DX VF-25 Renewal Series (Part III)

[mechaninac]

Does it have to be matte to absorb radar? Do light and sound waves behave the same way? (Meaning does something that bounces off light well also bounce off sound better?)

Edit: I read up a little on Radar Absorbing Material and from what I understand, it's the composition of the paint itself (contains iron balls) that causes it to absorb radar, and not the finish. So I think a matte or gloss finish wouldn't affect its radar absorbing ability.

A gloss finish is inherently more reflective than a matte one, even when dealing with the much longer wavelengths of the radio spectrum of EM energy. It's not much, but every little bit counts towards a planes' low observability quotient.

[Sandman]

What i would like is to have armour parts either included with the valk or sold separately. It's ridiculous the price you have to pay for one. IMO rude to rerelease the vf-25s when it's hard to get the parts for a reasonable price.

[spanner]

What i would like is to have armour parts either included with the valk or sold separately. It's ridiculous the price you have to pay for one. IMO rude to rerelease the vf-25s when it's hard to get the parts for a reasonable price.

Yes a bundle including the parts would be a lot better next time around! At least included the Super Parts as standard.. or heck make it a super bundle with all the parts! The boxes would be HUGE!!

[Loop]

So, you are definitely entitled to your opinion, but I have never understood the logic highlighted in bold. Whenever I see a real car or plane, they are almost always glossy (unless they are old and faded or someone is in the middle of paint applications and has a matte black coat). So, why do you and so many others think that a matte paint job looks more realistic? I agree that a matte paint job can look nice, but I don't necessarily see it as "more realistic" when compared to a real car or plane.

Please explain so that I may be enlightened.

Thanks

I used to live on an Army base with landing field and we had an Army airbase really near where I lived. I also used to go to the Ramstein AFB a lot when I lived in Germany. All of the fighters that flew around there were in matte. Anything that was shiny was usually a museum or display plane at the front gates of the base or what not.

[Duymon]

If Military planes were glossy they'd shimmer in the sun and it might make them more visible in a dogfight. That's prolly why the majority of warplanes are matte colored.

Considering that even the aging F-16's can pack JHMCS and AIM-9x's that literally can lock, track and hit targets nearly behind the aircraft everyone is always going to to give their fighters every possible edge, even if it's as low tech as a non-reflective paint-job.

Edited August 7, 2015 by Duymon

[NightCastle]

I used to live on an Army base with landing field and we had an Army airbase really near where I lived. I also used to go to the Ramstein AFB a lot when I lived in Germany. All of the fighters that flew around there were in matte. Anything that was shiny was usually a museum or display plane at the front gates of the base or what not.

Cool. I appreciate the history of your knowledge and subsequent preference.

[Valkyrie Driver]

If Military planes were glossy they'd shimmer in the sun and it might make them more visible in a dogfight. That's prolly why the majority of warplanes are matte colored.

Considering that even the aging F-16's can pack JHMCS and AIM-9x's that literally can lock, track and hit targets nearly behind the aircraft everyone is always going to to give their fighters every possible edge, even if it's as low tech as a non-reflective paint-job.

The USAF and USN used to use a clearcoat on the natural metal finish, but it was hard to maintain and increased radar reflectivity, we stopped doing that in the 60's, after that we moved to a gloss white. Paint is mostly for corrosion resistance, though the low vis grey that we started using in the 80's replaced the Lizard schemes. The reason for matte finishes over gloss finishes, is matte paints are more forgiving. Gloss paint makes it hard to get an even finish, and the gloss paints we used were incredibly toxic. Matte paints are less so. Light and radar reflection and ease of maintenance are the big reason why we use matte paints now. Just as a note, the Gloss white paint we used in the 60's to the 80's was an Isocyanate base, and it was a hard and resilient surface, so it provided great corrosion resistance, trouble is, it was highly toxic as I noted before. So there is precedent for Glossy fighters.

[Kyp Durron]

Does anyone know the reason for Bandai making the VF-25's and VF-27's glossy to begin with?

[spanner]

Does anyone know the reason for Bandai making the VF-25's and VF-27's glossy to begin with?

this is a good question!

my guess is they either screwed it up or simply didn't care for anime accuracy..

[chyll2]

because it is glossy in the show

[spanner]

not really I reckon..

[Lolicon]

Glossy plastic is cheaper, I'm told. I couldn't find anything on a quick Google search on the matter though.

Someone with knowledge of plastic manufacturing please enlighten us.

