Monday 16 April 2018

Heller 1/72 Mirage IV

The model has been rescribed, all fuselage joints filled, sanded, polished, rescribed again to get rid of dust and swarf and liquid glue run around the lines to neaten them up;



Looking at the wings I noticed one side was higher than the other so using hot water I tried to gently bend it into shape, unfortunately this happened;


In all my years of modelling this has NEVER happened to me. Obviously the wing is totally ruined so with this and the recent balls up with the Airfix Mustang I'm taking a break from the hobby for a while as nothing is going right modelling wise so time to do something else. All projects have been put back in the loft and the bench has been tidied;


Be back soon!

Thursday 5 April 2018

Airfix 1/48 P-51D Mustang

After spraying the model with Tamiya X-1 gloss black and letting it cure for a couple of days I masked off the anti glare panel on the nose and sprayed it with AK026 Olive Drab;


The paint went on well but then I noticed it was 'crazing' all over the area;



I can understand getting a reaction if I had used a laquer thinner in the olive drab paint but it was Tamiya X-20 which is basically IPA (Iso Propyl Alcohol) so I can only assume that Tamiya paint doesn't like AK paint.
The reason I sprayed the model with Tamiya gloss black in the first place was to use it as a basecoat for Alclad however I may just spray it with paint from a rattle can (such as Tamiya TS-17) as I'm getting fed up with the arseing about required as Alclad doesn't like masking tape apparently, of course what I'll have to watch now is for any reaction with the black basecoat over the entire model when spraying the aluminium....stupid fucking hobby....
This one will be parked now as it's very close to being sent to landfill and joining the other USAAF subjects I have residing there.

Monday 2 April 2018

Heller 1/72 Mirage IV

The model features raised panel lines so I decided to start rescribing them using blue electrical tape as a guide for curved surfaces and a straight edge for flat surfaces;





After rescribing the lines excess dust and debris was removed then liquid glue was washed over them to clean out the remaining swarf. I'm undecided as to whether to replace the rivet detail as in 1/72 scale it would be quite tiny.
The lower wing features a recess for the AN22 nuke supplied in the kit but I will be using the CT52 reconnaissance pod so I decided to fill this recess using .30 thou styrene strip and lots of Revell filler;






All very nice and it looks quite good, so much so I rescribed the panel lines across the styrene insert.
It was at this point I wondered how the recon pod would look fitted to the model when I came across a fairly obvious problem;


....there needs to be a recess for the recon pod. F**K SAAAAAAAAKE!!! What a complete idiot!! Soooooooo guess what is being removed very soon? At least if anybody reading this blog is due to make a Mirage IV with a recon pod they won't make the same mistake. also
that will teach me to actually check the fit of parts first although in my defence I thought the pod was mounted on a pylon like the ASMP missile....duh.....