SPA Modeler

Stikpusher wrote:Man you've been busy at your workbench!

Yeah, and BOY does it feel great! Especially because I finished something!

Duke Maddog wrote:

Stikpusher wrote:Man you've been busy at your workbench!

Yeah, and BOY does it feel great! Especially because I finished something!

That's one of us... it's already mid April and I haven't finished a damned thing...

Hopefully you'll finish something soon Carlos. You work is always worth the wait anyway.


Here's my work I was able to complete so far to date. I'll start with my aircraft...

After a week and a half in the window, the C-118 decals are finally ready to be applied:



Hopefully that will happen soon.

I got some grey paint laid down on the underside of my A-37 Dragonfly:



Once that was dry, I masked it off so I could paint the upper surfaces:



I then shot the OD basecoat on the top. I had started to mask off for the second color when I remembered to take a pic:



Once that was dry, I finished applying the first round of Silly Putty:



Later on I shot the tan color down. For some reason my airbrush was not acting right and I got a bit of fisheye on it:



Gonna have to wait a bit while that dries so I can fix it later.

While waiting for that to dry, I started on my Charlie Don't Surf kit, getting the cockpit done on the F-102:



After that came the engine exhaust:



While that was drying, I started the wing sub-assembly:





After that, I thought, why not? and added the intakes to the sides of the fuselage:



After all, the more sub-assemblies I can do ahead of time the faster this thing goes.


That's all I got on my aircraft besides painting the nose of my C-118 white, but that will be shown another day. Moving on, I was able to move forward on some armor and even started a new one...


First off, while I was masking off models to paint camo colors, I masked off the little FWD ammo carrier with some Silly Putty as well:





I have to wing this since the colors on the call out don't connect properly in any fashion to make a consistent pattern.

Here's the first color on it so far:



Later I started a UM Models M-4 Sherman with Mine Rollers. I didn't get far with this one: when I cemented together the four parts of the lower hull; one side was farther forward than the other, making this lopsided. I had to cut it apart again and re-glue this to fit right:



That was as far as I got on that. It is drying while I try to get over being so fed up with that kit.

Finally, I got the second track on the T-14 Armata tank:



Afterward I got the whole thing primed so I can get it painted:





Moving on from that; I decided to work on a few other models that had been sitting for awhile. I pulled out my VW bus and shot a light blue color on the interior parts:



While I had that light blue color out, it corresponded to the color of the Borax wagons. First I had to mask the wheels:





After I'd done all that work, I thought, why not try and remove some of all of the wheel assemblies? I gave it a shot and managed to get both wheel sets off one wagon, then one off the other. Then I shot the blue:





I also shot the water tank, leaving some fingerprints behind despite the paint being dry:



That was also the first time I'd shot acrylics. I only had that blue in an acrylic so in the airbrush it went.



Well, that pretty well sums up my last few days. It ain't as much as I'd hoped to finish, but I'm glad to be making some progress. Enjoy the show and feel free to comment, they are always welcome.

Thanks for looking in.

Mark, I'm just a couple bench sessions away from wrapping up my Quad .50. And a few more sessions after that for the F-86. I intend to have the Quad done in time for AMPS. And the Sabre shortly afterwards.
You're making some good progress on all your builds there. Are you gonna weather the Mule Team Wagon? Give it a nice Death Valley Days look? The Tweety bird is looking real good! I want to see that one in person. I remember watching those at Ft Irwin when they would play the role of Frogfoots and come at us during NTC rotations. Once upon a time...
What is this "Charlie Don't Surf" build that you speak of?

Wow, that is an impressive assortment of subjects you have going Maddog! Question to you: have you had any issues with using Silly Putty as a masking medium? I've used it before but I found that it can leave a residue that reacts badly to certain clear coats. Also, it settled very deeply into one wheel well and I had a heck of a time getting it out so I stopped using it after that. I now use Blu Tack and it seems much more benign on plastic surfaces.

Thanks Carlos for the great reply! I would like to weather the mule team wagons, but since I forgot to paint a black base for chipping I'll just have to wing it with some light dirtying up. I shall try some experiments to get the look I'd like to have. If all goes well on the painting of the Tweety Bird, I should have it at AMPS next time you are there. I love hearing stories like those about training days and such. As for the "Charlie Don't Surf" build; it is part of the Vietnam campaigns going on at Modeler's Alliance. They actually have about seven-in-one campaigns for this; all included in the overall "Charlie Don't Surf" Vietnam campaign.