[Kyp Durron]

@ spanner76 : Yeah, not really seeing the gloss there. It's funny, really, how Bandai can get it so right with the v2 VF-25's, the VF-27's, YF-29's, and the 171's sculpt wise, but totally s#it the bed when it comes to the finish. Notice how the YF-30 and VF-19 Advance have matte finishes.

Edited August 11, 2015 by Kyp Durron

[Valkyrie Driver]

@ spanner76 : Yeah, not really seeing the gloss there. It's funny, really, how Bandai can get it so right with the v2 VF-25's, the VF-27's, YF-29's, and the 171's sculpt wise, but totally s#it the bed when it comes to the finish. Notice how the YF-30 and VF-19 Advance have matte finishes.

I wouldn't really call the VF-19Advance's finish matte... It still has a pleasing shine to it, so maybe more of a satin finish really... To-ma-to, to-mah-to...

[Chronocidal]

I believe this came up in a discussion about the Yamato VF-19s, and someone mentioned that the process applied to molds so they produce a dull finish involves an etching liquid (probably a weak acid) being applied evenly to the molds. I don't know exactly how costly or labor-intensive that might be, but it sounds risky to the integrity of the mold.

I think they really nailed the gloss on the VF-19 Advance and YF-30 though. It just looks right, without being overly shiny.

[Valkyrie Driver]

I actually kinda like the glossy finish on the VF-25's and VF-171's kinda reminds me of this:

[NightCastle]

I actually kinda like the glossy finish on the VF-25's and VF-171's kinda reminds me of this:

Wait! I thought AF planes were supposed to be matte.

[Mechapilot77]

they were going for glossy...didn't get it "wrong". i think they were doing everything they could to make a modern "chunky monkey" in terms of evoking a toy like feel yet being a collectible. those coming from a toy background usually like glossy....those coming from modeling background probably like matte. i'm actually ok with either though matte does seem to evoke more collector friendly stuff whereas glossy evokes the toy oritented stuff. its a fine balance. i think wit the type of plastic bandai uses...it looks good glossy and toyetic.

[Valkyrie Driver]

Wait! I thought AF planes were supposed to be matte.

They are now, but that's the intake and wing root of an F-106. Back in the 1960's through to the 1980's, we painted our Air Defense Fighters in this glossy isocyante based paint. The F-106 was grey, and I think most of them were a light grey. Dad's Air Defense Detachment painted their F-4's in the same color (giving the REGAF guys conniption). The low vis matte schemes started in the 1980's and became widespread when Strategic Air Command and Tactical Air Command merged to become Air Combat Command.

[Loop]

Yeah Nightcastle, this is what I meant by "Museum pieces" They are usually scattered all over military bases.

[Valkyrie Driver]

There were a ton of Static Displays at Lackland, There was the 8th Air Force Museum at Barksdale, and a bunch of randoms at Keesler. There was also the 101st Airborne Museum at Ft. Campbell that had a few good ones too. I've only seen two F-106's on static display, one at Selfridge ANGB's MIANG museum, and one at Camp Blanding.

[NightCastle]

They are now, but that's the intake and wing root of an F-106. Back in the 1960's through to the 1980's, we painted our Air Defense Fighters in this glossy isocyante based paint. The F-106 was grey, and I think most of them were a light grey. Dad's Air Defense Detachment painted their F-4's in the same color (giving the REGAF guys conniption). The low vis matte schemes started in the 1980's and became widespread when Strategic Air Command and Tactical Air Command merged to become Air Combat Command.

Ok. I guess we learned from the glossy previously, right?

Yeah Nightcastle, this is what I meant by "Museum pieces" They are usually scattered all over military bases.

Ahh. Ok. Cool. Thanks.

Edited August 11, 2015 by NightCastle

[Valkyrie Driver]

Ok. I guess we learned from the glossy previously, right?

We learned that the isocyanate paint was incredibly toxic, and difficult to apply. We have since learned that glossy finishes increase light and radar reflectivity, making them easier to spot. Before the glossy paint the aircraft were silver, or natural metal finish, which decreased corrosion resistance. We also learned that other paints would strip off as they heated up with multiple trips through the Mach barrier. The Faster you go the more heat you generate from air friction, the faster the pain wears off. The Glossy paint was a tougher finish.

It was mostly applied to air defense fighters, that is, they weren't deployed overseas, so the need to be harder to see wasn't as pronounced. Also you kinda wanted to be seen, so that russian bomber would know you were there and ready to shoot him down. Now paint technologies are so much better we can make matte paints that are every bit as tough as the old isocyanate gloss paint. Now we can have our cake and eat it too...

