Hey gang,
I need to add the wing tip beacons to my 1/32 hellcat. Anyone have any ideas for doing this or know of an AM kit that might have them?
Thanks,
Fred
There is after market clear, red, green, and amber plastic from which navagation and beacon lights can be made. If clear lenses are made as parts of the kit then Tamia paint makes clear (translucent) red, green, and amber (yellow) that can be used to tint the clear lenses. If the lenses are not provided then the molded part of the wing, fuselage, etc., can be cut away and replacement lenses can be made (carved/shaped) from clear sprue, and tinted as mentioned before. Lastly the kit lense molded to the wing or fuselage can be painted silver and then tinted with clear red, green, amber, or clear. For clear lenses white glue or epoxy can also be used to form a lens and then, you guessed it, tint it. These are a couple of ways to accomplish navigation lights.
One thing that I’ve done it the past is to cut a notch or use a dremel to make a dent where the light goes. Then I paint it bright silver. After the silver dires completely, I use epoxy to fill in and form the light. WHen that is dry I paint it with whatever clear color I need. When done usually the light will pass through the paint and epoxy and reflect back out.
I do a similar thing but instead of silver I fill it in with the colour 'cause often the lense is clear with a colour bulb. I bought a sheet of around 1/4" clear acylic plastic for nav lights that were too big for a piece of sprue, I chop a piece off around the right size, cut the light out of the wing if need be, drill the hole, add colour or whatnot then crazy glue the clear plastic in place and hopefully the glue’s strong enough to survive me carving and filing it the rest of the way down to be flush with the wing. (using progressivly finer sandpaper, a rubbing compound and a coat of future to finish if off)
Which system you might want to use depends on the type of light on that particular aircraft.
You could use clear plastic. Dip it in future that has been tinted with food color, and let it dry. Or… You could do like me and actually light the wingtips with fiber optics and a grain of wheat bulb…
Thanks for all the ideas, guys.
The hellcat has corner lights, where the entire front corner of each wing is a giant lense. The kit has a panel line where they would be. I cut out the area on one wing in hopes of replacing the plastic with clear plastic only to find out I don’t have anything that would quite fit. From the clear sprue that I have, nothing seems to have the right dimensions - it’s all too narrow and shallow. I’d have to make a lense from multiple pieces and it would look like junk.
I may just end up ordering some clear plastic from someplace online as the only place by me (michael’s) never has anything.
-Fred
Check the yellow pages for plastic or plexiglass suppliers in your area. The glass shop I worked at years ago carried plexiglass, as well as home improvement centers.
Did someone mention re-cycling toothbrush handles in translucent red or green? Ought to be thick enough for 1/32. The plexiglass/acrylic shop near me (Tap Plastics) has a $1/pound scrap bin with odd shaped pieces as thick as you need. Since you need under an ounce…