Ralph Nardone

As does Italeri--or perhaps "did" is the right phrase, I haven't seen one in some time. Didn't they also do the earlier Kiowa, too? Also, Monogram did the AH-1G years ago. They pop up from time to time at swap meets. Ralph

The good: It is cheap. Even when new, it can be found for less than $20. It builds up into a decent model. The bad: There are some detail issues with the kit. The heat exchanger vents are the earlier style, and the intake trunks are short. The ugly: Depending on how you look at things, the shape is off in several areas, most notable of them being the cockpit hump. John Chung did a three-part article on HyperScale that outlines his build. http://hsfeatures.com/features04/fa18ejc_1.htm http://hsfeatures.com/features04/fa18ejc_2.htm http://hsfeatures.com/features04/fa18ejc_3.htm Ralph

A friend sent me pictures of an in-service Merkava II and a Merkava IIIbaz, and the anti slip coating on those tanks looks like 24 or 36 grit--it is really coarse. What I want to try on my Academy Merkava IV is using the Liquitex Acrylic Gel with Stucco Texture. I picked up a jar of it at the local Hobby Lobby a few years back to use as concrete texture under figures--it looks good as concrete, and it might just work for the anti-slip coating on the Merkava. My friend uses N-scale ballast and white glue or wet paint, I may try that, too, and see which option looks better. The Liquitex option is probably the cleaner way to go--spead a thin coat on the areas that require it, then let dry. My only concern is that the Liquitex stuff is water based and might not stick too well to unpainted plastic, so I may have to prime first.... Ralph

Until the advent of Parafilm, I used to use Scotch Tape exclusively to mask canopies. Whenever I was left with residual adhesive, I took a fresh piece of tape and used it to remove the adhesive. If you use enamels to paint with, you can use Goo Gone to remove the adhesive residue. Other than the residual adhesive, I never had problems with Scotch tape. I switched to Parafilm to avoid the adhesive residue issue. Oh, and I think you meant to say that it is translucent--Scotch tape certainly isn't opaque. Since I switched to Tamiya tape, I haven't looked back. Great stuff.... Ralph

You can do the same with most hobby acrylics, using Future in place of the Boyd's Clear. Testors Acryl line now includes some metallics for car and truck models. I add Future to almost all of my acrylics that I airbrush--it serves the same purpose as Floquil's Glaze did. The paint flows better, and dries with a bit of a sheen to it. Military modelers who use enamels can use Glaze or even Metalizer Sealer.... As to the original poster, I use mostly Tamiya, Testors Acryls, and (when I can find them locally) PollyScale. I mostly build military subjects, and I can find any color I need in these three lines--but 99% of them are flat. Being military subjects, that's just fine.... When I build cars, though, I use the Tamiya sprays--they dry fast to a nice gloss, and they don't take a week or more to outgas. I rarely have to polish the paint.... R

And, if you do spill some on your skin, don't shoot accelerator onto the glue--it WILL burn you. Even tap water can accelerate the cure enough to cause burns. If you spill it on your hand, wipe off the excess with a paper towel, then go run some water on your hands once the glue has cured. You'll still have super glue on your hands, but I find that running water on my hands helps to cause the glue to begin flaking off almost immediately. R

While there may be volume, sometimes you have to watch out with Verlinden--some of the figures in the line have some serious proportion issues. While not as prevalent in 1/35 as in the larger sizes, he's still got a few with huge hands, long arms, and giraffe necks. At my seminar in Atlanta (2005 Nationals), I repeated Shep Paine's warning--you can easily fix lack of detail with paint, but fixing proportion issues is difficult and you can't just paint over it....a figure with "the proportions of an ape and the face of a gargoyle" will still have the gargoyle face and ape-like arms no matter how you paint it. And, just to be fair, Verlinden isn't the only manufacturer that sometimes has proportion issues--Series 77 figures tend to be a wee bit too short, something that is more easily fixed than most problems. It just seems to affect Verlinden more than the others, and it is usually something with the faces, hands, and arms. Anyone who has ever painted the Verlinden 120mm RAF pilot or the Operation Drumbeat U-Boat commander can testify that the pilot's arms hang well below his knees (almost to mid-calf!) and both he and the U-Boat skipper have positively huge hands. Some of the later Verlinden works have some pretty horrible faces, more akin to zombies and/or horror movie characters than humans. R

