Model Kit Builder » How-To

masking … a different approach.

Klaus Weitzel — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 20:04:12 +0000

Sometimes you need to mask of areas differently if you don’t manage by “just” applying strips of masking tape around the area you want to have masked. Here is a different approach, you apply the stripes all over the area and then use a scalpel (a sharp one so be careful!) to cut out the area you want to paint. Here the area are the 2 rear air scoops in the rear area of the Porsche.

Detail view of the masked area ...

... and the cut out area afterwards

As you can see, my scalpel was not sharp enough, so the edges do look more ripped than cut. For me that means … do it again. Anyway, here is also a complete view of the car with the samples …

The masking again ...

... and from the other side.

Masking and Spraying

Klaus Weitzel — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 07:44:24 +0000

Last week I went to town wif Claudia, my wife. Actually I don’t like at all going to town, but as a “reward” I got myself some new propellant for the old airbrush. OK … I didn’t have the other 2 guns yet so I thought let’s go for it with the old one. I masked the right side of the Porsche 936-78 to give the air duct a bit of the old red colour that the LeMans Car of ’78 (Jacky Ickx , Henri Pescarolo, Jochen Mass) had. Additionally the rear wing gets some of that red as well.

View of my "Paint Booth" ...

Detail - Masked of Area of

So here you have it, a nice look into may spraying area. It’s located right beside one of two windows in the room (remember the fresh air!) but, since I don’t have active air circulation, I have to protect me during the brief painting sessions. I actually have 2 cardboard boxes, a small one for little parts and the large one for the bigger jobs.

small paint booth with spainted spoiler

large paintbooth with model and airbrush

In the last picture the freshly painted parts just need to be protected against dust for drying and they are ready to go. If you don’t protect those freshly painted parts, they will attract the dust like a magnet (in the larger pictures you can see what I mean …).

Creating a master for a lexan windshield – done!

Klaus Weitzel — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 19:47:32 +0000

Remember, a couple of posts ago I promised a dutch reader that I would make a master for the Tamiya King Cobra wind screen. Finally I did it. I mixed up some CeranoFix (by Eberhard Faber) and pured it into the windscreen part I had.

The empty lexan wind screen

The empty windscreen besides CeramoFix

Some people tend to adhere to strict recipes when it comes down to mixing something, but I tend to mix as I go on. I am used to this by my apprenticeship as electrician, about 20 years ago. Anyway, stir the mixture well and leave it a bit liquid so it lets air bubbles escape. The more liquid the mass is, the longer it will take drying.

The CeramoFix has been poured

Final Product ...

Now I will let it dry a couple of days and then get it ready to ship if this reader still needs it …

[UPDATE]
Now I’ll just need the address of Peter to ship it to him. But that will be done privately.

Metal finish for model kits

Klaus Weitzel — Fri, 08 May 2009 20:57:30 +0000

In quite a lot of model kits you have to deal with a metal finish of one sort or the other. Now, what options are there for the finishes?

Paining with enamel
Painting with acrylic
Foiling

You most probably have done the first and maybe the second as well, but did you try the third yet? The advantage of foiling is that you can achieve loads of different finishes with the same material (e.g. aluminium wrap) just by sourcing it from different manufacturers and treating it differently. But be cautious, foiling is not for the beginner.

There are a couple of nice articles about this topic, for me notably:

I wanted some model with less detail to start with so for my first experiment I ordered the “Naboo Royal Cruiser” from Fantastic Plastic for this experiment.

Royal Naboo Cruiser by Fantastic Plastic

I am not sure yet what foil to use, but the shiny side of a simple household wrapper foil seems the right material for this. As alternative I have set my eyes on some specialised chrome foil for modeling purposes, but as you can imagine the price is comparably higher than for simple household alu foil. So, watch out for the model comming up.

X-Wing – Painting & Masking

Klaus Weitzel — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 06:22:32 +0000

I started painting the upper side of the X-Wing and masking the lower side. This time us worked differently for the masks on the underside. More about that later in this post though. The paint is dry and the masking removed. Since I use a brush to apply the paint, there are differences in the amount of paint on the wing. Together with the sharp edges of the masking this does bring some raised edges to the painting.

painted wing

painted wing detail

To get rid of those ridges there is only one thing to do, sand them. Additionally this moment can be used to apply a bit of weathering to the paint like you can see in the detail image. You can also see, that I didn’t take care properly with the masking. The paint ran into the small details on the rear side of the wing.

