The Spitfire's Unveiling

This will be the last post for the Spitfire build and the fastest model that I have completed. From start to finish this took me just about three months. A new record for me! I won't bore you with too much talk, I'll wait until the end. On to the pictures!

Before dry brushing the upper surfaces.

I dry brushed Winsor & Netwon oil mixing white over the top surfaces. It muted down the paint job and blended the decals for a sun beaten look. I'm still not completely sold on it and may still remove it with some Turpenoid.

Remember the Bare Metal Foil (BMF) I used to mask the front two canopies? The downside is that it is not really easy to remove. It breaks and tears when you are taking it off. You will either have to resort to using your fingernail or a toothpick. Once the foil is off, it leaves a lot of the adhesive residue behind. It took a soft cloth and quite a bit of Goo Gone to clean it up. I broke the pitot tube off for a fourth time while unmasking the canopy.

The Final Pictures.

I used EZ-Line for the antenna wire and rigging coming off of the horizontal stabilizers.

I used BMF for the rear-view mirror. It gives it a nice reflective quality like... a mirror.

I used a silver pencil to dot the walkway and the areas that got a bit of wear.

The following pictures include a 1/48 Revell JU-87D Stuka I did a few years back. It was only my second model back in this hobby. I can't say I would recommend the kit, but for this purpose, it shows the relative size comparison since they are both the same scale. One was an easier target than the other in real life.


Two Warriors From the Battle of Britain.

As I'm in the project management field, I find it valuable to capture lessons learned. Here is what I learned from this project.

• Siphon airbrushes suck. Literally and figuratively.
• Attach as many parts together with Tamiya Extra Thin before painting as possible.
• Attach as many parts together with Tamiya Extra Thin before painting as possible. (Not a typo)
• Extra Thin is the best method of adhesion. Use sparingly and with as many parts as you can. 
• Don't worry about the cockpit too much unless you leave the canopy open.
• Keep a light touch when dry brushing. Otherwise, you may find some wet paint.
• Tamiya decals are thick, like everyone says.
• Oil brushes and acrylic brushes are different. Use the right one and don't mix them.
• Blue tack leaves an oily residue, use white tack instead.
• Keep the same downward angle all over when spraying soft camo lines with the sticky tack method.
• Don't spray lacquer thickly or over 50% humidity, otherwise it will either get foggy or settle unevenly and distort your washes.
• Foil is a pain to get off after painting and lacquering.
• Rattle cans suck, adapt everything for the airbrush, including primer and lacquer.
• Never spray air directly onto the model from the airbrush after running paint dilutant thru it before you know it's completely blown out.
• Primer actually has benefits, like preventing paint from peeling up from using Tamiya masking tape.

That's all there is to this project and the Spitfire wraps up my third aircraft. I hope you've enjoyed the build process, found it entertaining and perhaps learned something along the way. I have.

If you have any questions or comments and would like to contact me, my email address is amodelforants@gmail.com .

While You're Waiting....

The final Spitfire post should be coming soon. In the meantime, I'll just leave this here.....

 (Image courtesy of the Intertubes.)

Tamiya German Hanomag Sdkfz 251/1 Armored Vehicle

Amazon has struck again! I needed to fill an order to meet the $35 free shipping limit and just like grocery store end caps at check out, they snagged me with some targeted marketing. I've been eying this kit for a while now and I finally took the bait. This will be my first ever armor/vehicle kit. What better way than to combine the two? I've always enjoyed the look of half tracks, they're just beastly vehicles. I've been tossing around the paint scheme on this one and I think I've figured out what I'm going to do. Since this kit was only $15, I'm going to mess around with weathering again and as vehicles got pretty dirty, it should be fun. I'm also going to try mud and dirt this time.

The box! How exciting! This kit has been produced since 1973. As you can see, there was no roof in the back and the troops had max headroom.

The lower and upper hull. The vehicle itself is about 6 1/2 inches long.

La di da. Parts.

Wheels?

More parts.

Little guys! I may mess around with painting them, haven't quite decided that yet. I really like what I've seen in the world of dioramas and you usually don't have a diorama without characters.

There was a pretty good sized square ejector pin mark in the bottom, I masked it off and smudged some putty in it.

Voila, gone!

I thought the shaft for the steering wheel was pretty stinking short. It was barely in the hole assigned to it and it was laying against the component on the left hand side. I just took a piece of plastic that came with the kit sanded it down pretty roughly and glued it in place. I'm not too concerned with how it will look because you probably won't be able to see it in the end.

I think the big hole in the center is an ejection pin mark. The other side of the seat there are nine holes that are uniform and significantly smaller. The holes on this side will be filled and sanded.

Those awful holes are all nicely filled in now.

The near-completed interior! I was going to take another picture with the seats in so it would be complete but I forgot. Oh well.

The interior detail in this kit is pretty sparse and it definitely won't win any prizes on that mark. A number of armor geeks have commented numerous times on forums that "this part is not right, that part is inaccurate" and so on. I don't generally worry about stuff like that, at least not right now. I want to get this kit together and mess around with painting and weathering. Stay tuned!