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Everything posted by wm cheng
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In these photos you can see the clear (milky clear) bits are filled with the crazy glue / baking soda mixture. I added a lot more excess than I needed so I could file away the extra crazy glue. I don't believe I could of used my traditional ways of filling here (although I haven't used epoxy putty yet) since these flaws are too large for Mr. Surfacer, and the resin in these tight cavities would not provide enough tooth for the regular Tamiya putty to adhere too. The regular Tamiya putty actually includes solvents in the mixture to slight melt the surrounding plastic to create a better bond too, the resin won't react this way, so the regular putty could just pop off and would not provide any strength for the delicate intermediary struts. As you can see the openings themselves are quite rough, I'd need to use my flat files for the sides and my round file for the tops and bottoms later on. I will allow these crazy glue fills to cure now.
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OK, that baking soda mixed with crazy glue idea to fill in certain areas was a complete bust! - failure. I don't get it, I tried mixing a bit of baking soda with the crazy glue in a plastic bowl, and the baking soda caused the crazy glue to instantly solidify - all I got was clumpy lumpy bits of dried crazy glue. I tried all different consistancies, but I couldn't make it work in the end. However, the crazy glue (as mentioned by Valkyrie before) is really hard - which in this case works to my advantage - I need to majorly reinforce those intermediary struts in the 3-slot vents before I can properly file them down to proper shape - otherwise they'd just snap while I was sanding them. So I tried to fill them with crazy glue, but the bubbles where actually too big to just fill in with crazy glue only, so I decided to add some baking soda to the holes, tried to pre-pack them with the soda, then added the crazy glue to the outside. This seemed to work, plus the struts were strong now (hopefully able to withstand the sanding and shaping by the files)
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I would need to drill out these leg/engine ports to allow the legs feet tips of the Valkyrie to slip in.
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OK, 3 hours later and not much is happening - either this is a bad day... or this is where the "real" work begins... Starting on the actual resin booster kit itself - now I'm going over it with a fine tooth comb to visually inspect it for flaws and work to be done (intead of the blinded gee Wow! filled with glee that someone actually finally tackled one of my favourite subject mechs) and there are indeed some work to do (even though the Captn' did a fantastic job sculpting this baby, the casting leaves quite a bit of clean up work. My particular cast has bubbles which break every intermediary struct within the 3-slot vents (which makes them very weak). Secondly, there was a bubble on both tips of the forward booster where it mates to the top of the Valkyrie, which needs to be filled, shaped and re-contoured to match. Aside from various seam lines, the forward intake is going to be a bit of a surgical clean-up too, since the yellow resin is quite hard and brittle compared to the white stuff. Maybe I've been away from resin kits and have been spoiled by beautiful Platz white resin or Hasegawa styrene for too long, but all this work is a bit surprising.
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Hey everybody, I'm back for the whole day today... Hope to make some real progress... Yes I've sanded smooth the gear doors, but there are still panel seams between the doors and fuselage, I think its more important to make it look smooth and consistent first, then re-etch the panel lines if necessary, or even draw them in with a thin pencil to be sealed by a clear coat later. Thanks for the tip on the Mr. Base White, I'll look for it when I get to a hobby store next. I'll still try the baking soda and crazy glue thing, I think the baking soda makes the crazy glue less hard - just wanted to learn a new thing or two. If it doesn't work, I'll use my old Tamiya putty, and I'll still use Mr. Surfacer for the small bubble stuff. But when I post the pictures, you'll see my booster requires a little more re-construction than just seam filling.
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A close up showing the before and after of the sanding. You'll notice that there isn't much Mr. Surfacer left after sanding. It serves as a kind of marker to know how far I've sanded down to. I think I might paint a coat of Mr. Surfacer 1000 over the seams again to make sure - I hate to find out that I didn't sand long enough when I start painting - plus since this will be white plane, I intend to skip the priming stage on the Hasegawa kit (however I will prime the resin boosters). Anyone with any tips on filling resin part gaps with crazy glue and baking soda - I've been told that's the easiest way to go for minor bubbles and such, but I've never actually done it before. Any help or suggestions or links would be appreciated - do I add the baking soda to the crazy glue on the part, or pack the part with baking soda then add the crazy glue or do I mix up the mixture on a card somewhere to apply with a toothpick?? I'll experiment on the boosters and show pictures when I get to that stage - which is next...
