Airfix Messerschmidt Me109 E-4 - Part II

It's been a tad quiet here for almost a month, but luckily I did manage to find a bit of time to work on my Me-109. In fact the work on it has progressed significantly and I have now reached the weathering stage.

So far, I am very pleased with this kit. I've experienced no problems while putting it together - all parts fit snugly and once everything was in place, only minimal filling was required to hide the joint between the fuselage halfs. The only mishap of this project happened during that stage and it was self-inflicted - I made quite a mess while rescribing fuselage panel lines.

Painting splintered camouflage scheme was equally straight-forward. As first step, while paint was airbrushed on wing edges and rudder control area. Once dry, those areas were masked off and pretty much whole aircraft was sprayed with RLM65 Helblau. Finally, the camouflage consisting of hard-edged two-color splinter pattern (RLM2 Grau and RLM71 Dunkelgrün) was much easier to reproduce than the diabolic curves of the Spitfire. All in all, a very simple painting scheme that shouldn't cause problems even for complete novices. At the same time I have to say that even this simple paint job learned me an important lesson - mask everything when working with airbrush. If you don't, there will always be some overspray accidents and even the mist that "bounces" from areas that are supposed to be painted will find its way onto unexpected places.

Oh yes... all paints used in this project were from Lifecolor. Great paints for airbrushing (less so for brush painting though) and the early war German set is worth every penny.

After painting and two coats of acrylic gloss varnish, it was time for the decals. Once again, I was completely blown away by the set provided with this kit. Not only is the quality very high (thin film, but able to withstand some mishandling), but also admirable attention to detail. One negative observation though - for some unexplicable reason only the guidelines for the largest decals is provided with the kit. Detailed instructions for all the stencils can be found on the net and wasn't very easy to track. For those interested, the document is located at http://www.airfix.com/_assets/files/A01008%20stencil%20layout.pdf at the time this post is written.

White and blue surfaces was masked of and first layer of
splinter camouflage was sprayed on the model

I had some problems rescribing the panel recesses
on the top of the fuselage

Once done with the painting, I applied two layers of gloss varnish onto entire model.
Next day I put on the decals. I was slightly perplexed by the pitot tube that was in the way of the cross on right wing, but this problem was solved by cutting the decal up just enough to be able to fit it around the obstructing bit. Generous dosage of MicroSet fixed the rest - the cut is completely invisible

Topside... looking all business!

Airfix Messerschmidt Me109 E-4 - Part I

An early Messerschmidt 109 was a rather logical choice for my next airplane project once I was done with the Spitifire. Not only am I rather keen on having those two old "enemies" sitting side by side on my display, but I was also very interested if Airfix would be able to keep impressed "two models in a row".

First impressions of the model were very positive - two sprues of grey plastic with no apparent blemishes or defects with clean mouldings and very nice panel engravings. Cockpit consists of three parts, making it possible to install it in open position. One detail did however raise my concern - some of very small details are attached to the sprue with rather "solid" lumps of plastic. Extra care must be taken when removing those fragile parts, because they easily be damaged or even broken due to the force needed to cut them out of the sprue. This is especially true when cutting out rear aerlion support balks.

Cockpit of the Messerschmidt is even sparser that that of the Spitfire and suffers from a major problem - the two part decal for instrument panel simply doesn't fit! It's at least a millimeter too large and would have been almost unusable if it wasn't for the fact that cockpit is so cramped that it's hardly possible to see any detail at all once the fuselague is closed and cockpit is in place. Nevertheless, if you don't have third party components at hand, you'd better be prepared to close that cockpit to avoid embarrassing questions. :-)

Italeri Stug III G - Part III

Yeah... nothing says Christmas like doing some work on a Nazi armored vehicle! Alright, most of work has actually been done over last couple of days, today I just applied finishing touches to the paint job.

As you can see from images below, the Stug is now completely assembled, painted and awaiting first coat of blank varnish. Reaching this stage turned out to be something of an adventure, filled with problems and mishaps.

As previously mentioned, the model itself is extremely simple to assemble. With the exception of tracks, I could glue together all parts before spraying the base coat. Then came first (and perhaps only) important decision during assembly step - would I work with chassis and superstructure separately or should I put them together and hope I could put tracks in place once I was done with the paint job. I decided for the second alternative - naaaag, wrong choice... but more on that later on.

Once the model was in one piece, it was time to take out the airbrush. Overall coat of sand yellow was followed by standard German disruptive pattern consisting of olive green and dark brown blotches. I tried to apply the pattern used according to Italeri in Normandy 1944, but the end result should be regarded as "free interpretation" rather than meticulous reproduction of cammo scheme shown in instruction manual. The simple truth is that I still have a lot to learn about airbrushing.

