Some Progress At Last

Well it seems ages since I made any progress but I've finally found 5 minutes to pick up my brush, not that I actually did much by way of painting.  A second coat of matt to try and kill the shine, don't think I had mixed it enough the first time, hopefully.

Nearly done

A word of warning and a lesson learned, make sure you don't get varnish on your fingers and then handle another model with your finger on the decals. Where there used to be an 'F' there is now a couple of blobs of white!  Oh well I suppose it's a chance to use my white Uni Posca marker for the first time.

Ooops!

 

I even managed to spend a bit of time sticking some wings on to the dakota. Had to do some hacking to get them to fit even acceptably, never mind well. 

The tail looks a bit wonky from this angle, probably is then

Yeh, it's definitely skewiff

 

 There's going to have to be some serious filling going on before this is ready to be primed.

On the subject of priming I have to offer thanks to the folks over at TMP for their help choosing a descent primer spray at a sensible price.

Chipping Away

So I managed to snatch a short time to start the weathering process on my Tomahawk and Spitfire.  Still short of some pastels or weathering powders I decided I could add those little wear marks you get, the little areas of chipped off paint and the like.
Very old Citadel Mithril Silver was the best I could muster for the purpose and my old drybrushing brush (which is now officially dead).  I targeted the leading edge of the wings and the tail fins, the panel lines of the ammo lockers and the engine cowling, along with along the join between the wing and the fuselage where the pilot would walk to gain access to the cockpit.  But I probably spent the most time on the props having read that it was not unusual for the rear side to be virtually scrubbed clean of paint whilst the front looked in good condition with just a little damage along the leading edge.  I hope these came across OK and I haven't gone to OTT.  I guess it will all look a little different again when the exhaust soot and general grime goes on.

Tomahawk looking chipped up

I'm hoping I haven't gone over the top with the chipping on the engine cover

the rear of the props looking quite scrubbed.

Spitfire sporting the same treatment.

The quest for Azure

Not these ones, which is spelt differently anyway.

But the colour used for the underside of RAF planes in North Africa during WWII.

I have the Airfix Curtiss Tomahawk IIB (airfix.com/curtiss-tomahawk) which I started building far too long ago.

I used the correct Humbrol 157 for the underside, thought as it was going on that it was a bit dark and grey but hoped it would dry lighter and more... well blue I guess.  But it didn't, much to my disappointment.  So I tried mixing my own but wasn't super happy and I feared I was starting to obscure the etched detail as well.
So I started to look in to the matter and was amazed at how hard it was to get an authentic Azure Blue for the underside of my little plane.  There was an 18 page discussion on  britmodeller.com for a start which took some time to go through and actually get to the answer.




Thought I was going to be getting a Vallejo bottle from somewhere on line as this was looking to be about the best, until I reached the details about Precision Paints and there excellent attempt.  But as I read further and further down the thread it appeared Humbrol had listened to their customers, and the research they had undertaken, and reformulated the colour to and excellent standard.  Problem was they hadn't changed the tins, but there was a way to tell using the numbers on the sticker on the bottom.  So the next time I was in town with more time than 

just the run in for the bog shop I nipped to the local hobby shop (mainly train stuff) and picked up a tin with the correct numbers on the bottom.

So once home and family duties out of the way I couldn't wait for the moment of truth, would this be the dull grey or a nice blue with a violet tinge.....?

The moment of truth

Success (though paler than I thought it would be)

Well as the lid was carefully prised off a light violet blue greeted my eyes, and a smile crossed my face.  Though I must admit that I thought it was way lighter than I thought it was going to be, especially compared to my amateur attempt at mixing my own version which now seemed far far too blue, as can be seen from the pic below.  The 157 Azure Blue was also a bit thinner than I thought despite some vigorous stirring and didn't coat as well as my acrylic experiences and I was fearful of the detail being totally obscured.  But we'll see how it dries and what a bit of weathering can do (even if it is my first attempt).

My own attempt next to the Humbrol 157 (still wet), the wheel wells show the original 157 which came with the kit.

In conclusion, it's taken Humbrol a long time but they've come up with the best Azure Blue around.  Just a shame they couldn't do it in acrylic as well.