First model here, fourth to be built and first model aircraft. I was going to have my next model be the Das Werk/Takom Panther G but seeing as my new riveting tool is coming in today, now would probably be a good time to start!
As for what’s included. I think I want to go with 204 Fighter group, Rabaul. I really like the camo scheme and I think it’ll make for a good challenge and look cool with the sort of white-ish tan base color.
From what limited bits I’ve read, aren’t Zeroes with a white ring around the Hinomaru on the fuselage a sign of a Nakajima built aircraft? Were most Hamps Mitsubishi aircraft? Was this specific Hamp a Nakajima or Mitsubishi built aircraft?
I do like the little figures but I am not at all ready to paint figures yet! I do think they could be useful for a diorama build since I like the poses.
First bits assembled and off to be rinsed in water to clean before painting. So far everything is nice but now that I’m part of a forum I can be a super detail fanatic and say that I am a little bummed about the lack of any real raised detail for the instrument panel. Oh well.
Small edit addition: I do have most of the paints from AK for Japanese naval aircraft since I heard they were made with assistance from some people who absolutely knew a thing or two about Japanese aircraft colors. Seemed way easier than praying that I had the right colors to mix.
Now as far as questions.. Does anyone know if the mask set for the other Tamiya A6m3 that’s included with it will fit well with this A6m3 without any need for modification?
How does one make a simple mask for the hinomarus? I have masking tape but it doesn’t seem to be wide enough to make hinomaru masks, at least not with just one strip.
Lastly, any good diagrams for rivet lines for zeroes? I do want to attempt riveting this kit since it’s cheap and I bought a galaxy riveter for the task.
I’m afraid I can’t answer your question but there’s a fella by the name of Carlos aka @stikpusher that might be able to help you out with the questions about the white bands, masking sets and rivet line diagrams.
You chose a good kit because these old Tammy Zeros are hard to beat.
Thanks for the vote of confidence Joe. Although I can only answer some of the questions here. All A6M3s were built by Mitsubishi according to what I have read, and yes the white ring around the Hinomarus is usually indicative of a Nakajima built aircraft, from the factory. But as these were all built in overall gray, and this one had received a field applied upper surfaces green camouflage scheme, the white outline on the fuselage Hinomaru was likely also field applied. If you look at this photo of the actual aircraft, you can see the the wing Hinomarus lack the white outline
I can’t help you with rivet line drawings, as that is something I do not partake in. But you could likely turn them up with a Google search.
Lastly, here is the Scalemates entry for this kit, along with all associated aftermarket products… yes there are several mask sets available for this kit. Just scroll down the page to see the masks.
Really wishing i painted the cockpit in sub assemblies but we learn. Trying a pre shading technique, but I’m sure it’s a little obvious that the white was sputtering quite a bit.
Currently running with a cheapo vivihome (i think it’s just a fengda copy) i got with a decent compressor. Maybe I’m not cleaning it enough or something but I usually run around 18 psi with a 1/1 mix of tamiya paint to thinner and it seemed to work okay, well except now. With the whites it’s really funky but I think it’s down to a bent airbrush needle? Maybe I didn’t clean it properly? Or maybe it’s just improperly thinned paint, but i do sometimes see semi-thick sputters come out. (Though when I properly stopped spraying with no paint coming out, IE air but no paint then stop, the problem of larger speckles stopped but it still is sputtery.)
I don’t want to blame bad airbrush just yet because I’m sure I effed something up with it. Thankfully all this paint is going to be covered up mostly in the end and sputtering will only add to the random effect for now.
So how would I go about diagnosing this issue? Seemed to work fine when I first got it with German grey and the same 1/1 paint mix but maybe down the line with improper cleaning or not putting something together just right or SOMETHING I messed it up.
Would love to hear suggestions!
As for my previous questions, I’m not looking for an aftermarket mask set. I have the other Tamiya A6M3 kit I am excited to make one day and I know it has a mask set you have to cut out so I’m curious if anyone knows if the mask set for that A6m3 works for the older one I have!
And, was the white around the hinomaru field applied or just leftover amber grey from when they (presumably) masked the hinomaru to paint the field applied camo? It looks too bright to be the amber grey but at the same time I wouldn’t know why they painted a white ring around it.
edit: Oh yeah those photos are not kind to my sputtering issues LOL
And some more painting, this time the interior green color. I’m not quite sure on the color. Maybe it’s the lighting or something but it doesn’t seem to match any of the Mitsubishi cockpit colors offered on Aviation of Japan.