Once the cammo was applied, it was time to put the tracks in place. That's when the nightmare in this project began. First of all, as turned out, there wasn't enough room to squeeze the track links between the front sprockets and mud guards of superstructure. After brief and futile attempt to push track links into place (net result of that effort was a broken sprocket wheel ) I realized that I had to partially break up the model to even have a chance to get those tracks in place.

Misery likes however company and this case it was no different. There is no other way to say it - Italeri seriously dropped the boll with track assembly for this model. As can be seen in pictures I posted previously,  track assembly consists of a couple of solid sections and a number of individual links that are supposed to be  wrapped around the wheels. The thing is though that the sprue itself seems to be reused from another kit and needs to be cut to size before it is put together. The simple fact is that no matter how much you'll try, you will not be able to complete the assembly if you follow instructions provided by Italeri. Luckily there is a surplus of separate links, which can be used to cobble together passable tracks. But the assembly process which should be pretty straightforward is a real pain in the neck and in my case at least, the final result looks rather shoddy. Luckily, I build 1/72 AFV:s for my wargaming, where 1 meter rule applies - if it looks good from a distance of one meter, then it will do.

Not happy with Vallejo at the moment

Vallejo has been my favorite paint maker ever since I've decided to make a switch from Humbrol enamels to acrylics. Vallejo Model paints are pretty much the only thing I use for miniature painting (the other hobby of mine).

Right now however they are not my favorite company. The reason? Their "new next best thing since sliced bread" aka. their new polyurethane primer! I've spotted couple of adds about them and as I'm always curious about new stuff, I picked up a bottle of it when I saw it at a trader stand during my visit to C4 Open show. Couple of days ago I had a chance to test it out, as I needed to do some priming on one of the kits I'currently working on. First impression wasn't very positive - straight out of the bottle, it was rather thick, but at the same time it had tendency to pool together on bare plastic on which it was sprayed at low pressure levels (I stayed at 10-15 psi). I found it rather difficult to work with, although to be fair, the fact that I had a 0.2mm nozzle on my airbrush could have had something to do with it (thick fluid + small nozzle = clogging).

This less than optimal first experience turned out to be only the prelude to my problems with that "great" primer. Couple of days after my test run I found some free time and decided to work on the Stug. Imagine my surprise and horror when, as I picked up the airbrush, I discovered that its trigger action felt soggy as if its innards were filled with sticky glue. The problem became obvious almost immediately once I stripped the airbrush - once the needle was out, I saw that it was covered with sticky white goo. Same stuff stuck to the trigger mechanism and nozzle wasn't in much better condition. The whole brush was covered with residue from that test I did couple of days before.

Now here's the thing - I'm rather anal when it comes to keeping my airbrush clean. I strip it and clean both the nozzle and the needle with airbrush cleaner after every painting session, no matter how short it may have been. Test run with Vallejo's primer was no exception.

After a night of soaking all detachable components in cleaner fluid and with rather significant effort I managed to remove most of the goo and restore the airbrush to usable condition. Based on that experience it is clear to me that the airbrush cleaner I'm using (from Lifecolor) is barely capable to thin that stuff out. Until I find find a thinner that does visibly better job cleaning/thinning it, this new "wonder crap" from Vallejo isn't coming within a meter from my airbrush!

Italeri Stug III G - Part II

Just a quick update to keep this blog alive. Rather busy times in "real life", so there isn't as much time for model building as I would have liked, but I did make some progress with the Stug. Image below shows the model in "inbetween" stage, with black pre-shading sprayed on grey foundation coat.

Airfix Spitfire MkIa - Part IX

And so, without further ado, here is the finished model. Finishing steps consisted of highlighting the panel recesses with water-solvable oils, installation of cockpit, antenna and propeller and finally double coat of Testor DullCoate matte lacquer.

Nothing particular to report about those finishing touches, except for the fact that cockpit fit could have been better - I was unable to get perfect fit, as a result right edge of cockpit sticks out a fraction of a millimeter. In any case, I must say that I am very pleased with the final result. There is still a lot of stuff I need to learn, especially when it comes to handling the airbrush, but considering the fact that this is my first model in a very long time, I'm rather pleased with the end result.

C4 Open 2012 - Part 2

All right, time for another batch of photos from this year's C4 Open. This time around it's the most noteworthy airplanes that participated in competitions. My personal taste is usually on "small is beautiful" side, but this year it was the P-38 Lightning in 1:32 scale that made deepest impression on me.