Water, an ice cube or two, Kiwi, and a cotton ball. Never used spit.... Ralph

I can't really say--I usually can get back to a model once a week, and haven't had problems. So, I'd say maybe a few days would let the Ambroid cure completely... As for the Plastruct stuff, their Plastic Weld is strong stuff-basically MEK and Chloroform and is intended to be used with their ABS shapes. It can cause glue sinks for weeks after if you use too much. I only use it where I'm having difficulty using any other solvent-type cement and where I know I have a few weeks to allow for any sinks to apear. I learned this the hard way--I used it almost exclusively early on, and almost every model I used it on developed a glue sink where the plastic was thin, especially wing trailing edges. It does develop a strong bond, though--if you need to break the seam, you'll break the part first. It makes the "bead of plastic" filler technique easy, since it dissolves the styrene very quickly. I'd rate the Plastruct Bondene (which Plastruct intends for styrene) down the scale after ProWeld and maybe even Tamiya's Extra Thin. It ranks there with Testors Liquid Cement--truth be told, I haven't seen the Bondene around lately. I had forgotten about the Weld-On line of products. Gil is correct--Weld-On #4 is good stuff, as is Weld-On #3. I'd rate them right up there with ProWeld. Ralph

There's a thread on Modeling Madness, and the consensus seems to be "yep, Tenax is extinct". That being said, I've never used it--I prefer Ambroid's ProWeld or (when I can't get Ambroid) Plastruct's Plastic Weld and Bondene. I swear by the Ambroid stuff, a friend swears at it because he's had ghosting where he's glued a seam--the glue bonds quick, but takes a while to fully cure and evaporate, which leaves a ghost of the seam. He builds much quicker than I do, since by the time I finish a model the glue has long evaporated. I have little trouble addressing the ghosting. Lately, though, I've been using the thin CA from Hobby Lobby. I don't normally like to use CA for a build, but when I've needed a fast bond, this stuff is the bomb. I bought a 1/4 oz. bottle a while back, and I've not lost a drop due to the glue curing/gelling in the bottle. Ralph

Well, seeing as I don't actually use spit (I use water), I can't say. Perhaps we should start another thread along the lines of "How does putty dust taste?" or "Do you eat your fill of filler?".... R

I've used the wet finger trick to smooth various one- and two-part sealants and epoxies for years. Everyone knows (or should know) that a wet finger smooths out a bead of latex caulk, or spackle. It also works for silicone caulk, and it certianly works for Milliput and Apoxie Sculpt. Anyone who has worked in the aviation industry knows about Pro-Seal, aka PRC-890, 1422 B-1/2, 1425 A-2, etc. They are a family of black or brownish-blackish polysulfate-type two-part sealants used to seal fuel tanks, antennas, feed-through connectors, and other areas where the pressure vessel is penetrated, as well as faying surfaces of sheet metal patches and antenna doublers (these are generally "shot wet", you smear this junk on the patch/doubler and the skin and rivet it in place while the sealant is wet), and to seal the edges of pneumatic de-ice boots. A 50-50 mix of Denatured Alcohol and distilled water is the preferred solution to use to wet the bead of Pro-Seal when smoothing it. I'd say that it probably does work--you might want to test it before you commit to a masterpiece model.... Ralph

Super glue and baking soda is quick, but I have found that over time the resulting filler leaches out a brown ooze. Microballoons would be my choice with super glue for a filler, although medium viscosity super glue seems to work fine all by itself. If you need something to give the glue more body, the microballoons are the trick. Also, have you tried using super glue to attach a thin strip of Evergreen, sanding to shape once the glue is dry? You can also try an accelerator, but the glue will become brittle when you use it. As always, sand once the glue is dry or you will be left with a rock-hard mass that will take 80-grit and a belt sander to remove.... Ralph

I can't say about 1/35--have you tried The Red Lancer or Michigan Toy Soldier? I know that Andrea is still using metal for their figures, and the Poste Militaire 110mm Sailor Malan figure I bought last year are metal, too. I did a quick search on The Red Lancers site, but everything that came up was resin. You may wind up going with resin.... http://www.redlancers.com http://www.michtoy.com Ralph

I finally managed to land a part-time gig doing retail sales. It will at least get me out of the house for a few hours every day. I'm still looking for something F/T that has benefits; until then I'm thankful for a large tax refund, a lot of vacation pay, and the fact that my 401(k) didn't tank--without that, I'd be a hurtin' pup financially. This is the worst I've ever seen it in aviation, nobody's hiring unless you want to deploy overseas. Were I younger and single, I'd give it thought. Unemployment is a joke, too.... R

