Modeling Nostalgia: My First Model Kit

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4 responses to “Modeling Nostalgia: My First Model Kit”

1. February 25, 2020

   Lee Fogel

   That’s right on the money, Jon. Thanks for sharing your memories and the good times that we, as a generation, shared back in those days. ‘Nostalgia builds’ will never die off…the memories they help bring to the surface are part of our core as kid and later as an adult.

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   1. February 25, 2020

      Jon Bius

      Thanks so much Lee!

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2. February 25, 2020

   Guest

   I never got to know or appreciate my parents (divorce and whatnot), so, I’ll just cut to something I have come to appreciate, is that no matter how mediocre my older models are, they still look ok when viewed from a distance. 🙂 Which is why I enjoy having scale models around, and hopefully I will improve on the task of making seams flush and painting stuff properly without ending up with more random selections of paints or hues. Seems like recent projects is a humbling experience and only recently did I learned to clean up seams for good, by sanding over the layer of primer paint for a resulting 100% smooth surface. Too much paint and panel lines risk being filled up, even with an airbrush apparently, but I suppose one can always re-scribe the panel lines.

   These are the latest improvements, which is a big deal for me:
   1) I’ve finally learned to airbrush on Vallejo Glossy Black primer to get a smooth finish. Trick is to thin the damn paint.
   2) I’ve finally become comfortable airbrushing on Humbrol Clear gloss coat, at 7-8 psi. A basic requirement is that the model surface is prepared to be as smooth as possible, from clean plastic, to primer paint, to color and finally any gloss coat that is covering the model.
   3) Somehow, I had until very recently never leanred to clean the nozzle cap for my airbrush (Iwata HP-CS Eclipse 0.35 big self centering nozzle). No idea what impact that might have had previously.
   4) I am now sifting all the paint I am using, and I am using a 10 ml jar to mix it all in before I pour the paint over into the airbrush cup. Apparently, especially with Vallejo primer, lumps of paint seems certain to help clog my airbrush.
   5) I will invest in a glassfiber pen (2mm) to clean up excess glue from gluing on photo etch, this will help a lot. I also got myself a bottle of de-bonder for the cyanoacrylate, but I think the liquid seem to maybe eat into the plastic.

   Something I will try out when masking canopies, is to just place bits of masking tape onto the canopy, then draw with a pen the approximate shape, then take the tape off, and then try cut the masking tape into shape. I tried cutting the tape into shape directly on the model, but that did not end well for me.

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3. February 25, 2020

   Guest

   Btw, I learned a new trick from others the other day.

   You can take a bicycle wire (I’ve tried this mself), and then strip the outer layer of wiring, and you get to the core part, which looks a lot like a tank towing cable in 1:35 scale, and apparently the right size too. I am reading that the metal can be annealed with heat to become soft, but I haven’t tried that yet.

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