Justin Davenport

Thanks John...and you will now see it finished, she is DONE. More pics in the finished entries section and in the critique corner.

That's my favorite part of modeling....the time when I'm about to put the decals on, the time when the major painting is done and the bird isn't finished but it looks substantially like what will end up on the display shelf. The time when I'm doing the decals, applying the finishing touches. I've just glued on the landing gear, I'll go to bed and let it dry overnight, then put on the stabilizers and gear doors, then it'll be finished. Justin

Oh yeah, I'm up for that. These kinds of group builds are the most fun, the ones like this and the last Matchbox GB as well as the upcoming Monogram GB. By the way, Phil, I'll try to make the meeting tomorrow, if the weather's OK. The last time I drove when it was snowing on the benches I did a 180 in my now sold Mazda pickup. Anyway, I've thought about entering something in that chapter's Airfix challenge, but going across the Point of the Mountain is a bridge too far....but if there's something like that planned for our chapter or the Gathering I'm totally up for that. I've got some mor

Thanks both of you....here's one last shot from tonight. I've gotten the TWA decals on - except for the registration, flag, and door decals, those will come tomorrow or Tuesday. It was a struggle to get the stripes on but with some help from the extra striping they had for the 727-100, I got the job done. The bird will look pretty good from about 2-3 feet away but I don't think it'll win any contests. However, I got some good practice on gloss white and BMF, those two are never easy.

Here's the underside, before I got the gloss white on. The underside is Alclad Polished Aluminum over Painter's Touch gloss black. I used SNJ powder to further polish the finish.

I spent the last two weekends working on this bird....finally got a decent Alclad finish for the underside but had a disaster with my engine nacelles so I've rebuilt and redone them. At least it was the engine nacelles and not the airframe itself. I also got the gloss white on...using several coats of Tamiya white primer followed by light coats of Painter's Touch gloss white (Spray can). I had to do some sanding and respray a few times....the bird doesn't look perfect but it looks good enough.

Yes, I am using Alclad II. I've seen a number of posts from British modelers saying they use Halfords spray paints and their models looked good...but I'm afraid I've never heard of that brand being available here in the states. At your average Home Depot you'll find Krylon, Painter's Touch, etc....I've used Krylon gloss and flat white in the past with decent results. But yeah, you do get a lot more paint for your money with those big tall cans. Justin

Thanks Ray....I've now masked off the wings and painted the engine nacelles gloss black in preparation for Alclad. (Painter's Touch Gloss Black works great, I've heard so many bad things about the Alclad Black Primer I won't touch it with a 10 foot pole). After I get the Polished Aluminum areas done I'll mask them off, then it's on to the white. Justin

Thanks, Little Bird. I wish I had some further updates but I will be getting to the seats this week. As for the thrusters, I'm still trying to think that one through. Maybe I can get some milliput and practice....or use some evergreen styrene. Justin

PM inbound.

I built that kit a loooong time ago when I was still in high school. And now I have another one in my stash and I want to build it someday. Maybe as part of the Monogram GB? The missiles all look the part and I don't remember any major fit problems. Justin

Thanks both of you. Alby, I wouldn't mind some pics of Ramon's 1981 jet, as I would like to do one of the Osirak jets as it was during the raid, if not now, then sometime later. Justin

Here's the cockpit interior. I used Tamiya USAF Light Gray rattle can plus Polly Dark Gull Gray. Windshield frames (the interior frames) are gloss black, the top of the instrument panel coaming is flat black. Next up: working on the seats, then the wheel wells and maybe the RCS thrusters. I'm trying to come up with a good approach for them as I want to do the shuttle as it would have appeared during reentry and landing. (During launch the thrusters are covered with white covers). Any thoughts on that? I've heard of others using Milliput but I've never used that stuff yet. Then again, I

I've done some work on the star trackers and the cockpit....the weather FINALLY got good enough to spray so I made the most of it today. During the work on the trackers I drilled in the wrong place and had to use filler to get the hole filled in, then drill another hole in the right place. Mission accomplished.

Thanks, both of you....I've been kinda busy with other projects and studying for my CCNA test. But I'll be resuming my work on this bird soon. I'm thinking I'll do the current bird as I have the references for it (thanks to Isaac Gershman's site and others), and it will match well with my shuttle Columbia which will be done as it was during STS-107. It looks like Ramon's bird has a smoke tinted canopy instead of a gold tint if I looked at the pic on the link iaf-man provided correctly, so unless advised otherwise I'll try to tint it using Tamiya Smoke. Thanks again. Justin

Well....the weather in Salt Lake turned bitter cold just after my last update and my airbrush compressor gave out so I had to replace it. I've finally been able to resume serious work just this month, and after some struggle I found the right mix of thinner and paint to get my homebrew Coroguard to work:

The weather finally warmed up enough for me to get a move on the 727, I may be able to make it with that. But I won't be able to get to any of the others I'd planned on doing, so the Mig-29 and 727 will be my contributions. Justin

Thanks for these pictures! I plan on going back to Washington this spring to walk around the Enterprise and see Space Ship One. Justin

Thanks Chris....it's too bad my local hobby shops don't have Xtracolor. And I don't think I'll be ordering from Hannants just for the decals. I'll try again with my homebrew Tamiya mix and see if I can get a good mix of thinner and paint. If not....I'll ask around the IPMS chapter and see if anyone else replies here. Previous threads on Coroguard were where I got the idea for the Tamiya mix in the first place. Justin

I am SO in!!!! I've got lots of candidate kits. Justin

Yesterday the weather finally warmed up some, so I tried to spray my "Coroguard" mix (Tamiya metallic gray and white) on my Airfix Boeing 727. However, the paint comes out with small "chunks" in it and I never could get it quite right, so I'm wondering what to do. I used a lot of Tamiya thinner and the chunks disappeared but the paint was too thin, so maybe I just need to experiment till I get the right mix. But are there any spray can alternatives to this that would make a decent Coroguard? Or any other suggestions? Thanks. Justin

hey Cheetah! Go for the F-16N. Aggressors are always great. Justin

Good work....I hope to see the finished product. I have that kit and thought about starting it sometime soon....did you rescribe the panel lines? I may try that or just build it out of the box and see how well I can do the black color scheme myself (I will do black when I get to the X-15, I just can't see that bird in any other color on my shelf). Justin

Sweet work on that P-40, nice paint job and overall work. I have 2 of those kits in my stash....I started on one of them but didn't get far (just interior coloring) and another one I don't think has been started. I wish May would hurry up and get here already. I'm dying to do another one of those Monogram kits.....as soon as I'm done with my CCNA studying and finishing up some other kits I was already working on (like the Airfix 727, the Raam, and maybe the PL Enterprise I was working on last winter) May will probably be close at hand anyway. And the P-40 will be one of my entries. I ha

Thanks! For this build I only brushed on Future at the areas where the decals would be applied, not on the whole a/c itself. (I didn't even do the windshield!). I applied the decals while the Future was still wet and the result worked, there really isn't any noticeable silvering on the bird. During the paintjob I made sure to brush everything in the same direction and use several thin coats. I also used a very small 20/0 brush to "draw" the outlines of the dark earth bands, then used the larger brush to fill in the rest of the dark earth areas, with touchups applied by the small brush.