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Vallejo paint is lousy. In more ways than one.


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20 hours ago, Otto said:

I will use the Agama paints where I can. Looking at the pictures above, none of them look even close to RLM 82. 82 is actually a very dark green Unfortunately there is no FS comparison I can compare it to. There is no green dark enough on the chart. If I was forced to pick a FS color than it would be 24052 but more green but that dark.

Interesting.  I always thought RLM 83 was a very dark green and 82 was light.   😮

Edited by Falconxlvi
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If I remember my history right, Model Master got RLM 82 & 83 reversed.I do remember going through the paint shelf renumbering bottles because they screwed that up.

 

 Not that it matters much on my bench these days anyway-I made the switch to Colourcoats long ago.

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The Modelmaster 82 I have is the right shade but just too light. The 83 is a very bright green. Now that you mentioned that, that is exactly what "Vallejo" did. the bottles of RLM 82 I bought, some were actually RLM 83. I never thought of cross-referencing that mistake.

Edited by Otto
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When I got back in to the hobby last summer I bought the old stand by testors enamels. It had been 30 years and that was pretty much the standard back then. I built a couple starter models and decided to dive into acrylics. I've been airbrushing a long time outside of modeling and from some of the reviews Vallejo was the way to go and Hobby Lobby carries them. I started with my Williams Brothers Gee Bee. I sprayed the Vallejo primer coat down and let it dry +12 hours (work) and when I taped off the scallops I had to do adjustments to the curves. The second time I pulled the tape up to adjust the curve the primer came off in a big sheet.  I'm using low tack automotive pin striping tape and Tamiya yellow tape. Since the primer layer was ruined I played around with rubbing it with my fingers and different grades of tape. Fortunately/Unfortunately the primer came off easily. I resprayed with Testors enamel and all was right with the world. My second mistake was using the Vallejo clear coat. Not having learned my lesson I shot the model with V. Gloss Clear and it is still soft after 2 months. I can't handle the model bare fingered, any heat from my fingers softens it up almost instantly.  I may be on lesson 3 now but so far the Tamiya acrylics are working great. I'm seeing a lot of negative comments about them here but so far they are working beautifully. I can get them fairly local and at $2.50 a jar I'm not complaining. TIme will tell.

 

Jim

Edited by jimharley
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First of all there is nothing you can put over enamel but another enamel. That is the main disadvantage. The Tamiya is not a true acrylic. It is an Alcohol based paint. Yes they are much more durable but the colors will never match real world colors. The Modelmaster and Polly scale colors are very good Acrylics but they are all "scale lightened". In their own way, I'm quite sure that all of these paints are fine paints. It just depends on how finicky a modeler is about truth of color. Since I was the SNCOIC in charge of restorations for the Air-Ground team Marine Corps museum in Quantico Va for quite a few years, paint research is an obsession for me. I never give up until all the research is done and verified to the best of my ability. The best place to research the late war German colors is in the Czech republic since most of those colors were used well post war and just renamed with the Czech standards. They are still well documented. They are actually better documented then some of the later paints out of the 70s and 80s when everything went to pot. Russian colors are also very well documented from the earlier periods and so are British to this day. Most of those colors had stricter standards then FS colors have had in the past. I was also in charge of corrosion control in F-4, C-130 and UH-1N squadrons and can testify that I had 5-6 shades of gray on an aircraft that was all supposed to be the same color. Paint colors are just an obsession with me. 

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The Vallejo primer is utter garbage. It sticks to nothing. Considering adhesion is one of two or three major reasons to use a primer, complete BS. I had the same

experience as above. I use Tamiya spray or AMMO one shot primers. 

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1 hour ago, ESzczesniak said:

The Vallejo primer is utter garbage. It sticks to nothing. Considering adhesion is one of two or three major reasons to use a primer, complete BS. I had the same

experience as above. I use Tamiya spray or AMMO one shot primers. 

 

Agreed.  The only acrylic primers I use are Mission Models and Badger Stynylrez (which is also repackaged as Ammo One Shot primer and UMP primer).

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I have never used a primer under any paint or color on a model. Even though I should have on some yellows. I never found the need to use primer. I mix my own reducer and it also works as a surface wash which helps with adhesion.

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As little as I have used these new "Spanish" made paints, I have found that the AK Interactive has the best adhesion better than the MiG and Vallejo paints. The Vallejo paints are actually worse in adhesion than the artists paints I buy at Hobby Lobby. But having said that they still adhere quite well. It still takes a lot of fingernail scratch pressure to scrape them off. The Polly Scale, Model Master. AK, and Agama I can't scratch off with my thumb nail. The Agama and AK paints adhere as well as the old Model Master and Polly Scale paints. Due to good authenticity I will always go to the Agama first.

Edited by Otto
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Since I will not be using Vallejo very much if at all I wont worry about it. I am satisfied with the AK paints though. Now we will see how accurate, if at all they are. Up to this point I have not been impressed at all with the accuracy of the Spanish paints.

Edited by Otto
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At this time I am building a 1/48 Grunau Baby II from Fly Models and needed a "cream" color for it. At first I figured it would be RLM 05 which was prescribed before the war for training aircraft. I bought the Vallejo RLM 05 since that is the only one I could find. It is EXTREMELY yellow. Not really much different from RLM 04. I have seen a few color pictures of German training aircraft from before the war and they looked nothing like the Vallejo RLM 05. So I bought the AK Interactive AK009 "Dunkelgelb" and it looks 1000% better. If it is not right on than it is EXTREMELY close. I think in this case unless someone puts a authentic color chip next to it (which I don't even know it exists) it will definitely pass. The dark greens, RLM 82 and RLM 71 I need for some post war Czech aircraft such as the Czech He-111, He-219, Me-109, La-7 and La-9. The Czechs used the RLM-71 for bombers and RLM 82 for the fighters, under their own paint codes. The Cream and a lot of RLM 02 was also used by the Czechs. Not to mention the underside RLM blues

Edited by Otto
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