(At least, none that immediately pop out to me)
The paint (ak real colors) did airbrush well, despite me being very poor at it! Maybe I’m just having mixing issues with tamiya white or maybe there’s something else to it. I did preshade the cockpit but I unfortunately don’t have any photos.
I’m not entirely sure about the result of painting, both color and my own skill. It looks fine, but I’m just not entirely sure about it. Maybe it needs another layer or maybe I need different lighting.
Either way soon to come is detail painting the little bits and bobs, a clear coat, decals, clear coat over decals, weathering/chipping then finally a matte varnish. Seems like a lot of clear coats and truthfully I’m not entirely sure how many I really actually need, but if it’s what it takes then it’s what it takes.
All in all it isn’t the best work but good enough I guess. Eventually I’ll git gud.
Edit: Ooh new question for you all. With zeroes, was the very top section of the flight stick painted the same color as the interior or no?
There has been work done but I haven’t gotten any photos. Royally effed up the radio decal trying to get that thing into place, really should’ve either cut the gauge section from the radio or i should’ve just done better.
Kinda sucks there isn’t anything that I can definitely paint different colors. Like all the little red knobs inside the cockpit aren’t molded really so there just isn’t anything to paint aside from making the thing the radio decal sits on a darker shade of green since that’s what I’ve seen on interior photos.
Also might’ve put the gauge cluster a bit too high but oh well. Still looks alright for a little 1/48th scale cockpit and I only can improve from here (hopefully)
As of now i applied mark set and am probably going to wait tomorrow to look at the decals and decide if they need another round of mark set before clear coating.
Guess that means I’ll have plenty of time to figure out how I’m going to get vallejo air paints to work nicely while that all dries. Yippie…
And I’ll have to mask off the tracks and running gear too, plus I’m worried masking tape will stick too hard on the tracks or something.
I’ll clear coat later, some other time. Tried vallejo paint on my other model and immediately tip dry, so that’ll be fun to clean.
Maybe I’ll just try an exorbitant amount of flow improver (aka replacing thinner with flow improver entirely) and see if that helps it not immediately tip dry.
So, once I clean my airbrush I’ll put on a clear coat then try vallejo paint again. It’s all I have for dunkelgelb and I’ll have to paint with pure acrylics anyway so might as well throw myself against the wall and see what sticks. Thankfully I can just practice on the bottom part of the model until it decides to behave.
But enough of my insane ramblings from a newbie, here are some progress photos.
Not too much done since my free time has been mostly spent playing games with friends or alone, but hopefully this slower pace of modeling will keep me interested in the hobby and not get me burnt out.
Tried both sponge chipping and doing it by hand. I do like sponge chipping because it’s easy but the one sponge I had kind of sucked for chipping so I’ll have to find a different one. I need to be more careful with my hand chipping but it’s a start.
Edit: I didn’t realize the weird bits sticking out the side of the main instrument panels were supposed to be the back of the machine guns until I saw someone else’s post on making an a6m.
I also feel like something is off with the photos. I swear the green isn’t as radioactively bright in person as it appears.
I’ll have to add more hand painting since I didn’t do enough I don’t think.
I highly doubt the masks from the recent Tamiya A6M3 will fit this kit. They are totally different molds with about a 50 year model-making technology gap between them.
So, painted a few more things and before I seal everything with a matte coat and finally get to move on to more assembly, I’ll have to do some more painting and research on what color the space just behind the cockpit under the canopy was. For whatever reason the engine cowling color/anti glare black comes to mind but I’m not entirely sure.
Did a little oil wash and while the effect isn’t very noticeable on the cockpit itself, maybe should’ve been a little more daring, the fuselage parts I do actually like.
1: Get a proper fine tip brush and find out how to properly clean and maintain it. I feel like the brushes I have aren’t fine/thin enough for delicate scratches at this scale and I also think I may be a bit rough on cleaning which makes it more of a broader brush.
2: Do hairspray chipping on the cockpit.
Probably would look better. I’d do it on the fuselage but I fear with preshading and all the layers I want to add that there will just be too much paint over it.
3: Be more careful with decals and placement
Overall since I think I’m pretty much done with the cockpit, for my first go around it’s not too bad. Certainly a good start.
Looking good. For fine brushes I like sable - like Windsor & Newton series 7. The 000 is very nice. I clean by swooshing in lacquer thinner and gently drying - finish with a (sounds terrible but works) a little s pit between the thumb and index and twirl. Some folks use B&J brush cleaner type stuff but I’ve been using this technique with these (expensive) brushes for years and they last if you take care of them.
Unrelated question, one that might be better suited to the britmodeller website, but I’m going on a vacation to the UK and will be in London and primarily in Portsmouth. Any good hobby shops in those areas to visit?