For the painting of the upper side you saw in the last post already, that I did do the masking in two steps per side, the lower side has been masked a bit differently. I masked in one step and cut out some areas where the masking tape goes over the areas which are to be painted. For this you need a good scalpel. You want to have them areas cut and not ripped away.

masked wing

masked wing detail

This image shows you the first step with the cut away areas where the three red stripes (you remember, we are talking about “Red 3″ as the call sign) are going to be. In the next step the rest of the stripes will be masked and cut away. Instead of using the narrow masking tape this time I will cover the whole area with stripes and then cut out the stripes. It is also well visible that I took better care with the masking and the tape actually fills the recesses of the wing.

masked wing closeup

Painting the X-Wing

Klaus Weitzel — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 08:53:34 +0000

It’s been quite some time since I have done something with the X-Wing, so I decided to go on a bit with it. For the base colour I will keep the darkish gray of the primer. So this will be a masking frenzy, since there are loads of body panels which need to have slightly different colours.

Overall View

Frontend Top Panel

The start was made by masking off the red stripe in front of the cockpit and the Squadron Position Markings (Red 3) on the wings. I used 6mm Tamiya and 1mm Kyosho masking tape. The Tamiya one was used for the outside (rough masking) and the Kyosho for the fine masking of the wings. The images above show 2 parts of the fighter, the Front End and the Wing Tip, masked and painted. It is also quite visible that the painting has been done with a paintbrush and not by airbrush.

After having done the first maskings, painted them and removed the maskings I now started with more masks for the body and the wings. As you can see, they have not yet been painted

Wing Tip

Overall View

When applying the masking tape, you can either work area by area to be painted, like I have done here or you can work by covering complete areas and then cutting out the regions you want to paint. Also in the area behind the AstroMech bay I started applying a black wash to get out the details a bit.

Frontend Panel

Wing Tip

Building your own Paint booth for modelling

Klaus Weitzel — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 19:20:20 +0000

If you are intending to spray paint or airbrush your models you should consider a paint booth. I mean a small one, not a large one like you’d find in a real body shop … Anyway, it is not hard to build one. Here is how to do a very simple one.

You’ll need a large cardboard box, some hinges, some plastic sheet, a blow dryer, hose and some furnace filter. Of cause you can substitute any of these for better materials (e.g. plastic instead of the cardboard, acrylic instead of the clear plastic sheet …). The selection on materials depends on how much you want to invest and even how much space you’ve got. The minimum size requirement is that the largest model you build fits inside with enough space around it.

Second minimum consideration is the ventilation. Since the purpose of a paint booth is to suck away the paint particles ant with that also protecting you health it is quite an important consideration. Don’t design it too small. Over at Brian’s Model Cars there is a nice article posted in 2003 by a guy called Klaus (not me though). The title of this article is “Spray Booth Design And Fan Selection” and a big part is about calculating the amount of air replacement and selecting the fan for the ventilation. There is also a basic paint booth design. One finished model (made out of cardboard) you can find on the site of Steven Jones who used the standard 14 x 20 furnace filter to define the size of his booth.

Personally I currently use 2 open cardboard boxes which I do not yet have ventilated or even cut to size. The booth is positioned between 2 Windows which are both open to create some airflow. For health protection I use a respiratory mask. But the ventilated paint booth will come one day.

Handling old / vintage model kits with damages

Klaus Weitzel — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 14:32:21 +0000

Some of you have read already that I go to flea markets and do some of my sourcing there (see my Faller AMS post for instance). Sometimes you might get really vintage kits and if you are lucky they are even complete. Mostly the plastic or resin parts will be OK but the decals are a different issue. You’ll find that they are yellowing and worse even splitting.

Yellowing: Paperbacking and/or Varnish discolour the decal.

Cracking: Cracking or micro cracking are physical defects of the decal.

If your kit has only one of these defects you are lucky, because there are a couple of ways to rectify these issues. Have a look at the http://www.oldmodelkits.com/blog site. In the blog they have some articles about restoring damaged decals. On the site itself they sell vintage model kits.

Worse than cracking and yellowing to the decals are damages to the plastic parts or missing parts. If a kit is still packed in it’s original package and maybe sealed the chances of missing parts are a bit smaller than if the package has been opened and the kit is part assembled.

As a teenager I remember having built quite some airplane kits in 1/72 scale but also two 1/35 scale WW1 planes, both kits from the 60′s or 70′s by Revell. A Fokker DIII (Tri-Plane) was one of them. One of the body sides was badly twisted as if if got warm. Obviously there was no direct assembly possible, that twist had to go first. The body panel was slowly heated up until it could safely be twisted back into it’s original “shape”.

Now that was not enough though since it wouldn’t stay in that position. So I heated it again and used sellotape to fix it to the other body panel and let it cool down.Instead of just heating the body panel (hot air pistol, blow dryer, etc.) you could opt for soaking the twisted part in hot water and then work it to fit the counterpart.

If a part is actually broken you can just glue it back together, like you would anyway do with the model later on. Depending on the broken part you could opt for repair “on” the model, once the part gets glued to another part.