Many thanks....it's tough out there. Ralph

The last post I saw on the subject indicates "No". However, I don't know if they've re-thought that....it would be the right thing to do. I guess the answer will come in one of their newsletters.... Ralph

Well, probably not--Jodie has to be in the office to get ready for classes the following week, and I've been unemployed since March. We're waiting to see where 2011 will wind up, and we've yet to decide whether to head to Phoenix. It all depends on timing.... Y'all have fun. Ralph

Sweet model, James. You definitely have the touch when it comes to the mottled camo.... Ralph

As James noted above, the canopy shape issue is with the E-3 kit, and Eduard has corrected the shape and will issue the corrected canopy in their E-4/E-7 kit. The E-1 canopy is correct.... Ralph

Separate rooms AND separate glue? Wow.... Jodie and I share a room (and paint, but we have separate workbenches and glue), which is probably a good thing. We'd never find anything if we had a common bench! Congrats on your nuptials. May you both be happy together for many years to come.... Ralph PS--Jodie says hey, too!

I figure it keeps me out of bars, and therefore out of trouble. Seriously, it is something I do to feed my interests in history and machinery. I was fascinated by airplanes as a kid, so I built model airplanes. As I learned more and more about history, I found myself specializing--first in WWI airplanes, then WWII ships, then everything WWII. I've since added the history of the Middle East and other eras into my modeling mix. I do a lot of "Heritage" collections (for instance, I have planned collections in 1/48 scale of all the mission aircraft flown by the Florida Air National Guard and the 23rd Fighter Wing, as well as the U.S. Coast Guard aircraft) and "family" collections (i.e., all versions of the F-111 or the USS New Jersey as she appeared during WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and the Cold War). Pretty much everything, although I tend to "specialize" in aircraft. My interests are varied--in the last four months I've completed one car, one armor piece, and three airplanes, I have another two airplanes and a ship in work. I also have two figures in various painting stages--most of my figures are of soldiers of the American Civil War (War of Yankee Aggression, or whatever term you like to use), although I have done a few pilot figures as well. The one genre I haven't done a lot in is Science Fiction, and I'm not exactly sure why that is....although I have been tempted by the FineMolds Star Wars models. Ralph

Sweet! Nice work. Has anyone boiled down the differences between the Riley GT-2 'Vettes and the Pratt and Miller GT-2 'Vettes? Is the ALMS and IMSA going to homologate both, or have they told the teams that they need to get the P&M chassis? I know one GT-2 'Vette team got horked--they were running Riley chassis and were told that they'd have to switch.... Ralph

The aviation industry usually feels the pinch first, and recovers last. This time, though, the pinch came later on--and it had a lot to do with the auto makers' use of their personal airplanes to go look for a handout. It was commonly held that things would start to ease by now, but the more I talk to people, the more it looks like this will be a long haul, even longer than the slowdown of the 1980's. Right now, I'm hoping to get a call from the FAA to work as a Safety Inspector, because that will probably be the best aviation bet I'll have. You're right about technology. New Cessnas are equipped with the Garmin G1000 integrated avionics/display system, a system which would make some veteran corporate pilots run away in fear. Had my instructors told me that in 20 years, you'd go from pulling and repairing radios to performing software updates on a system, I'd have told them they're smoking crack. 90% of the work done on the newer airplanes (specifically GA stuff--Cessna, Beech, Piper, Mooney, Diamond, and to a lesser extent Cirrus) are software upgrades. If a radio or display fails, it gets pulled and replaced if in warranty, and pulled and sent to the factory if out of warranty. Garmin would rather do that than have the shops in the field crack the unit open and have a go at fixing it. Older airplanes are a huge concern, and it is getting harder and harder to find qualified technicians to fix the older stuff--I was the shop mamanger for about 2 years, and I could not find an experienced techncian, only installers. As far as a job goes, I may have found somthing to tide me over. It isn't anywhere close to what I was doing (this one is retail sales), but at this point.... Thanks for the comments on the Scooter. They are neat airplanes, and I should have a Hobbycraft A-4N done shortly. I'll post pics when I finish. Ralph

While I haven't tried it, a friend of mine swears by plastic Easter Grass. He uses it as his padding material. I put mine in boxes, pad them as best I can, and wing it from there. I figure I can fix anything that breaks when I get to my destination. Ralph