Hi everyone, and let me give particular thanks to Swanny and Pixilater. You two have modeling skills that simply astonish me, I can only hope to match your skills some day. Below is a current trio on which I am working, all in 1/48 scale. The P-51B is Accurate Miniatures; the P-51D is Tamiya, same one as on Swanny’s site; the F4U-4 is Hasegawa.
First off, I plan to do the P-51D in NMF, it will wear the markings of George Preddy’s final Mustang, “Cripes A’ Mighty III”. I am going to use Alclad II metalizing lacquers, and I have read, re-read, and re-read several more times Swanny’s excellent tutorial on using Alclad II.
I understand that the surface has to be flawless before the black lacquer primer goes down. My concern is some of the Squadron white putty that I’ve used for filling a few small gaps. This stuff seems to soak up paint, every time I’ve painted over it I have a white rough-looking patch where the putty is, it is thirsty for paint! How do I combat this?
And then yesterday, when painting my F4U Corsair, I dropped it, it fell and landed flat on the floor, right side up. The wing-to-fuselage joint came unglued, that was the only damage. So now I have to re-do a couple of joints and re-paint. I’m awaiting decals from Great Models Webstore, for the blue-nose Mustangs, as well as for the Olathe, KS Navy Reserve F4U, circa 1956.
This Corsair is not one of Hasegawa’s better fitting kits. I can’t wait to build a couple of Tamiya’s 1/48 F4U kits. I’ve heard nothing but rave reviews of them.
Sand sand sand to smooth the putty. But I no longer use squadron white. At Noreastcon IPMS Regionals I picked up this new acrylics putty from one of the vendors. Basical what it is is a water based acrylic glop, you brush it on and it wet sands real smooth. NEVER NEVER dry sand it though, because disaster will strike.
I have to agree with you on the Hasigawa F4U-4 not being the best fit around, I myself am working on that kit for the After the Battle Group Build and have had a few fit problems here and there, Mainly because I decided to lower the flaps, reposition all the control surfaces, fold the wings, and open an engine panel.
As to your Mustang filler problem, I have absoutly know clue how to help, I can offer some advice on another way to fill those seems, I like to use Apoxy putty for all of my seems, blends well and can be smoothed out very nicely, plus it wont eat up the paint, try it.
MA Cooke, you need to seal the putty first with a lacquer primer. The gloss black is not a primer. That’s why your putty keeps showing through. It’s just like painting a car. Spray a few light coats of primer, wait for it to dry and then sand it to 1000 grit smooth. Then you apply the gloss black lacquer. Can’t wait to see these bad boys finished. You have gotten rid of the mallet, right?[;)][(-D]
No, mallet is still there; I’ve gotten my meds dosage adjusted! [(-D] And the Krylon Gloss Black is a lacquer paint. (Besides, it says so on Swanny’s site, so nyeh-nyehhhhh…)
I think what I’ll try is simply spot priming the putty areas first, then sanding that down until baby-butt smooth.
Hey Bert, I still have the AMT American LaFrance pumper if you’re interested. Let me know.
Hey Mitch.
You sorta missed my point about the gloss black. I know it’s lacquer but I said it wasn’t a primer. Puttied areas need a primer to hide the difference in texture between the putty and the plastic. Primers have much more solids in them than glosses do so they cover these areas a lot better.
I’ll email you about the other topic so that the powers that be won’t try to use the virtual rod on us for using this as a trading forum.
I was going to scratch-build high-side compartments on both sides, a roof-mounted 3-hose cannon; “attack lines” (1-3/4") where booster reels used to be; I was going to collect old, dirty white shoe strings and lay in the hose bed for hose; old umbrella fabric makes a great hose bed tarp; Scott-pacs, Halligan tools, TFT nozzles, I could spend 200 hours on that [censored] !
