Paint problem

[Unglued]

How does one go about painting neat-looking yellow circles on a 1/72-scale bomb? I'm thinking about figuring a way to chuck these things in my variable speed drill. Is there a better way?

[Kaibutsu]

You might be able to use a Circle Template.

Select the correct size for the bomb, paint the circle template Yellow and insert bomb.

My 2 ¢

[huntermountain]

Go to your local hardware store, and get yourself a set of washers. Usually you can get sets with various types and diameters of washers. Now paint the area where the stripe needs to be yellow, after it dries, search for the right diameter washer, and put it on the bomb. Spray/paint the rest of the bomb in the right colour. After you remove the washer, you should be left with a nice, crisp and straight yellow line around the bomb.

Edited because of hamfistedness

Edited August 8, 2012 by huntermountain

[breadneck]

How about you paint the whole bomb yellow, then you just cut some thin tamiya masking tape to the desired width with a metal ruler, mask the area to be designated "yellow stripes" and voila! Certainly you will get a good result if you spray paint the bomb, so why not make a bundle while your at it ;-)

[Unglued]

How about you paint the whole bomb yellow, then you just cut some thin tamiya masking tape to the desired width with a metal ruler, mask the area to be designated "yellow stripes" and voila! Certainly you will get a good result if you spray paint the bomb, so why not make a bundle while your at it ;-)

Why didn't I think about painting these stripes BEFORE I painted six bombs olive drab?!!

Other than the tape being tricky to get hold of and wrap neatly around the rounded ends of bombs that ranging in diameters of from 1/16 to 1/8 of an inch, I think it would give the cleanest edges.

The idea of using washers to mask off the area probably wouldn't work because the bombs aren't perfectly round and the washers are. Paint would work around them. But the washers gives me an idea. Maybe I can find rubber "O" rings of the right size.

One other idea occurred to me, and I think it's a good one: Just paint the tip of the M-82s and M-117s yellow instead of painting a stripe, as they sometimes did in the field in Viet Nam. With my fly-tying awl, I pierced a tiny hole in a latex glove. By stretching the latex and putting the end of the bomb in the hole, being careful not to tear the latex with the bomb fuse, and then oh-so-carefully pulling the bomb to 3/64" from the end, I've created one clean line up to which I can paint yellow. Now all I have to do is remove the OD from the tip, paint on a white base coat and then a couple of coats of yellow. And that still doesn't address how I'm going to paint the yellow and red stripes on my BLU-27 napalm bombs.

And there's this other problem. With all my muttering, moaning and groaning, my wife is starting to wonder what I'm doing in my man cave. How do I explain this in such a way that 1) she won't call the guys in the white outfits, and 2) she won't leave me?

Added a couple hours later: OK, just tried the "pin-hole in the latex glove" method and it works for making a clean line between the OD and the yellow tip on the bomb. Little flaws in the edge can be cleaned up with a sharp X-acto knife. This method solves my problem for this model (A-1H), but I'm still looking for a method of making clean stripes on 1/72 scale weapons. And please don't suggest decals.

Edited August 8, 2012 by Unglued

[breadneck]

You should be able to think outside of the box sometimes! i assume you already have installed the latest microsoft windows (®)ight? Must keep up to speck :-) Well if those yellow rings are supposed to be transferred onto the curved part of the bombs (tips/beehind) well then my method may be tricky enough (you do not need the Tamiya tape) BTW, your idea of mounting the bombs in a drill chuck is not a bad one (slow rpm`s) but then you would have to be able to place the bombs pretty much in the center of the pivoting action. And they may be less than perfectly rounded as far as i remember. One other more complicated method is to use parafilm(®)and thread it over the tips/length of the bombs and then insert the bombs into a drill chuck, start up and use a sharp blade (ultra high precision) and squeese the tip of the blade onto the point of the masked areas, then peel of the "yellow areas" sounds complicated, but then again the lengths we go to

Edited August 8, 2012 by breadneck

[Unglued]

Breadneck, you'll be proud to know I'm using your "paint it all" technique on my BLU-27 napalm bombs (which get red stripes, not red and yellow, as I mentioned earlier in this excruciating thread). It works great on those larger sized bombs. Thanks.

