Many thanks again to Mark, Roy, Mark Mk11, Trev and Ken!
Again, apologies for the delay, as you'll see below its been a bit of a waiting game whilst I keep changing my mind!
I'm finally (almost) fully equipped now so things should be back on track...famous last words!
The contents of the second pack are shown again in
Photo 10, here we get the first of the tyres (this is a racing slick one, I’ll probably be using the wet weather types with the treads on the model but I’ll be trying to pick out the raised lettering on this one for practice later), we also get the nose cone to which the front wing is fixed onto (actually in to is more accurate) and most importantly the bracket which screws into the underside of the wing (arrowed). Also, there are two poly bags with Type A and B screws. The bracket is first push fitted into the locating holes on the underside of the wing (a pretty good tight fit too) and is then permanently fixed in place with a Type A screw as shown in
Photo 11.
Photo 12 shows the bracket from the rear with its support strut engaged in the rear locating hole.
Photo 13 illustrates the airbrush I’m using, a
Model BD-130A which is basically a cheaper (but pretty good anyway) Chinese copy of very similar airbrushes made by western companies. I was very lucky to ‘inherit’ both this airbrush and the accompanying compressor shown in
Photo 14 from my good friend
‘Godan’ who supplied the set via Ebay, so I could produce a painting of a Humpbacked Whale for him some years ago. He then bought himself another airbrush/compressor set up and left this one with me (with my eternal thanks)!
My newest foray into airbrushing involved a purchase of
Vallejo products shown in
Photo 15, as you can see on the labels,
Black Surface Primer, Semi-matt Aluminium from the
Metal Colour range and a clear
Metal Varnish to seal the paint for the decal application. The first task was to airbrush the shiny chrome wing with the black primer coat. The bottle had no mention of thinning the primer, only a distance to be airbrushed from so I (naturally) assumed it was a ‘pour and go’ media – wrong! I couldn’t get anything to come out of the nozzle until I thinned it down in the paint cup and eventually out it sprayed. I did finally manage to obtain a pretty nice uniform coat as seen in
Photo 16 but it took ages compared to the expert’s videos on Youtube. I then came to the conclusion that it must be my maintenance (or lack of) of the airbrush. Because of my rare use of the airbrush I’d never gone for any of the ‘proper’ materials like cleaners and thinners etc, just used good old clean water. I now decided it was time to get the real thing so I sent off for a set of cleaning tools as shown in
Photo 17 together with a bottle of
Vallejo Airbrush cleaner. I also sent off for a spare 0.3mm needle and nozzle set (seen at the top of the group, the one in the airbrush does have a slight ‘kink’ at the point) and also, as the various videos recommended, a second water trap to fit onto the airbrush which is shown at the extreme right in the group photo. There
is one already on the compressor outlet but one on the airbrush end of the hose is also a good idea. The cleaner set and solution duly arrived and I dismantled the BD-130A to soak the nozzle and nozzle cap in the solution overnight. The cleaner isn’t cheap but after ordering it I discovered yet more Youtube videos which showed how to make the stuff yourself for a heck of a lot less!
I’ve just got hold of the last of the ingredients today so I’ll be making some up as a soaker and using the Vallejo bottle to spray a few drops through the brush as a last ‘super clean’. I’ve also discovered how to make up acrylic paint thinners as well so more on that later. After soaking the nozzles overnight I brushed over them removing some well caked on old paint and then went to screw the tiny nozzle back onto the front of the brush. Then it all went wrong! Not using my reading glasses I hand threaded the nozzle on and then rotated the little wrench that came with the brush until it locked onto the nozzle nut to tighten it on. It was only when I noticed that the nozzle was now laying in the palm of my hand I realized the wrench had actually located onto the nut as I applied it and the act of ‘searching’ for the nut had sheared the nozzle off leaving the threaded shaft in the head of the brush! The remains of nozzle number one are seen in
Photo 18. Fortunately for me, that gold coloured cylinder in
Photo 17 contains a sharp pointed reamer for cleaning paint out of the inside of the nozzles, I found that by sticking it into the severed shaft and turning anti-clockwise the broken piece came right out again!
Anyway! Thank goodness for that new needle and nozzle, they both fitted on like a dream but for an extra insurance I’ve also sent off to China (its cheaper) for another two needle and nozzle sets AND an additional set of five more spare nozzles – just in case!
I hadn’t yet come across the home-made thinner recipe when
Photos 19 and
20 were taken which show the effect of airbrushing the
Vallejo Semi-Matt Aluminium. I had to thin the ‘airbrush ready’ paint slightly with water to get it to spray fine and light but the coverage was really good which showed how important a really clean airbrush is to getting it right (and having a non bent needle probably helps too!)
The next task was to give it a couple of thin coats of the Metal Varnish. In the bottle, the varnish seems as thin as water, but once again I had to thin it down further to get it to spray. This was accomplished eventually and once it was dry (only a few minutes unless you are going to mask over it) I then came to the next delay – I’d gone from too shiny to too dull!
Even with the varnish, the semi-matt aluminium was still too matt for my liking. Another watch on the Youtube tutorials later I was sending off for a bottle of
Vallejo Dull Aluminium which, despite the name was actually shinier than the semi-matt. It only took a few days fortunately and by this time I’d mixed up a small bottle’s worth of home made airbrush acrylic thinner to use instead of plain water. This was 2/3 water, (distilled if you live in a hard water area), with 1/3 Isopropyl Alcohol and about ten drops of Glycerin. I found the Dull Aluminium sprayed on very well and a single coat was enough to cover. The Dull Aluminium wing is shown in
Photo 21.
Photos 22a to
24b illustrates the added depth given to the rivet and nut/bolt details on the wing and under bracket. I first used the
Humbrol Blue-Grey Enamel Wash with a small fine paintbrush to ring the rivets and any right angled faces around the nuts and bolts. The beauty with the enamel wash is that any mistakes can be simply washed away with white spirit on the brush with no effect on the acrylic paint and varnish underneath. Once dry, the raised rivets and details were then picked out with
Mig Matt Aluminium, by sewing needle tip for the rivets, and fine brush for the nuts and bolts and those grub screw thingies on the end brackets shown in
Photo 23. The rounded rims at the front of the support bracket were also highlighted in the Mig paint by brush.
So, (finally) I’ve got the ‘metal work’ done on the wing and in the next installment I can get the decals into place to complete this first section. Oh, nearly forgot, during all this I also found another airbrush accessory I could really do with (apart from a spray booth of course), just waiting for another parcel from China with a twin airbrush stand to fit onto the compressor – two hands are just not enough!
Until the next one, stay safe and Happy Modelling to you All!
Robin.
Oh, and Mark, Yes! Don't we just!
Plymouth57 attached the following image(s):
First wooden ship:
The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second:
Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third:
HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale
Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault
Index for the Victory diary is on page 1