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VFC-12 Ambush 06 - FINISHED!


Dragon

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I'm gonna color my world blue with Academy's F/A-18C dressed up as a VFC-12 Ambush adversary bird. I'll be using Fightertown Decals to do Ambush 06. In addition to the decals, I'll be using an aftermarket seat and of course the mandatory G-Factor brass landing gear.

 

PIJLZTC.jpg

dYoZcaE.jpg

 

I'll be trying out the Bombshell Brew paints on this build, anxious to see how they perform. Supposed to be a rainy day in the PNW, so it'll be a good excuse to jump into this build.

 

Mike 

Edited by Dragon
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I decided to start this build off doing the centerline fuel tank. I wanted to do a quick and simple subassembly, so I could try out the Bombshell Brew paint. My paint of choice is Mr Color, and although I'm really happy with how it performs for me especially when doing freehand camo work, I'm always open to trying a new product. 

 

I really like the squeeze drop bottle Bombshell uses, makes paint dispensing easy, and the bottles have, what I'm assuming is, a ball bearing to aid mixing when shaking the bottle. The line has a wide range of colors for adversary aircraft which suits me with my current interest in adversary aircraft. After playing around with the paint consistency and air pressures for awhile, I found a combination that I thought performed the best for me. So, I tired it out on the fuel tank:

8uOsAfZ.jpg

I found the paint sprayed and covered nicely without any issues (the tank as pictured has a coat of Tamiya X-22). I still need to play around with the paint consistency and air pressures though as I wasn't able to get a nice tight demarcation line between colors that I like. More practice needed!

 

A couple of other issues were exposed though. First, the paint colors don't match the decal colors.  I've read it's difficult for decal printers to match the FS colors. I've had similar issues with low-viz decals. The second issue, the paint colors don't match the colors of the aircraft, see the pic posted by Lud13; their hue or shade just isn't the same as the colors on the aircraft. I understand that lighting conditions, camera settings, and one's computer screen settings can affect how the colors are seen, but to me, they aren't close. 

 

I'm going to get some AKAN paints and see how they look.

 

Mike

Edited by Dragon
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Shawn - some great shots you have there. I'll definitely be using them for reference. Thanks!

 

Maru - thanks for the encouragement. Hopefully, I can do it justice!

 

A small and quick update. I ordered two AKAN paint sets from Linden Hill. One, is the Russian Deck Aviation set, and the other is the USSR Deck Aviation set. Fingers crossed the colors are a better match. 

 

I spent the evening painting the wheel wells white and prepared them for a wash. I'll let the paint and clear top coat dry a couple of days before applying the wash. 

 

I've also decided to do something I never do and that is to use a resin cockpit. Reading folks posts about their frustrations and the challenges getting resin pits to fit was something I didn't need to inflict on myself. However, I have been wanting to expand my modeling skills and test myself, so why not give this a try. Any advice is most welcomed!

 

After painting the wheel wells, I started cleaning up some of the resin pieces that were the easiest to cleanup.

xyi31im.jpg

I need to cut the pour block off the pit piece and the ejection seat. The seat comes with PE seatbelts, never used these either. Should be comical figure them out.

 

Stay tuned for me probably getting frustrated and bailing to a seat with cast seatbelts!

 

Mike

Edited by Dragon
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Jim - yes, it is the Aires cockpit, and and I agree on the detail, very nice. I can see why folks include resin cockpits in their builds! Happy to hear the fit wasn't all that difficult. If I may ask, how much of the resin cockpit bottom did you have to remove? The kit cockpit has a notch in the bottom to allow the top of the front wheel well to attach to it. How did you address this with the resin cockpit?

 

Thanks,

Mike

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Yeah, I had to sand the bottom pretty hard to get it to fit - it was quite papery and translucent by the time I got it where it needed to be, but I managed not to sand through it. As with most things in modelling, taking your time and checking regularly is the key. I started with my Dremel but finished off with hand sanding.

 

Jim

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Nice start Mike. What's life without setting yourself a little resin challenge - as Jim says, sand, fit, repeat (ad infinitum)... 

 

Torben

 

 Torben - Yeah, I figured it was time to test myself with a resin challenge plus encouragement from my wife helped too!

 

Well, I've decided to go all in with this resin challenge, so I picked up the Rhino Modelworks intakes and exhausts for this build.

ZijVpgT.jpgWith all this resin, it's a good thing I have the G-Factor landing gear!

 

The AKAH paints arrived today.

9X4cuUp.jpg

I'll start spraying it later this week. Fingers crossed the colors are a closer match to the decal colors.

 

Since I'll be playing with PE on this build, I figured I'd better get a proper tool to work it. So, I picked up a Hold and Fold.

z9dBGq7.jpg

And here are my first pieces using the Hold and Fold tool:

qdOYs9v.jpg

This tool is pretty slick! Definitely makes PE easier to work with.

 

I also made some progress on the front wheel well:

oAqQptk.jpg

I still need to add a little wash to dirty it up a bit and give it some depth.

 

That's it for now.

 

Mike

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