[Fly-n-hi]

Here's a tip:

Next time you get a decal sheet that has the yellow curved decals for bomb stripes scan it into your computer. Then you can print out that sheet and presto...you have a mask template that you can use to cut out your own stripes. Paint the bomb yellow first then apply the masks.

You could also use use drafters templates with the elliptical edges to get some curved masks.

Depending on how round/bulged the bombs are straight masks work just fine if cut thin...like Mk 82s for example. Those big round WWII bombs would need the curved masks.

Edited August 9, 2012 by Fly-n-hi

[The Keeper]

, just tried the "pin-hole in the latex glove" method and it works for making a clean line between the OD and the yellow tip on the bomb. Little flaws in the edge can be cleaned up with a sharp X-acto knife. This method solves my problem for this model (A-1H), but I'm still looking for a method of making clean stripes on 1/72 scale weapons

Now do that twice, first with yellow then with OD and you'll have yourself a stripe instead of a yellow nose.

As mentioned above, you can use decals or circle templates to cut yourself some " C " shapes out of tape which you can then use to mask your rings.

hth

[Unglued]

Now do that twice, first with yellow then with OD and you'll have yourself a stripe instead of a yellow nose.

hth

Why didn't I think of that? Thanks!

[Unglued]

Here's a tip:

Next time you get a decal sheet that has the yellow curved decals for bomb stripes scan it into your computer. Then you can print out that sheet and presto...you have a mask template that you can use to cut out your own stripes. Paint the bomb yellow first then apply the masks.

You could also use use drafters templates with the elliptical edges to get some curved masks.

Depending on how round/bulged the bombs are straight masks work just fine if cut thin...like Mk 82s for example. Those big round WWII bombs would need the curved masks.

Thanks, Fly-n-hi.

[breadneck]

This just came to me. I was watching one of those WWII combat films on Youtube the other day, and they usually show the bombs being released. It does seem that most ordnance had a terrible tear on them (especially bombs) atleast the allied ones as far as i can see. So i guess some sort off metal chipping effect is not completely out of the question. So then painting the bomb yellow would not work that well anyway :-(

[toadwbg]

for 1/72 scale just draw-in your Yellow ring with a Yellow Prismacolor pencil.

Drink a Beer or 3 while your doing it too

[caycebugs]

Glue bombs together, paint, cut thin strips of yellow Tamiya tape, wrap around end, dip in Future, let dry. I used toothpicks with blue tack in bomb fin to dip and then stuck in styrofoam to dry.

Edited August 21, 2012 by caycebugs

[Doughboy]

FWIW I would not worry too much about it. A lot of the bombs we used did not have a clean edge especially in the AOR. Here is a pic of some 82s I took at Bagram showing what I mean.

The 82/84s we see commonly stateside are typically in better condition than the AOR bombs. The lines are cleaner and the OD is fresher. However every 82/83/84 I've ever seen in the USAF the tip of the nose is painted yellow. The Navy uses the stripes. BLU-109/113s M-117s are a different story they use stripes.

Edited August 21, 2012 by Doughboy

[Kaibutsu]

Hey DoughBoy,

Great pictures, but what's with the beer cans in the second picture?

Just wondering

[Doughboy]

Hey DoughBoy,

Great pictures, but what's with the beer cans in the second picture?

Just wondering

That is from AFCOMAC at Beale AFB. USAF Ammo troops have to go up there for training starting at E-5. We go up there lean a bunch of war fighting planning and execution things. This culminates in a week long exercise. Deployed students build the bombs and the people permanently stationed there tear down the built up munitions and put them back in the igloos. Tradition is that when we do a build that requires nose support cups we put beer in the fuze wells for the permanent party guys to enjoy. So we built up a bunch of G-38s and put the beer in the noses for them!