TheFlyingDutchman Posted July 14, 2013 Share Posted July 14, 2013 This is my entry for the Africa GB. It's a Canadair/Bombardier Regional Jet CRJ-200. The CRJ series are a stretched and upgraded version of the Challenger business jet. The CRJ-200 is the shortest member of this family, followed by the CRJ-700, CRJ-900 and the CRJ-1000. I'm using Revell's 1:144th scale CL-604 Challenger kit with BraZ Models' resin conversion set. I used the nose of the Revell fuselage on a CRJ-900 model from Authentic Airliners to give it a transparent cockpit window. The decals will be home-made. I don't know yet how I will do the giraffe design on the tail and winglets, but it will be either done free-hand with a brush, or masked and airbrushed. The first option seems to be the easiest one, as the tail is only approx. 2 x 2 cm. greets Jelle Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Kingoalie Posted July 14, 2013 Share Posted July 14, 2013 Neat subject. How do you like the BraZ fuselage and wings? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted July 14, 2013 Author Share Posted July 14, 2013 It looks very good, it's sharply casted and almost looks like injected plastic parts. The fitting on top of the fuselage is perfect, on the belly there is a nasty gap but nothing some putty can't fix. The resin is quite brittle, however, so I broke the tail off of one half and caused a large crack through the fuselage when I tried to remove some resin to fit the main wheel bay. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Kingoalie Posted July 14, 2013 Share Posted July 14, 2013 Good to know, thanks. I may have to pick this conversion up as I love "simple" conversions! Quote Link to post Share on other sites
FokkerFan Posted July 14, 2013 Share Posted July 14, 2013 Nice project Jelle. What will you do with the cockpit window? Are you going to fill the gap? It should turn into a nice model. Ingmar Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted July 15, 2013 Author Share Posted July 15, 2013 Nice project Jelle. What will you do with the cockpit window? Are you going to fill the gap? It should turn into a nice model. Ingmar I bought another half built Challenger for a few euros from someone on Modelbrouwers so I will use the clear window part from that kit. I can try to make a new window on the other one by scratch but that won't turn out as neat as using the original part so I will use the part on the Zambezi as it has cost me some more than the donor kit :) Quote Link to post Share on other sites
LHRHKG Posted July 15, 2013 Share Posted July 15, 2013 Nice livery. Look forward to seeing your progress on this one. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Living Legend Posted July 17, 2013 Share Posted July 17, 2013 Awesome subject! I've been trying with no luck to get someone to make decals for their 735. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted August 1, 2013 Author Share Posted August 1, 2013 (edited) Here it is all blu-tacked together. The fuselage has been puttied and sanded and I applied some alu paint to see if the seams are completely gone. It looks good on top but the belly needs some more attention. I decided to remove the resin tailfin as the halves fitted quite badly, but the tail is identical to the original CL-604 tail so I can just use the plastic kit tail instead. Edited August 1, 2013 by TheFlyingDutchman Quote Link to post Share on other sites
vince14 Posted August 5, 2013 Share Posted August 5, 2013 I'm liking this a lot! Vince Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted August 19, 2013 Author Share Posted August 19, 2013 I applied the first layers of white paint. It needs a few more layers as the panel lines still appear too dark. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted August 25, 2013 Author Share Posted August 25, 2013 Another update. I airbrushed the tail and outboard side of the winglets in a light khaki colour. I then painted the giraffe spots by hand, without masking. Also I airbrushed the wing's leading edges and engine pylons aluminium. I hope you like it :) greets Jelle Quote Link to post Share on other sites
ChernayaAkula Posted August 25, 2013 Share Posted August 25, 2013 Nice! Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Kingoalie Posted August 26, 2013 Share Posted August 26, 2013 Looks great! Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted August 26, 2013 Author Share Posted August 26, 2013 Thanks!! It needs some touch-ups and it looks a bit messy on the tail's leading edge but that will be covered by another aluminium painted strip. The stabilizer is still dry-fitted. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted August 29, 2013 Author Share Posted August 29, 2013 The brown spots were a little too small, leaving a bit too much khaki coloured open spaces. I fixed that. Also I attached the VERY tiny fiddly landing gear. I then designed and printed the decals. I did this with nothing more than some standard software. The Chipolopolo banners were drawn in MS Paint, which is not a very sophisticated program to say the least, but I drew it in a quite large format (about 500 x 100 pixels). I then imported this picture in MS Word and scaled it to the right size, which is about 2 cm. It looks just fine, no visible pixels at all. The Zambezi titles are typed in a Font that is very similar to the original (I believe it was Verdana) with some little adaptions like a slightly larger space in between the letters and a gap in the bottom of the 'a' using a thin white line figure, also in Word. The big advantage of printing decals directly from Word, if you have a font that is a close match, is that all letters are vector based files which means they come out of your printer without any visible pixeling, no matter what size they are. A tricky part is getting the colour right, which is why a printed a second set of Zambezi logos as the other ones were too dark. I printed most of the set twice, just in case. And here it is with some decals already applied, next to its big Estonian brother (CRJ-900). greets Jelle Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Kingoalie Posted August 29, 2013 Share Posted August 29, 2013 It's coming along nicely! Great job on the decals too. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted November 10, 2013 Author Share Posted November 10, 2013 (edited) I have been waiting for the Nazca Decals CRJ-100/200 detail set for over three months (I don't know why, but I've got them and that's what counts) and it was worth the wait. One problem I always encounter though with Nazca Decals is the thick carrier film. I tried DACO strong decal setting this time and it actually worked, when you make sure the setting comes under the decal as well they settle down quite nicely. The downside is that my home made decals were absolutely not resistant to the strong stuff, so they were destroyed. This did not really matter as I originally printed them on white decal paper because I ran out of transparent paper. I printed the new ones on transparent paper and it looks better. I sealed the model to protect my home made decals from the DACO setting when applying the rest of the small detail decals from the Nazca sheet. I already applied the wing's flight control surface panelling and the cabin door outlines. Here's what the little giraffe looks like at the moment: greets Jelle Edited November 10, 2013 by TheFlyingDutchman Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted November 15, 2013 Author Share Posted November 15, 2013 The little giraffe is finished!! Together with its Estonian brother, the CRJ-900 At Lusaka Airport: And flying along the Tanzanian Kilimanjaro B) greets Jelle Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Litvyak Posted November 15, 2013 Share Posted November 15, 2013 Jelle, that looks great! (So does the Estonian one!) Quote Link to post Share on other sites
vince14 Posted November 17, 2013 Share Posted November 17, 2013 Nice work! Vince Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheFlyingDutchman Posted November 19, 2013 Author Share Posted November 19, 2013 Thanks!! :) Quote Link to post Share on other sites
swbailey Posted November 21, 2013 Share Posted November 21, 2013 Real sharp looking bird! Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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