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@Harry_the_Spider
Thanks for the offer but the plane now sits in a box.
I initially went for the D-Day invasion stripes but completely messed them up on the wing.
Question:
I am struggling with painting the Lightning as the paint is not sticking to the plastic. What causes this ?
I have washed & rinsed the mouldings twice with washing up liquid (Ecovert). Have now resorted to spraying the sprues with aerosol Tamiya grey primer but I'd rather not do this for every model (it's expensive and the shed is cold etc).
Lots of people wash their kits, i never have and never had a problem with paint not sticking. Are you brush painting? If the paint isn't thoroughly mixed or if its airbrush paint then that can cause it. Tamiya acrylics for example don't brush very well at all but spray beautifully.
StirlingCrispin
Question:
I am struggling with painting the Lightning as the paint is not sticking to the plastic. What causes this ?
I've got an old Matchbox kit that was my Dad's and he never got round to making it, so I nicked it 🙂
I had the same issue with the paint sticking and ended up giving up on it. I thought it might have been a problem with the paint, so tried it on a different model & it went on fine.
I've tried washing it a couple of time, but it made no difference.
I put it down to being years & years old and the plastic degrading - perhaps some kind of chemical in the plastic leeching out over time contaminating the surface? It's like someone's put a 'hydrophobic' coating on the surface. This is with acrylic Tamiya paint. Maybe enamel would work, but I'm not buying all new paints, just to do that one model.
Have now resorted to spraying the sprues with aerosol Tamiya grey primer
I use acrylic car primer. A rattle can of that costs about £6 and is enough to do half a dozen kits. As long as you use it sparingly it doesn't obliterate any detail on the model. Also I spray the model after it is built rather than when it is on the sprues.
If you gloss coat the kits before you apply the decals they'll slide about more so that you can position them and ultimately they'll stick better once dry.
Huge can of worms! Quite a few well respected modellers are adamant that they never prime their kits. I often do but not always. I use a Halfords rattle can of their light grey plastic primer. I find a light colour base coat helps to highlight errors (visible seams etc) so I can correct them (or at least attempt to!!) before the top coat goes on.
For the "Kate" model I posted earlier I used the matching Alclad black primer which i gently sanded to make it nice and smooth before the aluminium top coat went on. For top coats that are yellow or white you get a much better finish with the right colour primer (some people use pink primer I think for a yellow top coat)
Gloss before decals helps to reduce silvering mainly and also a gloss finish makes washes work much better. Washes don't tend to flow as well on a matt or satin finish.
I am struggling with painting the Lightning as the paint is not sticking to the plastic.
it's not so common now, but some older kit manufactures (Matchbox is a good example) used a moulding release agent, if the kit's been sitting around for years, the styrene will absorb it over time, and you'll never get it out totally, so it may need a coat of primer. Most people will tell you to wash kits before you paint them, I never do, and I've never had an issue.
Primer: Like Roackhopper, unless I'm black-basing, I don't generally prime my kits. I'm not competing or publishing on you tube, I build for my own enjoyment, so who cares?
Cheers All.
An Airfix factory tour briefly talks about silicon release agents and how they don't use them but you should always wash kits (I think - can't be bothered rewatching all of it).
I will continue to wash and will prime if required.
These paints were Citadel / Warhammer brush paints and also Vallejo airbrush paints. Hopefully priming will solve the problem.
Everyone raves about the quality of the Lightning kit but I am not that impressed by the moulding:
Soft plastic, ejection plugs and flash.
Everyone raves about the quality of the Lightning kit but I am not that impressed by the moulding:
Soft plastic, ejection plugs and flash.
Fuselage doesn't close up either without shaving a bit off the insides.
These paints were Citadel
oh, right. I’ve had issues with citadel paints on styrene before. They’re not great IMO
I'll never build one but this certainly looks impressive:
Gannets are cool. I'd love a 1/48 but a) It would be out of scale with everything else that I have and b) It would be chuffing massive.
With a bit of luck they'll cover the development of the new Gannet in the Hornby TV show. With this being a weekly 50 minute long advert I suspect that they will. With even more luck they'll down scale it to 1/72.
I did a Revell 1/72 one a few years back and messed it up. I've got a Sword AEW version (like the regular ASW but even uglier) that I'll hopefully do a better job of.
The Gannet was a big bird !
Some remarkable footage of the Ark Royal from the 1970s.
Anyone going to Bolton Show tomorrow? I have £50 and a shopping list!
With even more luck they’ll down scale it to 1/72.
Fingers crossed for this!
(unless its another example of coldwar stencil hell like the Ph*cking Phantom I have on the go currently!)
Question:
I am struggling with painting the Lightning as the paint is not sticking to the plastic. What causes this ?I have washed & rinsed the mouldings twice with washing up liquid (Ecovert).
A quick spritz with isopropanol and wipe over with a microfibre lens cloth might work better than a liquid soap. It’s a pretty benign solvent and shouldn’t damage plastics, although trying first on a scrap sprue might be advisable. I’ve always got some around in a little pump spray bottle, ever since lockdown, and I use it all the time at work for cleaning car bodywork before applying decals. Liquid petrol lighter fuel is very good for that sort of thing as well - back when I used to do artwork for print any sheet of CS10 board was given a wipe over before using a Rapidograph, to clean of any grease from fingers, it’s also very benign.