The Hannants London model shop is in Colindale in north London which is on the Northern underground Line. The Colindale station is now OPEN again!
Colindale opening times
Closed Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
Thursdays 11.00AM to 6.00PM
Fridays 11.00AM to 6.00PM
Saturdays 9.30AM to 5.00PM
Sundays 11.00AM to 4.00PM
Unit 2, Hurricane Trading Estate
Grahame Park Way, Colindale,
London, NW9 5QW
Phone 020 8205 6697
Email colindale@hannants.co.uk
Just put on a semigloss since getting a matte base clear ratio seems like a royal PITA and it’s looking great so far. A lot less shine might’ve been just what it needed.
I’ll post some more pictures later but through my eyes and how I’m seeing it through the lighting I am quite pleased.
A pretty solid update today with some good news for the A6M3 and some bad for my wallet/other project.
So first with the bad.
I can’t get Vallejo Air to work.
Which means I probably won’t be able to get my hataka red line paints to work for me either. So I might have to shelf my hetzer until I get Tamiya XF88 and I might have to get the hataka lacquer set for ija tanks. I don’t have a spray booth set up, working in my room with ppe, a fan and an open window, but hopefully I can get a decent airbrushing booth somewhere soon before I go all in on tamiya acrylics and lacquers. They just spray SO much better for a novice like me out of my cheapo airbrush.
Now for the good!
Got the fuselage all in place and the cockpit on!
I think I did fine for sanding, the tamiya nato black (My favorite black) I use for base coats will pick up imperfections. Obviously there’s a decent gap I’ll have to fill on the thing behind the cockpit chair but as the proper procrastinator I am, I’ll do it later.
I also might have to do panel lines which won’t be fun. Never done it before and it doesn’t really look easy, especially since a lot of the fuselage panel lines are not recessed so it’ll probably be harder to have a proper idea on where they go.
But the cockpit looks great! I love how it looks in there. Obviously a nicer kit with a more detailed cockpit would be absolutely stunning but even this looks pretty good to me! I think the shadows really help.
With my hetzer on the shelf until I get the tamiya xf88 maybe I should start on that Type 97?
There are some good videos on YouTube to help with the panel line process. The one bit of advice that I found most helpful is to lay down a piece of tape along where the panel line will go. This acts as a guide for your scribing tool so your lines are straight. Then take it slow and don’t press on the tool when scribing the lines. Many shallow passes are much better than one deep pass.
Sorry to hear you’re experiencing problems with Vallejo paints. I’ve been using them for awhile and generally don’t have too many issues by using an airbrush dedicated to arcrylics only , using the Vallejo thinner
and using their cleaner after every use. I have ran into the dreaded airbrush tip dry recently with their IJN Ash Grey. I had to stop thoroughly clean the tip add more thinner and kept a brush handy to clear it occasionally but overall it did spray well.
Oh masking canopies.. How actually not too bad it was!
Sure it isn’t perfect but honestly I was expecting it to be WAY worse. It probably won’t look good considering it isn’t perfect (far from it) and there’s going to be a lot of cut marks from where I cut the masking tape (and messed up)
I have done other things. Mainly cleaning up parts and taking things off the sprue. Honestly a lot of it is procrastinating painting the small parts (IE landing gear) and waiting for mr surfacer and some x-acto knife saw blade things for rescribing panel lines.
I figure even with the not perfect canopy mask, any over spray I can get rid of with a toothpick and a little bit of patience.
Sidenote, I know with some gap fillers you can get rid of the excess with a cotton bud and some thinner/water, but how to you clean the excess off the cotton bud? Or do you just.. Keep going?
Do you dip it in the thinner? Rub it on a paper towel? Get a new cotton bud?
Maybe I’m just using too much putty, I can’t really figure out how to get it in anywhere.
Last bit, I’ll have to look at more photos because I’m not ENTIRELY certain if the back part is supposed to be masked off or not
or if that middle part is supposed to or not
That’s a great job. I believe that’s correct for the rear section too. I would recommend changing the Qtip as needed.
Have you tried an acrylic gloss for the glass panels?
This is looking really nice. Yes, you will need multiple cotton swabs. Get the ones that have triangular heads, much tighter and better for modelling needs. If you want to do your own masks, you can get thise tamiya/kabuki tapes in very wide widths. You can even get sheets.
Glass panels like the glass over an instrument panel? I did get some clear UV resin since that seemed like a good idea.
I probably will look into getting some triangular swabs for tighter areas. So far the basic amazon swabs have been doing good but it’s never bad to have tools.
And sorry for no real updates. Still waiting on a package to start on panel lines.
