After a few rounds of seamline fixing and rescribing, the pitot tube broke off. Oh well, it makes the kit a lot less fiddly to hold. So, first on is black primer.
To add some variety and fading to the monotone color scheme, I sprayed white in random straight lines across the top of the kit. I do this somewhat in the direction of airflow. I also varied the thickness and saturation of the white. I left the bottom without the streaks figuring since the bottom gets less exposed to the Sun, it will not fade as much.
Next is the main color of Dark Sea Grey (in this case, it’s er… Vallejo Model Air Dark Seagreen. Don’t ask). To keep the streaking visible, I thin the Dark Seagreen paint in a 1:1 ratio. I misted over the kit to build up the layers.
I stopped when I felt the effect of the streaking is subtle enough to my taste.
While prepping all the other parts, I managed to sweep most of them off the table and one of the main landing wheels ended up pulling a disappearing act. Since I didn’t want to get another box just for the one part, nor do I want to shelve the build, I decided to try my hand with casting the wheel with epoxy putty.
First I made the 2 halves of the mold with epoxy putty. Once they were slightly dry I pressed the wheel in. I only pressed up to the halfway point of the wheel for both ends. Once the molds cured, I rubbed some powder into the molds to act as a release agent and then pressed in more epoxy putty. Once these were slightly dry, I carefully pulled them out and left them to cure. Once dry, I trimmed and superglued both side together and sanded down the sides.
It’s definitely not great but it beats the alternatives.
With the epoxy putty wheel done, I have most of the parts ready.
Time to finish this thing up.
