled some up and made more of a mess.
I turned to the clear canopy. This time I went with my tried and true Tamiya masking tape and air brush. The results are dramatically different as seen here.
The picture shows some of the residue after I already tried to remove some. When I saw what my methods were doing to the paint, I realized that my efforts were useless. I could remove all of it and start over. If the clear canopy hadn't come out so good, I might have done that. There was no leakage with the Tamiya tape. It was able to bend successfully around the shallow curve at the bottom. Even where the tape overlapped at the end points, there was no leakage.
Verdict: PnS doesn't work well in this application. Stick with Tamiya masking tape.
Here's the plane before clear flat is applied.
This post is about the results of that test. This was a tough kit. We used the Hasegawa PE accessory set with substituted PE for the clamshell weapons bay doors and liners for the exhaust diverters. Not yet installed are landing gear doors since they have very fragile attachment points.
The Press-n-Seal (hereafter known as PnS) left a gooey residue behind on the styrene. It was a mess. And it leaked. I attempted to remove the PnS residue with alcohol and it didn't get it off. Then I used Goo Gone which removed the sticky stuff and also attacked the paint. To make matters worse, I had hand brushed the light grey paint and I had touched it before it was completely dry. This pulled some up and made more of a mess.
I turned to the clear canopy. This time I went with my tried and true Tamiya masking tape and air brush. The results are dramatically different as seen here.
The picture shows some of the residue after I already tried to remove some. When I saw what my methods were doing to the paint, I realized that my efforts were useless. I could remove all of it and start over. If the clear canopy hadn't come out so good, I might have done that. There was no leakage with the Tamiya tape. It was able to bend successfully around the shallow curve at the bottom. Even where the tape overlapped at the end points, there was no leakage.
Verdict: PnS doesn't work well in this application. Stick with Tamiya masking tape.
