atomicholiday

I've been thinking about going this route for a while now. Currently most of my tools and some of my paint are in a small toolbox. Some are in a little 3 drawer roll-away storage bin and a bunch are all over my bench. I'd like to get it all together into one unit.

Fantastic. What a cool plane.

Here's the completed cockpit. Let me know what you think.

Just a small update here. Motor is finished now. Also, I ended up stripping all the Future off the body and hood. Came off pretty easy with Windex. The only problem I had was one small piece of decal must not have been properly set. Took a small chunk of it off, so now I need to find some more decals. Then I'll decide if I go back to the old stand-by of Testors lacquer or try the Future again. Anyway, here's the finished motor-

This is starting to sound like a re-occurring theme here but, slipped with an X-acto knife in the late 70's and nailed the side of my right hand pinkie finger. I still have a fairly deep 1" scar from that one. Lesson learned: never pull the knife toward you when cutting. Or maybe we should all start using these-

If they're passing out keys, I'll take one of each please!

Wow. Love the look of the foil there. What a great project.

Beautiful build. That color looks great!

Point taken. I stripped the hood just now. All I can say is Future is awesome stuff! Came right off, left no trace it had ever been there, and the decals look great. I kept rinsing it off just to be sure, but I didn't see any issues at all. I'm gonna strip the body this weekend. This sort of makes me want to really dial in my technique with the stuff. If you screw up, there's no trip to the purple pond. Just clean it off and try again. Thanks for your input gentlemen!

Good topic. I was just thinking about this too. Something I have seen the military modellers do is to paint something in a dark grey (instead of black) and then add black wash. Eric, those look great! I need to get some of that stuff.

Nice Mach I!

I'm thinking about stripping the Future off my '69 Mach I build. I was thinking about using Windex, but will the ammonia in it hurt or remove the decals that are under the Future? I'm not worried about the paint because it's enamel and it's been on there for a long time (several years). Looked around here and elsewhere, but I couldn't find an answer. Thanks!

It's looking great Joe. Looking forward to seeing the finished project!

That's the way Ford should have built them.

Very cool idea.

That... is... killer! Loving this one so far.

First coat of clear with Future/Simple Greeen is done. Notice I said first coat. More on that in a minute. Ok, so there's good news & bad news. Good news is, as promised on swannysmodels.com, it does indeed still look wet! Some areas look spectacular. Now for the bad. It's pretty smooth for the most part, but there are some areas (like the entire roof & part of the hood) that sort of look like very tiny fish-eyes all over. Also I had a couple of very small runs. Don't know if you can see any of this in the pics though. Right now I'm thinking these flaws were more to do with my technique than with the mix. I think I got a little heavy handed with the flow. I think the stuff was really trying to level out though. Also, what's the cure time supposed to be for this stuff? I put one heck of a nasty fingerprint on the hood! And it isn't just wiping right off. I had to buff it off with 6000 grit paper. Which brings me to the second coat. I've already lightly sanded and redone the hood. We'll see how it turns out in a few days. If all goes well with that I'll do the same to the body. Otherwise, I'll be breaking out the Windex or ammonia and stripping this stuff off. Now with all that out of that way, I really have to start doing these experiments on spoons instead of stuff I care about. Since I got back into the hobby, seems like every time I pick up the airbrush, I'm shooting some weird concoction thru it that I've never tried before. Don't know why, but this time around I'm really pushing my limits and stepping out of my comfort zone (enamels). But I gotta say, I'm having a great time with it and really starting to realize that it's all about the journey. Questions, comments, suggestions always welcome!

That stuff will NEVER work! (just kidding) I'm gonna give either the light bulb or hair drying a shot pretty soon. My '59 Impala build doesn't sit level and I didn't notice until it I had the suspension on it. Thanks for the tip!

Sometimes I swear airbrushing is just voodoo. Seems like everybody does it different. That's cool though. Wouldn't be much of a challenge if the same thing worked for everyone.

If the chassis does have a twist to it, how do you straighten it?

SWEET!! Wow, that black turned out stunning!

Great looking motor Fred. Love the dipsticks and overspray on the exhaust manifold. Very cool touches. Well, I haven't had a chance to see how the clear coat turned out yet. I shot it and stuck it under a large tub to cure. Hope to get back to it tonight. It didn't look to good while I was spraying it. I hope it leveled out better. Will post pics. Gentlemen, thanks for watching!

No pics yet, but I did make a little progress on this one today. Got the cockpit and a few other pieces primed and ready for color coat. Paint should be here in a day or two. I tried using Mr. Surfacer 1500 thru the airbrush. Thinned it with lacquer thinner per suggestion. Not sure if I had the mix ratio wrong or what, but that was a pain. First off, it sprayed very grainy. I couldn't get it to go on wet at all. I had the airbrush about 4-6 inches away and still seemed like it was drying straight out of the brush. Pressure was set at around 16psi. give or take. And it was definitely drying in the airbrush and on the tip. But coverage was good and it sanded down nicely. I think before I try using Mr. Surfacer thru the airbrush again I'll pick up some Mr. Color leveling thinner. Anybody else ever tried this stuff? I'll get pics up once I get the cockpit done.

How did you get the tires to look so real?

Wow! That's sweet man! Great looking vintage Pontiac.