Hi there. This kit I have to say was a nightmare, huge amounts of filling and sanding horriable fits, but nice plastic to work with. This build was a learning process for me as I am not all that good with my airbrush yet, and have in the past had troubles with masking. I use Tamiya acrylics and had problems with paint comming up with the mask in sheets. So on this build I went to the locasl hardware store and picked up some Krylon primer and primed the Spitfire, and buffed off the dust that the primer left. Then I airbrushed the base color, ( not sure its the right color but was close enough for what I wanted to do) and let that cure over night. Next I airbrushed a light coat of future and let that cure over night, next came a heavy coat of future brushed on this time, I get runs with the airbrush, and let that cure over night again. In the mean time I scanned the camo from the instruction sheet, blew it up to the right size and printed it out. Next I used that as a guide to cut the masking from regular 2 inch 3M masking tape stuck to glass. That I applied to the model gently without burnishing the edges too much and misted on 3 light coats of Euro Green paint, and let that cure over night. Took the masking off with no troubles and no lifting then shot another light coat of future for the decals and a bit of wash. The wash was a bit on the light side and didnt do too much for the look of the model. Final clear coat was Model Master flat. I thought I would share this with all of you in hopes of getting some feedback, seems a lot of work to me.
An Idea kit? I haven’t seen any of those since the late 80’s. Most were knock-offs of other manufacturers’ kits. From what I can see it looks like you got it together ok.
You are correct in thinking that the base colour is off, it should be Ocean Grey, but as they say, it’s your model and it looks good from where I’m sitting. [:)]
I don’t think you needed the Future coats between the camouflage color coats, just before decalling is all I do. I think it looks pretty good. To get a little softer break betwwen colors, I put about a 1/32 strip of tape upside down under the masking tape on all the edges, or just use the paper and cut holes in it in places which I put tape over to hold it in place while spraying the next color.
one tip though…instead of loading on the paint by first spraying the krylon, try using a product from house of kolor, it is a plastic primer for adhesion, used mainly for r/c car bodies. I used to get the problem ofthe tapepulling off my paint, until I tried this product. Also, ‘kill’ the tape a bit on your clothes before using…it will cut down on the sticky-ness of thetape…
Thanks for all the kind words and advise guys. I do take advise to heart because it does seem to me that I did some extra painting that didnt really need to be done. But it was a good exercise for my airbrushing skills ( which do need help by the way), and masking.
Justinryan215 Krylon makes a plastic primer which is what I used got it at Ace Hardware. I dont really think an auto primer would work very well. I have used House of Kolor paints and really liked them, in fact I hear they came out with military colors now too. I know it doesnt sound like much but they are a bit too pricey for me these days as I am on a very limited income.
