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Hataka Paints made in Poland


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Hello

 

Just got the new Modern Luftwaffe Paint Set Vol. 4 from Hataka, a relatively new model paint brand from Poland. This set is labeled as a Mega Pack and contains no less than eight bottles with an eye lid dropper, like Vallejo, AK, etc. The paints included are RAL7030 Steingrau, RAL7039 Quartzgrau, RAL7009 Grüngrau, RAL7012 Basaltgrau, RAL7037 Staubgrau, RAL7035 Lichtgrau, RAL7001 Silbergrau and RAL9005 Schwarz. These are the standard colours of the very attractive Norm 81 scheme of Luftwaffe F-4F from 1983 till the mid 90´s. This is a specially welcome set, because Norm 81 colours were not easy to find from other brands.

 

Hataka has released many highly interesting colours sets in the recent time. My mouth was watering more and more, but I was reluctant to get one of the new sets after my bad experience with an early USAF Vietnam colours set, which was very difficult to spray. The airbrush immediately clogged and it was impossible to spray fine lines with it. I gave it to a friend, who investigated further how to work with those, but also failed. A couple of weeks ago, I read a topic in the Czech Modelforum, where the owner of Hataka claimed, that they have changed the formula.

 

Last week, I finally have ordered the Luftwaffe Vol. 4 set from The Sockelshop in Germany and it arrived here two days later. Yesterday and today I made a couple of trials and want to let you know, what I have experienced.

 

 

Hataka.jpg

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The setup for my first trial was a 1:1 mixture of 1 part RAL7001 and the original Hataka thinner. For the camouflage scheme paintwork, I am using my trusty Harder & Steenbeck Infinity CR with the 0.2mm needle. I am having this since four years now and it is a very nice airbrush, which I highly recommend. I am also using a 1st. generation H&S Evolution from time to time, which now is 17 years old and still going strong with no malfunction.


 

Hataka%201.jpg

 

 

 

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Now it was time to load my H&S Infinity with the aboved mentioned mixture to cover a 1:48 F-15 wing part of an Academy kit with an uniform coverage of RAL7001 Silbergrau. During the painting work I felt some mixed emotions. The coverage was quite well, the finish was dead flat but unfortunately, the surface got a somewhat grainy texture, which I don´t like really. After a drying time of 30 minutes, I polished the surface slightly with my fingers and the surface now became more and more smooth. During the painting process, I already tried to spray some fine lines in order to achieve to paint free hand camouflage schmes, what I usually do. But this proved to be rather tricky, however, considerably better compared to the defunkt SEA paints from my early batch.

 

My first conclusion was, that Hataka paints diluted with their own thinner is good for spraying larger areas.

 

Test%201.jpg

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Now, I would like to spray some free hand patterns of a darker Hataka colour tone for a simulation of a camouflage scheme. Colour of choice was RAL7012 Basaltgrau and I shaked the bottle a couple of minutes, so that the paint is completely mixed. This procedure also is recommended by the producer, as with mixing it with the original thinner. However, due to the limited performance of this combination for spraying fine lines, I tried many other thinners I have by hand, like AK, Ammo of MiG, Lifecolors, Elita Lifecolours, GSI Creos, etc.. Best of these was Ammo of MIG. The Hataka paint performed quite well, but the tip of the neddle clogged after a minute. Now I only had my last round free, the last thinner which I didn´t tried before, but this has changed everything!

 

I put one drop of Hataka RAL7012 in an empty Tamiya glass jar followed by a drop of Mr. Color Leveling Thinner (Mr. CLT). My first impression while stirring was, that it will not work due to the paint´s weird behaviour with the thinner while the mixture became somewhat chewy. My luck was to put more thinner in, rather than cancelling this trial. Now I mixed one part of hataka paint with four parts of Mr. CLT. After stirring the mixture thoroughly, it adopted the consistency of milk now and to my astonishment no signs of separation were shown. It seems to work. But how does it spray, if it really does so?

 

My compressor delivered 0,8bar pressure to my Infinty and I filled in the mixture. Already from the first pull of the trigger I felt, that the behaviour of the paint has radically changed with the new thinner. I mean, it has been positively changed and I was almost overwhelmed! Wow, the paint worked like a dream, thin lines were no problem anymore. The opacity was excellent, the paint dries to a perfectly smooth satin finish now. I airbrushed some fine patterns on the F-15 wing and during the whole process, I encountered no clogging of the airbrush!

 

My conclusion now is enthusiastic. The mixture Hataka paints with Mr. CLT is an almost unbeatable combination and it does work sensationally!

 

 

Test%202.jpg

 

Edited by falcon91352
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I am very happy with the result of my trial. I will order more sets from Hataka for my future modelling projects. They probably will evolve to my first choice of modelling paints in the future. But I have a couple of wishes and recommendations to the manufacturer Hataka:

 

1.) Please develop an own high performance thinner for airbrushing purposes. Mr. CLT proves, that excellent results with the Hataka paints are possible, but not really with Hataka´s currently available own thinner.

2.) Recently, a lot of French Armée de´l Air and Aeronavale subjects have been released, but we are still missing dedicated paint sets and aparently, a lot more kits will follow. We deserve sets for different paint schemes of Mirage IIIC, Mirage IIIE/5F,        Mirage F.1, Mirage IV, Mirage 2000B/C/D/N, (Super) Etendart and the Rafales.

3.) A Swiss AF set for F-5E/F, Mirage IIIRS and Mirage IIIS would be nice too.

 

Now, my last words of this small review are:

 

Test%205.jpg

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All I can say that adhesion is excellent! After pulling off Tamiya kabuki tape from the Hataka painted surface, there is no sign of paint lifting.

 

The F-15 wing was not primed before, only sanded with 1000 grid before painting. It is common sense, that water based acrylics do not adhere well on bare plastic, but in my trials Hataka has provided no negative effect here.

Edited by falcon91352
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  • 2 weeks later...

I tried Hataka in my SOTAR airbrush with their thinner 1:1 ratio and it clogged very quickly.  I will have to give it a try with Mr. Color Leveling Thinner.  Thanks for the information.  

 

Tom

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Great information!!!  Now I won' be afraid to get some Hataka paints despite the bad reviews I have seen.  They do have some great sets!

 

Mr Color Levelling thinner is sorcery.  It literally makes everything it touches better.  Recently a friend told me to use MCLT in Alclad Gloss Black base, as I had issues with it not laying down great sometimes and it always took forever to cure.  It solved both of those problems for me!

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