Scale aviation modeller international

extras I ”needed”: HGW fabric seat

belts, wicker seat from Barracuda,

spark plugs from Taurus, and

paint masks from Mal’s Masks.

Finally, the kit arrived and

as per usual, I kicked off with

parts preparation – removing,

cleaning up, and organising into

a rough painting plan – before

spraying on the primer (in this

case Mr. Finisher 1500), thinned

and sprayed through the airbrush.

I have a rattle can version but

find it not so good for smaller

pieces, and prefer the more precise

control afforded by an airbrush.

THE OFFICE

I then tackled the cockpit, starting

with the Barracuda resin seat.

Apparently, there was an early

batch that was a little narrow, and

as a result, the kit seat cushion

needs a little trimming to fit (not an

issue). There was, however, some

noticeable resin flash along the

open structure of the chair back,

which was a shame, as it wasn’t

easy to remove; the structure is

finely moulded and this detracts

from the otherwise ”perfect”

look. And although you can only

tell if you look really closely, the

second seat that came with the pack

was worse again, and despite my

best efforts, I couldn’t remove it

without damaging the wickerwork

effect. To be fair to Barracuda,

I contacted them via e-mail,

and they very kindly sent out a

perfect replacement set the next

day. It’s nice to see that excellent

customer service is still alive.

As per my usual method, I

sprayed all wood areas with a

light Vallejo Sand, followed by a

mid-shade overspray to feather

the edges, followed by oils to

capture the recesses. I then dragged

artist’s oils (ochre, sienna, etc)

over the surfaces to represent the

wood grain. It’s worth doing this

step as early as possible, due to

the drying time of the oil paints

(although it can be hastened by

a suitable drying agent such as

Uschi van der Rosten’s Blitz Dry).

The kit comes with perfectly

well-represented etch seat belts,

but I have a soft spot for the HGW

fabric belts, which are a superb

rendition of canvas straps. They

really look the part, especially

once suitably creased, and are

highly recommended. When

combined with the resin seat, it’s

difficult to see how the finished

effect could be bettered.

The instrument panel got

the wood treatment, followed by

”glass” faced instruments, which

are the kit decals picked out with

clear epoxy. This really looks

quite effective in this scale. I also

replaced the kit cockpit pumps

with real brass, although the kit

parts look perfectly adequate. I

always struggle to paint brass on

small pieces effectively (it looks

painted on and unrealistic), so

why not use real brass? It’s an

easy fix that, to my eye, makes

a significant improvement.

The internal structure was

rigged as per the instructions,

and this does add quite a lot of

interest to the finished model. I

used monofilament fishing line

and fine brass tubing to represent

the turnbuckles. This stage is a

little time consuming, but it does

look good once finished and is

quite visible on the finished model.

As a final touch, I usually tuck a

folded-up scale map (a scaled-down

image from the internet, printed

on thin paper), into a recess.

32 • JANUARY 2018 • SCALE AVIATION MODELLER INTERNATIONAL

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