Edited August 11, 2015 by Valkyrie Driver

[CoreyD]

Yeah Nightcastle, this is what I meant by "Museum pieces" They are usually scattered all over military bases.

The gloss coat used on museum aircraft also helps with weather resistance, as noted for the flying navy birds.

[Lolicon]

Seeing mickyg's work in the VF-19 thread motivated me to finally get off my lazy bum and start fixing up the displays in my valkyries.

First order of business: replacing the ugly paper display printouts I had before with waterslide decals.

Old paper printout:

New waterslide decal:

It's not perfect, but definitely looks much clearer now. It'd look better if I had a color laser printer, but I'm not buying one just to print a few decals.

[mechaninac]

It's been quite a while since the last VF-25 was released/reissued, and still not a peep on a VF-25G re-release...

[Duymon]

I don't know if the 25G will ever see a re-release. The Hikaru and Roy Analogues always get more attention while the Max / kakizaki seem more one-off's

I still love the plain fighter mode. So sleek :0

Edited August 12, 2015 by Duymon

[mickyg]

Seeing mickyg's work in the VF-19 thread motivated me to finally get off my lazy bum and start fixing up the displays in my valkyries.

First order of business: replacing the ugly paper display printouts I had before with waterslide decals.

Old paper printout:

25F console paper.jpg

New waterslide decal:

25F console waterslide.jpg

It's not perfect, but definitely looks much clearer now. It'd look better if I had a color laser printer, but I'm not buying one just to print a few decals.

Good stuff! Glad my efforts can get others to experiment a bit. I've done my VF-25G, YF-29 Isamu and now my VF-19Advance. The hardest part was cutting them out to fit. Going with a real decal would simplify things a lot!

So that was ink jet printed? Looks really good and the detail is great, especially given how small that silly thing is.

[Lolicon]

Good stuff! Glad my efforts can get others to experiment a bit. I've done my VF-25G, YF-29 Isamu and now my VF-19Advance. The hardest part was cutting them out to fit. Going with a real decal would simplify things a lot!

So that was ink jet printed? Looks really good and the detail is great, especially given how small that silly thing is.

Thanks! Yeah it was printed on an inkjet printer. The original decal was made for the 1/72 Bandai kit, and the display was way oversized on that thing, so I had to scale it down in Photoshop to fit in the 1/60 console. Decal paper is pretty cheap, so it's afforable to make your own homemade decals. I scanned pretty much all my Yamato sticker sheets and converted as many as I could into decals.

There are limitations though. For one thing, inkjet can't print white, so white text markings are out of the question. You can still do stuff like the UN Spacy kite by using decal paper with white backing. Decals with clear backing are really only good for light surfaces.

I'd love to get a hi res scan of the Hasegawa decal sheet just for the console decals. Not sure I want to buy an entire kit just for one decal. I tried emailing HLJ once about buying Hasegawa decal sheets, but they told me Hasegawa does not sell them separately, not even as replacement parts.

[mickyg]

I can upload a scan of my Hasegawa sheet, just like I did in the Bandai thread. I'm sure there's some sort of copywrite issues there but I'm justifying it by only including the consoles. That said, happy to take them down if there are any problems.

For the record, the ones I used in my VF-25 and YF-29 are from the Hasegawa VF-25F/S kit.

[Lolicon]

Oh man, if you could, I'd really appreciate it! Yeah, just the display decals would be awesome. I have plenty of decals already for any external markings.

Thanks a ton!

[mickyg]

I can upload a scan of my Hasegawa sheet, just like I did in the Bandai thread. I'm sure there's some sort of copywrite issues there but I'm justifying it by only including the consoles. That said, happy to take them down if there are any problems.

For the record, the ones I used in my VF-25 and YF-29 are from the Hasegawa VF-25F/S kit.

Just like I did in the Bandai VF-19Advance thread, here's a couple of macro shots of the VF-25 instrument panel from the Hasegawa kit's decal sheet.

In Green:

Red:

Back Console in Green:

And Red:

The size works as is for the Bandai Valks and as I requested for the other thread, if someone with Vector Graphics skills and tools can retrace these, that'd be awesome! The size reference is the circle for the decal number. That measures very close to 2.5mm in diameter in real life. These are very small!

[Lolicon]

You're my hero!

(I couldn't find an image of virtual Minmay kissing virtual Hikaru after Max defeats Miria in the arcade.)

Edited August 20, 2015 by Lolicon

[mickyg]

It's the thought that counts!

[valhary]

thanks this will be very useful!