This popped up earlier on my Flipboard feed, and I thought a few here might be interested…
https://www.historynet.com/canberra-model/
Tamiya 1:35 Achilles tank on my table at the moment. Makes a change from live steam. Might pop into Bolton today..
That Royal Navy film is fantastic, so many acronyms 😉
I’m at Bolton today as well
Hmmm... A lot of that stuff has been there before. Don't think I'll bother next time.
However, this guy was selling some nice stuff so I bought a painting stand.
https://www.ebmahobby.co.uk/index.php?route=common/home
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Your output is prodigous HTS!
Well the Airfix Phantom is phinally phinished. Bit of an arse to be honest - partly my fault for getting carried away with aftermarket - posher seats turned into a complete resin cockpit, then once I'd spotted the missing vents and grills around the air intakes I couldn't unspot them, so there ended up being resin splitters and photoetch bleed air grills. But the kit just felt a bit overcomplicated and as a result a lot of the bits didn't fair into each other all that well. Panel lines are a bit intrusive too (not helped by me overegging it with the Flory wash a little).
And the decals. Js F**g C****t, the decals. I think it was 3 weeks worth of solid decals. And they didn't play ball. None of the bigger ones had any interest in conforming to the surface, despite all kinds of lotions and potions, and anything with yellow on it was basically just not happening. Each yellow line on the bombs was about an hour each, and I ended up painting the red and yellow on the Sidewinders as the decals just sat there like planks.
Glad its done. Don't want to do another one!
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...and hanging with the boys...
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Good god! Those models, and the photos of them, are INCREDIBLE! you sunny sound happy JE, you should be very very proud!
Came here to thank Jon for those pics. Those models are beautifully done, the weathering on that Phantom is very subtle given the contrast in tone with the upper and lower fuselage - that's no easy feat. The Lightning F6 is a chef's kiss.
Worth all the agro Jon, phantastic! 👍
Good looking Phantom, but it underlines the fact that I really, really don't want the Airfix one.
Give me the Italeri/Fujimi any day and some resin exhausts.
A quick question for those of you using respirators while airbrushing - what are you using?
I recently switched from acrylics to lacquers and the fumes ain't good. Currently using Scott Profile 2 but I was priming with Mr surfacer earlier today and the respirator didn't feel like it was doing much.
Shit. The. Bed! JE, that Phantom is an epic build, you’ve got far more patience than I’ll ever have, going to that level of detail, I genuflect in your general direction. Love the Bucc and the Lightning as well. Congratulations sir. 🎩🫶🏻
Started this a little while after @JonEdwards finished his lovely version, so sorry; it's another 'Toom. Echo Jon's thoughts about the model, it's a curates egg of a thing, bits are well thought through engineering-wise, but it's let down by trench a-like panel lines, and a cockpit canopy that basically doesn't really fit. I'm too cheap to by aftermarket stuff for Airfix, so canopy closed. Scheme is he low-vis the RAF started using in the late 70's/early 80's, 29 sqn, the colours are a bit off, but they were painted with such a verity of schemes it's really hard to tell what's "accurate" anyway. I'm not sure the millions of decals add much to the whole in 1/72 scale, and I'm half thinking of toning down some of the white ones on the wings, they're just too bright for this scale. Anyway, glad it's finished really.
Oh, dunno what happened there, I thought there was an underside shot. so you get another post, sorry about that!
Loaded for Bear:
here, have another one from the other side, seeing as I took them!
Looking good!
Goy another Italeri/Fujimi one in the stash. Don't know whether to go low-vis grey or camo.
I've got an Itareli Jaguar next, that'll be gey/green wraparound I reckon,
nickc
Full Member
I’ve got an Itareli Jaguar next, that’ll be gey/green wraparound I reckon,
1/72? I did one in Desert Pink ages ago. It goes together reasonably well, but dry fit the wing and perhaps shim it up a bit. I didn't and probably should have done.
Cheers, yep done a dry fit and there does seems to be “some work” needed!
I've got a soft spot for Italeri. I've probably built more from them than anyone else. You certainly get thrown the odd "curve ball" by them.
Doing a Rafale M at the moment and have identified a few Italerisms from "walkaround" photos on Britmodeller, so I should catch them before it is too late.
Nice Nick. You must have got a shuffle on if you only started after I'd finished mine. I think it took me a month to do the decals! Kind of agree that the white stencils on the upper side are a bit bright, but the paintwork looks lovely - variation without being overdone.
Got some Jets down for a dust.
Nice collection, are they all the same scale? If so it's mad how small the Harrier is.
Yep. All 1/72.
The two Sukhois, the F-14, F-15 and the Sea Vixen are massive, and the SR71 is probably 50% longer than a Lancaster.
I saw the opposite - the Harriers are tiny!
Shonky picture, but the Harrier is still pretty big when you compare it to a Spitfire.
SR71 is probably 50% longer than a Lancaster.
We were at Duxford over Easter. The SR-71 is a truly massive aeroplane (at least in length). The F-111 next to it ws also a big old beast (anyone know a good kit I might be tempted when I've cut the kit backlog a bit).
They had a 1:72 SR-71 kit in the shop. Box was nearly as big as a Vulcan (kit).
Anyone building anything at the moment?
I've had an Italeri Rafale M on the go since February, but have barely touched it recently because being a grown up keeps getting in the way. Hoping for some shocking weather on Sunday so that I can get some work done on it.