stefanwest

Going for another old kit. As you can see the decals cannot be used so I made a new set. One on a clear decal sheet and another on white. We will see how it turns out.

It is weird to see a phantom with the longer landing gear up front. Guess that was for carrier landings?

That looks awesome!

I used the normal Aluminum. I also used Alclad clear gloss before applying decals and after. I was worried because the decals were original and in excellent shape but very thin. I trimmed them but they tended to curly up on me. The black letter decals left a haze on the finish but once I applied the Alclad clear gloss over them, they blended into the finish really nice. Speaking of EC-121 Warning Star. I have the Heller/Humbrol kit of that plane. I plan on painting it OOB which will be white and Dark Sea Blue which is the Navy version of the Warning Star.

Here it is. Completed.

Getting close to being done. Cockpit leading wing edges painted. Just need to do some touchup and then put on the decals and landing gear.

Here are some pictures. Another test fit of the engines. :)

Created some panel masks using the cutter. Hopefully they will show up as a different shade when I spray Alclad.

Just a quick note on the cutter. Creating your own decals using blank decal paper and then have the cutter cut them out will work because the software will print guidelines (basically some black lines) along with the images it prints when it uses the ink jet printer. The cutter has a sensor that will look for these guidelines so it knows exactly where to start cutting. The software handles this. So cutting new decals on white decal paper and have it trimmed should work. I have a few projects I would like to try. Below is my Airfix Chipmunk with recreated decals. I had to hand trim the decals created on white decal paper so this would have been a good project to try that.

Landing gear ready for paint. Wings attached and gaps filled in. Just need to replace panel lines and then ready for paint. Test fitting all four engines. Starting to look good.

The cutter looks like a ink jet printer. Instead of ink cartridges it has a knife blade. Never tried this but you create you own nose art for aircraft and then let the cutter cut it out with no extra decal film showing up on models. Especially planes with metal finish. Bought the cutter as a starter kit. Think I paid around $250.00 for the whole setup.

It is called Silouette SD. It is a hobby version of a vinyl cutter. Bought it from USCutter.com. Difference is the software will allow you to use any kind of picture, clip art or computer font for use in cutting. I use it for creating masks buy cutting blue tape. You can also use software to create design and print that to decal paper using regular printer then send the design to the cutter and cut the design out from the paper. Have done that with label paper for another hobby. This is different from the Cricket cutter you see in Walmart. That system only cuts images stored on cartridges.

Using the original decals to make it a military transport plane. Going to try and use Alclad for the finish. The propellers and engine cowlings are already done and painted with Alclad.

Bought this from a vendor at our last IPMS show. Only piece missing was the control panel so I decided to just paint over the cockpit windows. Besides, they are so small you cannot see any detail inside. Here is my progress so far. Panel lines all replaced and now painting the windows to be masked later. Add some plastic stock for tabs to prevent the wing from sinking in too far when it is finally attached. Here I am testing fitting the wing. More test fitting. Going to be a big plane. Test fitting a completed engine.

Cool. Thanks for the info.

You cannot see in the pictures but there are some rough spots on the metal finish were for some reason the alclad bubbled up and did not cover over the black primer. I used the black primer from alclad. So I have several bad paint spots. Also the red on the spinners crack for some reason.

Well it is done. But did not enjoy this build very much. Kit has a lot of fit issues and spent a lot of time trying to make this look good but I did not have much luck. Cannot complain too much. Won this model at a raffle and was also my first attempt using Alclad 2. Next time I should get better with that paint. So here are the pictures.

Great job! The yellow on the wings are nice and I know how hard it is to work with yellow.

Those decals came with the kit.

Posted a new picture in the main message. :)

UPDATE: A little update on my Airfix de Havilland Chipmunk. I finished the model the night before our local IPMS yearly model show. I took 2nd place in the single prop allied plane 1/72 or smaller. But I also took the top prize as best OOB model in the same category. Here is the picture. The OOB prize will come in the mail. Here we go with another old Airfix kit. This one I got from an ebay collection and it was a blister pack model. The original decals were too old and yellowed so I recreated them using a scanner and computer. You can see the results of the new decals on the model.

Wait till you see my current project. Airfix 1/72 de Havilland Chipmunk. The one that comes in a blister pack. I have to remake the decals. Going for the yellow Canadian version. BTW I saw I had a duplicate picture. I replaced the first picture. Enjoy.

My latest build. Next time I am going to try Alclad 2. Never used it before but want to try it. This aircraft has Greek Air Force markings from 1961. Model had molded in copyright that said "Airfix 1974".

You can look at my posts on escalemodels forums and see the pictures on the progress of the making of this model. http://www.escalemodels.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=12364

My latest project.