John, thank you very much. I have not had any issues with Silly Putty affecting my overcoats. I have seen a residue only once and a swift swipe of Goo Gone took care of it right away. Otherwise, I have had no troubles. I agree that sometimes this stuff is tough to get out of tight areas and I have had my share of difficulty removing it from cockpits and wheel wells; but I've learned to add some crumpled tissue or paper towel in them before adding the Silly Putty. This keeps it from seeping into such difficult areas. I really do love using the stuff. I haven't had to chance to try the Blu Tack, but I have heard from others that it does need to be replaced more frequently after multiple uses. I'm not sure that is accurate or just someone a little particular about his masks. Still, being able to pick up Silly Putty at Wal-Mart for 99 cents an egg, makes it readily replaceable once I do need it.


Thanks again guys for such great comments.

I managed to find a little more time today so I was able to get done everything that I wanted to finish yesterday... and maybe even a little more.

I'll start with my VW Bus. I took all the tape off to see how well everything looked and was a bit disappointed:



Gonna have to re-tape and shoot some more white. Oh well. I'll take my time as you can see that one door is missing. The chrome parts are missing too, or I would have assembled even more of this bus, but alas, that is not to be for now. Time to move on....



Next I took some time to finish the camouflage on the Dragonfly. I re-shot the tan color first:



After that dried, I added some more Silly Putty to shoot the third and final color:



Here is the final color on this model now:



Finally, after everything had dried sufficiently; I pulled the Silly Putty off this model, along with the tape:



It looks okay; certainly not as fine a paint job as I wanted to do. There are some touch-ups to do so I'll work on them and just move on. I never expected this to give me such trouble getting done.




Moving on to my Armor, I tried again with my Sherman mineroller. After two and a half hours and five lost parts; I managed to get one bogie done! Geez! UM kits really bite!



I was about to put this away again, but then I thought, why don't I just build other sub assemblies? So, I pulled out the sprues for the turret and got that started. I managed to get most of it done fairly easy:



I even drilled out the gun barrel. Then I decided to assemble the mine roller itself. That took some time and after a couple more lost pieces; I finally have a decent looking mine roller:




This one will take some time to finish. Meanwhile, since I still had the compressor fired up, I pulled out my T-14 Armata and put down the base coat. This model's instructions called for a 'yellow grey' so I decided to use Panzer Dunklegelb. It went on pretty well:





Later on I went in and filled in the under-sprayed areas.

While that was drying, I shot the second color on the FWD 3-ton. This was the light tan:



After it dried, I added more Silly Putty to mask this for the third color. The third color then went on; this time it was a light grey:



Once that was dry, I added more Silly Putty to this to cover the grey in preparation for the fourth and last color:



Then I pulled out a Flat Black and lightened it up a bit for a charcoal black. I shot this color on all the remaining exposed areas:





Once that had sufficient time to dry, I pulled (almost) all the Silly Putty off. (You can see some I left on the left front wheel) Amazingly enough I had no broken parts from pulling that off, thank God! I am far more pleased with this pattern than I am with the Dragonfly:





With that done, I was able to wrap up another day on the bench. Now I feel I accomplished something. This was where I wanted to be yesterday. I am very happy now with this latest progress. I hope you enjoy it too.

Thanks all for looking in, comments are welcome.

Reaching those "phase lines" is always a good feeling. The truck and Tweey bird look really good. Too bad about those lost parts on the Sherman and the VW Bus. What happened, did your tweezers launch them? That has happened to me on more than one occasion...

Thanks Carlos. I am more pleased with the truck camo than the Tweety bird one. Too rough, but hopefully I'll be able to refine things a bit when I do some touch-ups. I'm not sure what happened to the VW bus parts; I think they disappeared when the model box fell down and spilled open. I had thought I got all the parts and sprues, but apparently I was mistaken. The Sherman parts were tiny. They simply fell down out of my tweezers or fingers; rolled down my leg and disappeared into a vortex that swallowed them whole. Four of the parts were already assembled into half a bogie. When I tried to put it together with the other half; it fell out of my fingers, rolled down my leg and was gone. Next week looks a bit open so I might even get some more of these finished.

Stay tuned, more to come.

One day, when you least expect it, those missing parts will suddenly turn up...