More paint work (and a hint of the real apocalypse)

Well, what do you know? We all survived 12-21-2012. Maybe I’d better see if I can recall those emails to all my ex-bosses. But the date did coincide with our changing the dogs’ food, and if you know what new food does to a pug’s digestive tract, you’ll realize that this is nearly identical to a Mayan apocalypse.

So I guess I have to continue work on the models that I’m trying to wrap up by year’s end. There was a paint session yesterday that mostly consisted of surface coats and patch jobs.

Both the Tornado GR4 and the Ar-234 needed a surface coat. I define this as a final process for any particular color. Some colors don’t need it, but many of the greens, greys, and especially blues tend to go on rather grainy no matter how you thin them. The idea, therefore, is to blast on the color for good solid coverage, then buff them with a high-grit sandpaper (around 600 or higher), and then go in with a second highly thinned coat that will tend to clean up the peaks and valleys and give you a nice regular coat. Note that this is not a technique you would use if you like pre-shading, since the whole theory there is to just shoot enough color on to allow the dark panel line shading to come through. Since I don’t use pre-shading at present, it isn’t an issue for me.

The PO Red coat on the Phantom GR1 had a rather odd reaction on a couple of spots on the tail. There were two areas of what looked like spider-veins, as if the paint had solidified and cracked. I’ve seen something similar when mixing acrylics and enamels, but I only use enamels (with the occasional lacquer, but not in this case), so I doubt that is the issue. The only thing I could think of was sand it down and reshoot. So I did.

I also had to put some Insignia Yellow tail bands on one of the P-47 razors. When the paint cures and I can mask, the three P-47s will be ready for their Neutral Gray lower surfaces.

The final color was Alclad Light Burnt Metal, which I used for the exhaust stacks on the Revell Halifax. Tomorrow I’ll get that an the props installed and construction should be finished. I also spent some time decaling over the Christmas break, so I should be able to display some finished models shortly.

The photo below looks a bit like the previous painting session's shot, since it was mostly surface coats. Well, except for the P-47's Yellow tail bands.