After reading some of the info discussed regarding weathering, I have to ask. How do you guys best prefer to build and finish your aircraft?
factory to hardedend veteran
Mike
Mike
I do both. There is nothing wrong with a factory fresh paint job. In WWII they all had one at one time. Just remember, don’t put 10 kill markings on a shiny new airplane. Modern jets get re-painted every year or two.
I like to do a wash , especially to pop out the detail on tail edge flaps and other heavily dirtied areas like wheel wells and undersides.
I also use a slight amount of pastels and even a graphite pencil in some areas.
FSM magazine has had several excellent articles in recent past, check them out. Also check out the rest of this forum.
I stick mostly to factory fresh - weathering being an advanced skill i dont posess !
i have tried with exhaust soot on a Lancaster (mainly down to good reference) and judging by some WW II pics i’ve seen ‘weathering’ is by far a too moderate term ! still there was a war on…i’m still brush painting and feel weathering suits airbrushed models better (good excuse)
- happy VE day to you -
I like using a home-brewed wash. Fotuneatly for me, the paint I made the was from was old Ral-Partha brand, and is very gritty! Because of this, the lines of wash it creates are LITERALLY never even in color/darkness, which gives a much more realistic appearance than the solid black line left by regular washes, in my opinion. As for WWII planes, dry brush some silver paint here and there to make it look like paint has chipped off. Other than that, I think much more would be overkill!
ive havent tried weathering yet as im still a rookie, but i CANT WAIT to try on my next model!!! I better make it a cheap practice plane…
Guys, with 27 years working on the real thing, let me elucidate for you (ooer!)
If a military aircraft doesn’t leak, it’s empty, and they’re never empty! We had brand new Tornado aircraft flown out to Germany in the eighties, they’d only had test flights, something like five flying hours on them, & they were dirty! And paint was flaking off. Okay, they weren’t very dirty, but enough to show, especialy on the tail, from the reverse thrust exhaust. In WW2, a brand new aircraft to the squadron would have been flown from the factory, to an M.U. for radio fit/mods etc, test flown, then a delivery flight. So maybe a bit of exhaust staining would be okay. helicopters can get particularly dirty, especially operating out in the field.
You don’t need an airbrush, I used one years ago, didn’t get on with it, & have been brushpainting for years, just thin the paint before applying, the secret is, you need it thick enough to hide the colour of the primer, but not the detail. If you put on too much, Micromesh it, this tin’s & will make it smoother. For
weathering, see the techniques section for hints on drybrushing, it’s easy, it’s also easy to overdo it, practice on an old one first, look at photo’s of the real thing, see where they leak/stain etc.
It’s a funny thing, but a factory fresh model looks like a factory fresh model, but well done dirt can make it look a million dollars!
I went up and shot some pics of a new T6 at the local airport. They are currently offering plane rides in it so they have this thing looking mint. (I’m going to post them on Ron’s gallery website soon) They taxi’d it up to the hangar and pushed it in to store it for the night. First thing they did was kick a big flat catch pan underneath to catch dripping oil and they took the time to wipe down the oil trails comming out of the cowling and from underneath. When I asked about it, the first thing all the older guys standing around admiring this bird and reminicing said was “That ain’t nothing, you should have seen (insert a cornucopia of planes here)…”
Mike
I concur with albertsponson, aircraft are dirt magnets! I don’t recall seeing any models with dirty ejection seat cushions! At one time they all said “No Step”, but pilot sweat, maintenance guys climbing in and out and sun fade takes its toll on the cleanliness. Sometimes on other areas of the aircraft, you couldn’t read “No Step” for all the footprints! Though I remember my first trip to Red Flag at Nellis AFB in '86 I actually saw an AF maintenance guy lying underneath an F-16 with a spray can and rag…er, cloth and wiping the belly(A sight not seen at that time in Marine Aviation. If our birds got dirty, it went to the wash rack, usually on a rotating schedule.)I thought, “Geez, who’d he******off!” I also got a tip from another guy when I commented on the cleanliness of the wheels on his F-15. He said they use a solution of water and Dawn dish soap!