Kevin Futter Posted June 5, 2022 Share Posted June 5, 2022 Those of you who are LSP members, or follow me on Facebook, may already be aware of this build, so my apologies for the double-up. I've now got it to the stage where I'm painting on some of the markings, and of course, cutting the required masks on the Silhouette Portrait! But first, a quick recap of the build to this point. The kit was given to me by a friend a couple of years ago, and I decided to mate it up with a parts kit that another friend had sent me a few years prior to that. This latter box contained most of an entire Hasegawa Mustang kit, along with an assortment of aftermarket items and some scratch-built modifications. I decided to treat both kits as one, and use whatever aftermarket I could find in the parts box, and use it in a build of the first kit. Hopefully that makes sense! But in spirit, I wanted this to be an out-of-box build - so no rescribing! So, I started with the Grand Phoenix resin cockpit set and instrument panel: I modified the tail wheel and fuselage mount to allow me to fit it at the end of the build: I used Moskit exhausts in place of the kit ones, and modified the engine so I could mount it onto a length of aluminium tubing, to assist with installing it into the fuselage: The tubing also now forms the prop shaft. Assembly from there was pretty straightforward: I removed the excessive bulges from the True Details tyres: The scheme I've chosen is "Butch Baby", which is one of the schemes Hasegawa provides in the newer of the two releases I have. This has red-and-yellow stripes on the spinner, and similarly-coloured chequers on the nose. I had a lot of trouble masking up the spinner, and I'll spare you the gory details, but I got there in the end: This brings us up to today's update: masking the nose chequers. In preparation for this step, I scanned the kit decals, prepped them in Photoshop, traced them in Silhouette Studio, and then cut them on the Silhouette Portrait: Note that I'll be using commercial masks for the national markings, and the kit decals for the aircraft name and any relevant stencils. If anybody wants a copy of the cut file, I can upload it here, but it's a bit wobbly in places, and probably needs to be re-drawn from scratch. I cut two copies so that I could test them on a mule, before I commit them to the final model. I forged on ahead with the chequers, however: SMS Red next: And unmasked: Not bad! But certainly not perfect. Oddly, the vinyl mask managed to lift off a divot of the yellow paint in one area, which I definitely was not expecting: What I was expecting, however, was that the vinyl masks wouldn't conform all that well around the chin intake area, and I was right about that: I'll re-mask this area with Tamiya tape and go over it, but since the red seems a little fragile, I'll be laying down a couple of gloss coats before I do. Overall, it's a little untidy, but definitely in the ball park. Hopefully for the next update I'll have it all tidy and masked up ready for the main paint job. Kev 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mozart Posted June 8, 2022 Share Posted June 8, 2022 Ah chequers, don’t you love’em! You’ve made a good start Kev but in my experience “touch ups” are almost inevitable in some areas. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeC Posted June 8, 2022 Share Posted June 8, 2022 4 hours ago, Mozart said: Ah chequers, don’t you love’em! You’ve made a good start Kev but in my experience “touch ups” are almost inevitable in some areas. Agreed: been there, done that. This checked nose looks fine to me. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kevin Futter Posted June 8, 2022 Author Share Posted June 8, 2022 Thanks, fellas! I've done the touch-ups now, and given the area another gloss coat for protection. I couldn't resist posing the prop in place for effect: Kev 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mozart Posted June 8, 2022 Share Posted June 8, 2022 Super job Kev 👌 Max 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.