Was at Nordicon yesterday. One of the things that bothers me is heavily weathered aircraft that have super shiny, heavily futured canopies! Especially before and during WW2, the plexiglas was not UV resistant, and the canopies on those old planes fogged and scratched pretty quickly. Seems to me a heavily weathered aircraft would not likely have a pristine canopy.
Good point. But to be fair they also spent a lot of time polishing them between flights
Brand new: 
Now: 
Interesting point.
I think it depends a lot on the history / scene portrayed. If the aircraft is just back from lots of action, then yeah: grime and gunpowder all over the canopy. But early morning before the mission, the canopy should be pretty clean. That’s pretty standard pre-flight checklist stuff.
Clean is one thing. Super transparent is something else. Getting bugs and dirt off is easy. Getting scratches off is so-so, depending on how deep the scratches are. Getting UV hazing out is almost impossible- it goes really deep. Only real solution is periodic replacement.
The new composite canopies are something else.
I would say the shine is not too bad but yes, slightly overdone. What is needed is scale “spider webs” to represent the thousands of tiny scratches that diffuses the shine. Is this possible though? Maybe by rubbing a dry t-shirt in circles? No idea, to be honest. Good point though Don.
Plexiglas can be restored by using a polishing compound (such as toothpaste). I have restored weathered hatches on boats this way.
Just like scale color,I guess there is also scale shine.the answer might be simple,just don’t dip them in future
I’ve tried many compounds on my boat’s plexiglass and lexan windows with limited success. What in particular do you use?
Colgate, no mint, no gels. Baking powder can also be used.
I’ve used toothpaste, jeweler’s rouge, and plexiglas cleaner made for aircraft windshields and canopies on my Ercoupe (1:1 scale). While most of those cleaned it up to be useable, none made it look like brand new.
Interesting point.
You had an Ercoupe? Cool!
Thanks, guys I was getting nowhere with automotive headlight polish.
Agreed wholeheartedly. Besides the fact that Future’s new formula is horrible, Its just not realistic. Try Novis plastic polish which gets them to look “clean”.
Joe