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Didn't get much modelling in... argh... The comet is great, and you want a bit of abrasion to rough up the surface to give it some tooth for the paint to adhere to - sometimes the resin is just too smooth. I just used the regular orange tubed testors stuff (although I've been meaning to try some of the newer stuff like Tenax) but not the slow acting testors stuff, that's awful. I find the tubes stuff really strong and fills gaps really well. After the legs have been glued together - trying to get the rear gear doors properly aligned, I then painted some Mr. Surfacer 500 on all the seams to make them a little more uniformed and fill any little remaining holes.
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Great news, what about that comment about Ace Combat designs (I love any and all sleek aircraft designs!! ) I clicked on your link, but didn't get anything... Is Hasegawa branching out into other fictional aircrafts?! How about Yukikaze?
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The legs are now together, again I used tube cement for strength and I used enough so that it oozed out the seems so I can sand them down later. I also used the tape to keep the pieces together and the gear doors properly aligned. Now remember to glue in the forward gear doors (the piece with the blue/red light) it required a bit of additional sanding around the edges to fit into the leg properly.
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Make sure when you glue the legs together you don't miss this crutial piece (since its inclusion is only on the Super Valkyrie's Hasegawa instructions) - it was nice that the Captn' included a resin substitute for us. This allows the thighs to attach the legs at the proper bend angle at the knees. It would help that one has built a super Valkyrie before embarking on this kit (even though we are just using a regular Valkyrie fighter kit to make this).
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Before gluing the leg halves together, I thought I'd be smart and mask the black portions and the feet/nozzles off first. It is possible to mask all this after you glue it together (which is what I've been doing up till now) but I think this make a bit more sense.
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Now to glue the resin intakes to the thigh part. I used crazy glue for this bond, regular styrene cement wouldn't work due to the disimilar materials being bonded. Fortunately, the Captn' provided us with the "Super" parts needed to bend the legs/engines at the knees without having to purchase a Super Valkyrie to make with this Booster. He even assembled them for us, unfortunately, he missed a few injection pins holes on the inside of the intakes, which is a real pain to sand out after the intakes have already been assembled (so being the lazy sod I am, I left them)
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The afterburners now gets a thinned down flat black wash to pick out the raised details. (You'll hardly see this unless you are looking right into the tailcone with a strong light)
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I aged the gunpod the same way (yes I choose steel instead of the grey cause I thought it was cooler). This is before a black oil wash to pick out the panel lines and vents.
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Here I tried the "Exhaust" colour from Alclad - I like it a lot, usually I do it with a very thin coat of flat black, but I have to clear coat seal that in, since the light dusting of black is easily scratched or pulled off with tape. But this Alclad colour adheres to the undercoat of steel much better, plus its slightly browny, bronze metallic in itself - much more convincing as burnt metal! I tried to spray where I think whe parts look best burnt, mostly around the tips and that joint - becareful not to over do it, its nice to see the differences in the metal finishes. Don't worry about the injector pins inside the cans - you'll never see them. The good thing about building a few of these Valkyries is that you learn where to cut corners
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Thanks for tuning in... I take my photos with an old Nikon 990 digital, on macro mode with as small of an aperature (high F-number) as lighting permits. I try to get in tight, and this digital allows me to get within 2cm of the subject. Lots and lots of scrubbing, mostly with Comet and a toothbrush, then some detergent to get it all off during rinsing. Its very important to always scrub all resin kits, there are always release agents to help the resin "pop" off the molds that will resist paints or worst, interact with the paint coat years afterwards.
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Sputtering is not indicative of paint consistency, its a pressure problem (or misaligned needle/nozzle assembly). In fact, airbrushes are happiest spray extremely thin inks, the consistency of alcohol. But one must balance the viscosity of the medium with its ability to cover. What PSI are you spraying at? For metallics (Alcad) I spray at 15psi, for Tamiya Acrylics, I spray at 20-25psi.
