I suddenly find myself in the position of having to review a number of Eduard kits. (I say “having to” because building on someone else’s deadline, rather than at my usual slooowww, leisurely pace, is not terribly relaxing.)
Overall I find these kits to be quite consistently good in quality, accuracy and detail, though there are some recurring problems. At least Eduard’s finally discovered those little things we’ve all been familiar with ever since we were ignoring when we were little baby modellers: alignment pins.
Anyway, I have a stack of the first of their reissues under the tag “Limited Edition,” a claim that may or, may no,t be limited to the thousand kits claimed. We’ve all seen this claim before, and the kits always seem to be limited to the number that can be sold. Nevertheless, these are nice kits, every one (though any time you see the words “Limited Edition,” you can automatically assume an artificial increase in price over the original kit), starting with their Bf-108 in a half-dozen foreign insignia, including Japan. The biplanes are just downright beautiful. The color schemes are dazzling as are the decal sheets and the slick-paper color painting and markings guides. The PE frets are delicate and the occasional resin parts precise.
To the question: Every one of the paint callouts is in numbers for Gunze Aqueous or Mr. Color. I have no easy access to either of these, and really have no experience using them if I did have a LHS that carried them. To make it worse, on the main color list on the instruction sheets, the Gunze numbers are followed by such helpful information as the single word “gray” or worse, the word “green” used to describe three different numbers. What shades of gray and green?
Does anyone make a cross-reference for these paints, like the wonderful Stockholm IPMS cross-reference I use for Humbrol number callouts?
Many thanks,
TOM
Try this site it should have what you need.
http://www.airmodel.sk/english/topcolor.html
Duhhh. Yup, if I had a lick of sense I would have known to go back to the source and check there before taking up Forum space. Thanks MK, for answering.
And for restraining yourself from ending your reply with “you idiot.”
TOM
MKhoot,thanks for the link,but for some reason it’s not working on my computer at the moment.But to take Sharkskin’s question a little further,does anyone know of a U.S.supplier that regularly stocks Gunze and Mr.Color items? I read this gentleman’s techniques on weathering and he uses the above mentioned paints almost exclusively.I might add he does some incredible work,that I would like to replicate using his techniques.Here is a link to a couple of his sites if anyone is interested:
www.greatmodels.com has them… at least I think they have them. I think this site is uesful too, at least for German colors
http://www.jpsmodell.de/main_e.htm
Thanks for the info Sphealey,I will give Great Models a call monday and see just how much they usually carry at any givin time.Thanks again !
Later on…
When was the last time you visited IPMSStockholm sharkskin? They now have Gunze Sangyo Color Reference Charts as well as other major paint brands. Those guys are simply great.
Mr. Color is kinda hard to find in the US. Most shops that carry Gunze products carry the Mr. Hobby Aqueous. The color numbers are different (like 33 in Mr. Color is Flat Black, which is 12 in Mr. Hobby). Mr. Color uses a black backgound with white numbers, Mr. Hobby uses a white background with black numbers.
I’ve built too many Japanese kits to have the Gunze paint chart partially memorized. [:D] I’m such a geek.
Dan
Thanks for the info Jonas,but this info brings up another question…are Mr.Color and Mr.Hobby made by the same company? And are all these paints the same type? I appreciate your response,I may write your name down,just in case I have other questions.
Later on…
They are made by the same company (GSI-Creos), but they are nowhere near the same paint. The Mr. Hobby is an Aqueous Acrylic, meaning it’s water based,and the Mr. Color is a synthetic lacquer acrylic, meaning it’s lacquer based…
I haven’t worked with the Mr. Color stuff myself, but I’d imagine it’s like the spraycan Tamiya stuff.
Dan
Yup, as soon as MK jogged my feeble memory I went and printed out the Stockholm cross reference, just as I did their great Hubrol reference, and put it in my big fat general reference binder.
TOM
Thank you very much for the information Jonas,it is very useful.I checked out the Great Models web site and it looks like they carry just about every color I would need. I might add that it just so happens that I was digging in my back issues of FSM and found in the October 2001 issue that it has a cross reference for FS number colors for Gunze,Humbrol ,Polly Scale,Tamiya,Testors enamel,Testors Acryl,and also Xtracolor. I’m glad I found it because I think I am going to try to convert from enamel to acrylic.
Later on…