Gloster Gladiator "Royal Egyptian Air Force" [ICM 1:32] - RFI

[Alex]

Annoyingly, I'm realizing now that I must have glued these resin exhausts on flipped left for right, as they do not snake the correct way around the landing gear legs when held in approximate final position.  DANG.  Now I'm going to have to figure out how to saw them off so they can be re-glued later, inevitably ending up looking like they were sawed off and re-glued, because it's not going to be possible to re-do it and have it look this smooth.

 

Meanwhile, I've painted the lower wings and am waiting for them to set up solidly before masking them off and tackling the fuselage.  That still leaves painting the the underside of the upper wing silver dope, the underside of the plane itself in that odd interwar RAF black/white pattern, and then painting the roundels and fin flashes.  Lots of painting still to go.

 

 

[Alex]

Here's the overall airframe with the camo pattern completed.

 

I painted the "silver dope" on the underside of the upper wing using a mixture of MRP Boeing Gray and Super Silver

 

 

It looks kind of odd in that photo; fortunately just looks like silver paint IRL...  I think I will do the black/white pattern on the underside of fuselage/main wings next, then tackle the insignia.  Because of the pronounced relief of the hatch covers on the rear fuselage sides, I'm thinking about doing a mix of masks and decals - the aircraft code numbers may be easier to do with decals instead of trying to fit very small masks over big bumps in the plastic.

[Dpgsbody55]

On 12/12/2022 at 11:27 PM, Alex said:

Annoyingly, I'm realizing now that I must have glued these resin exhausts on flipped left for right, as they do not snake the correct way around the landing gear legs when held in approximate final position.  DANG.  Now I'm going to have to figure out how to saw them off so they can be re-glued later, inevitably ending up looking like they were sawed off and re-glued, because it's not going to be possible to re-do it and have it look this smooth.

 

Meanwhile, I've painted the lower wings and am waiting for them to set up solidly before masking them off and tackling the fuselage.  That still leaves painting the the underside of the upper wing silver dope, the underside of the plane itself in that odd interwar RAF black/white pattern, and then painting the roundels and fin flashes.  Lots of painting still to go.

 

 

 

You could try applying some Tamiya Extra Thin glue to the join and they should come off quite easily, without any damage to the parts.  Then just re-attach correctly and repaint.  This method worked for me in my Yak-9T build when I had a problem with the wing attachment.

 

Cheers,

Michael

[Alex]

The undersides.  I've read a couple of explanations as to why this paint scheme was adopted by the interwar RAF, basically having to do with making planes visible to ground observers in the days before effective radar.  I still suspect it was really a compromise such that at least half of the plane would always be camouflaged, day or night ... ;-)

 

The white is MRP White, with about 20% MRP Boeing Gray added.  The black is Mr Color Flat Black with a pretty good dollop of white added - pure black always looks wrong to me on scale models.

[Alex]

First round of masks

 

 

White paint

 

 

Masking part B

 

 

Green paint

 

 

Going to let that harden overnight before I try to get the last bit done - which is the narrow yellow band around the outside of the fuselage roundel.

[MikeMaben]

[BradG]

Looking cool mate.

[Alex]

11 hours ago, MikeMaben said:

 

2 hours ago, BradG said:

Looking cool mate.

 

Thanks guys.  Hope to get the painting wrapped up later today.

[mozart]

I very nearly had the same problem as you Alex with those exhausts but realised at the last moment when a trial fit showed it up.  Michael's solution is the way to go I reckon.

[Alex]

Paint completed:

 

There's a touch of aliasing at the edges because I had to put on so much white paint to cover the camo.  In retrospect it would probably have been better to do these first and mask over them before doing the camo.  If I was not so rusty at this after a year plus away from the bench I would have known to go that route form the outset...

 

I did as planned and cut out the detailed centers of the roundel decals and applied them.  Looks decent - they may be ever so slightly off center on the wing roundels.  Also applied the aircraft ID codes which settled down nicely.

 

 

 

Regardless it's not all that bad and high time to declare painting done.  I'm going to give it a flat coat overall, some pastels to tone down and break up the swatches of uniform color, another flat coat, and then it's time to finally glue that upper wing in place.  If I can do that by Tuesday, then when I return from holiday travel I'll be well-positioned to tackle the quickest and least-frustrating part of any biplane project - rigging.

[denders]

Coooool!!! 

[Alex]

This is subtle but kind of cool - by "dry brushing" with pastels it's possible to add contrast to the ribbing molded into the wings.  Pastels also work well to dull down and blend in the bright clean colors of the painted-on insignia.

 

I will need to shoot a coat of clear flat over this and assess if it needs more - clearcoating in my experience always seems to diminish the visibility of pastels.

[mozart]

Soft or oil pastels Alex, and how are you applying them please? 

[Alex]

Here's the appearance after the second flat coat.

 

 

The look is a little less subtle in real life versus photos.  But you can see the effect.  Here's all of the piece parts, along with the "palette" of pastels I used.

 

 

As an aside, I used flat clear from the new "GX" line of Mr Color paints (GX-114).  Worked great.

[Alex]

5 hours ago, mozart said:

Soft or oil pastels Alex, and how are you applying them please? 

I swipe my wife's soft pastels, like there:

 

I make a palette of colors I want to use by scuffing them on little circles on a piece of P320 sandpaper.

 

I use the smallish round paintbrushes to dab on the pastels and work them around, then use the large makeup brush to brush the parts in the airflow direction to remove excess and blend the whole thing together.