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Here I hand brushed the rear exposed portions of the leg in flat black (the gloss is because I took the picture before the paint dried) When assembled it will help with the illusion of depth when looking from behind and seeing around the leg portion of the nozzle. I am spending time here since I plan of being able to separate the Valkyrie from the booster - I suppose you can skip some of these steps if the Valkyrie never leaves the booster since you won't be able to look up the tailpipe if its got its leg stuck in the booster.
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The Alcad Steel works wonders on the gunpod! I've also got a different shade of Alcad called Jet Exhaust - it looks like burnt iron. Which I'll try later on when this coat of steel dries - I'll use it to shade the tips of the nozzles.
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Ok, enough preaching (modelling is already a dying hobby, we don't want our modellers to be dying themselves!) Here's a shot of the foot/nozzles, make sure to carefully sand the sprue attachment points with a fine 600 grit paper, these Alclad metalizers are very unforgiving and any scratches and blemishes telegraph through.
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OK, airbrush starting up. Safety first! I've been wanting to build a proper vented spray booth for years now, but in the meantime, I'd make do with a facemask. I've been spraying with my airbrush for years without any kind of protection, but January 16th of this year, my best friend Dan Lee died of lung cancer at the age of 35. He never smoked a day in his life and lead a very healthy lifestyle. However, we've been building models since highschool - and breathed all kinds of crap into our lungs - we were young and invincible! He was convinced that it must of been the chemicals we've been breathing in. Especially laquers which is an organic compound and highly toxic. So in lue of a proper spray booth for now, I implore you to use a proper facemask. I used to use the filterpaper mask that goes over your nose and mouth, but it didn't form a tight seal around the face. After consulting with our scenic artist, he swears by this mask from 3M which I highly recommend. There are replacable filter cartridges on either side for organic compounds filter 6000 series. So please, even if you have a spray booth, it might be worth considering this mask as well. Especially when we spray not only laquers but the Alclad metallizer stuff with real metal particles in a laquer suspension - double whammy!
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Hey Brettt, I couldn't find the link?
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Hmm, I've never measured, you kind of do it by eye - since each colour and finish is a little different, but 50:50 is a good minimum rule of thumb. Flat paints tend to need more thinning since it dries up in the airbrush more easily, and glossy paints needs less since its coverage isn't as good as flat paints. Additionally, you don't want to thin metallics too much or the metal particles will break up. For white paint, thin it to the consistency of skim milk, that should flow well. I'd spend the few extra dollars to get the Tamiya thinner - get the bigger bottle and it will last you a while (as long as you don't use it to clean the airbrush with). The tamiya thinner has a few flow additives in it that also allows it to thin clear colours better. Save the cheap stuff like windex and alchohol for cleaning out your brushes and airbrush (but spend the money on what touches your model - afterall, how do you put a price on all the effort and time you've put into the model)
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Hi everybody, nothing new to show - just a lot of scrubing and washing the pieces with comet (nothing to see here... move along...) Hey Ido, the two tubes are just some spare polycaps I had lying around - they look good once the canopy is on (I think the PE parts are wasted if you choose to close the canopy) but styrene tubes do the same job! Hey Chad, nice of you to join in I was thinking that I'd do the white Valk, in Roy's colours of black and yellow 001 but with Hikaru's pilot name on the canopy (since at this point in the series, he's inherited Roy's plane) but I will depart from canon on the boosters. I'm not sure about the white boosters, I was thinking that I'd do it in a grey/blue like the fast packs. I was going to add a few more grey panels to the Valkyrie itself, then lighten the boosters around the Valkyrie connection points to a light grey, so it doesn't contrast as much, but start working in some darker greys and blue greys (panelled kind of like my shades of blue for the YF-21) so that they look similar beside my Super Valks with the fast packs (since I feel they are part of the same mechanism anyways) I was going to decal them similarily too. Hey Berttt, feel free to join in and post some pictures (I would like to see where you're at too) As you can see from my pictures, I have two big bubbles right at the same spot as yours where the boosters contact the avionics hump on top of the fuselage too. Additionally, I also have quite a few bubbles ruining every one of the thin delicate members around the three vertical slots that I have to fill and build up again (argh! ) And yes, I too have a gap between the two mating surfaces around the edge. I don't think any of these is a big deal yet, I intend to try my hand at filling them with some crazy glue and baking soda. This will be a first for me - so wish me luck.