Missing parts are a bigger deal. If it is a really vintage kit you might not actually be able to replace it. You can only find a replacement (donor kit) or a badly broken model. Chances are low that you’ll find it. So you’ll have to scratch build the part or , if it is a part available a second time in the kit you could copy it. Everything failed? You still have the chance to make this model into a custom project where you use the parts available and create something new or keep it in your parts box.

BTW, the link above also leads to a site where you can order some really nice vintage models! Just remove the “blog” from the URL and you can browse …

‘Monza GT’ Inliner – 1:24 scale slot car chassis

Klaus Weitzel — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 14:19:01 +0000

For my Porsche 936-78 Twin Turbo kit I bought a new chassis, which I hope will suit it quite well. Currently I am not sure though. I chose the 1:24 scale “Monza GT” in-line chassis by Schmidbauer-Modellauto.

The chassis ready built

The motor of this chassis is mounted in line with the driving direction of the chassis making it a mid motor setup. To be honest with you, I bet 99.9% of all slot cars have a mid motor setup. I hope this motor position and alignment will suit the design of the body with the big motor compartment of the Porsche.

Technical Data:

Weight: 72,00Gramm
Wheelbase min. 75,50 mm
Wheelbase max. 122,00 mm
Width min. 50,00 mm
Width max. 73,00 mm

This chassis comes completely unassembled in a bag with loads of metal parts, bronze bearings, different kinds of screws and washers. As assembly instruction there was only a simple picture of the completely assembled chassis, which was unfortunately quite faint. That’s why I decided to walk you through the assembly but you need to have at least some skill in working with a screwdriver and a pair of pliers.

Required Tools: Pliers – small Screwdriver (Phillips) – 1 mm Allen key

Screws, Nuts, Washers and Bearings

Besides the big metal parts (you will recognise them) you can find screws, nuts, washers and bearings as depicted in this Image. The numbering will be useful for identification later on. You should have following minimum quantities:

No. 1 – self tapping screw – 4 pcs.
No. 2 – normal countersunk screw – 8 pcs.
No. 3 – black allen screw – 4 pcs.
No. 4 – hexagon nut – 8 pcs.
No. 5 – washer – 8 pcs.
No. 6 – bearing – 4 pcs.

There is no need to assemble the chassis in any specific order but personally I suggest to start either from the front or read end.

Step 1 - Front End

Step 2 - Rear End

I started from the front end. Take 4 of the No. 2 countersunk screws, 4 Washers and 4 Nuts and attach the front arm of the guide blade to the front end. Then press 2 of the bronze bearings in the holes of the front cross member. They should go in with pressing only and are a tight fit. Use 2 of No. 3 Allen screws to attach the cross member to the front end. Now slide in the guide blade and fix it with the large hexagon nut (the only one). The blade should have about 2 mm distance to allow for vertical travel.

After you have done the front end please switch over to the rear end. Use again 4 No. 2 Screws, 4 No. 4 Nuts and 4 No. 5 Washers to mount the rear end to the main chassis.

Step 3 - Motor Mount

Step 4 - Body Mounts

The third step depends on the selected motor for your slot car. Choose either the of the motor mounts and press the No. 6 bearings into the openings. Again they should be a tight fit but nevertheless should be just pressed in. Then take 4 of the No. 3 Allen screws to attach the motor mount to the rear end.

As last step the body mounts will be added to both sides of the main chassis. They are fitted with the No. 1 self tapping screws. The mounts have several holes, your choice depends on the width of the body you will mount.

This finishes the assembly of the chassis. We will look at properly setting-up this chassis at a later stage.

All the X-Wing parts ready …

Klaus Weitzel — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 21:42:15 +0000

By now all the parts should be primed and ready to go. Of cause I took my time and let patience rule me, applying the primer in a couple of thin layers with drying time in-between.

Primed Parts - 1

Primed Parts - 2

In the next pictures you can see, that the figures (Pilot and R2 Unit) and the clear parts of the cockpit have not been touched. At the current stage I am not shure how they will fit into the finished model.

Now should be the moment when to decide what colours to use for the painting of the X-Wing Fighter. I will use a sort of ebony colour as the main colour, red for the painting of the bird and I’ll need various darker colours for the recesses and maybe some battle damage. Most of those will be coloured some grey tone.

Primed Parts - 3

Primed Parts - 4

The number of stripes at the rear wing tips depends on the position of the fighter in the squadron.

Example: Red Two (Wedge Antilles) would have a single red stripe while Red Five (Luke Skywalker) would carry five of them. Also the colour depends on the squadron … Red Squadron would have red and Gold Squadron yellow or gold colour. That is for all markings on the fighter.

Some good reference Images can be found here:

http://www.starshipmodeler.com/ – please navigate to “Hardware Reference” – “Star Wars” and there the second section is the X-Wing section (no deep link possible due to technology used)
http://www.oohyeahzone.com/ – has nearly the complete Red Squadron from Micro Machines