HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

[No.1]

No matter of what paint you are going to use, I am sure that build will be top one. By the way- did US use during the forties P-26 for training? I ask because I think that I have seen some of them on operational airfield and in fresh condition.

Sorry for off topic

[Second Air Force]

I believe the P-26s were used in the very early part of the war for some training duties and as "personal" airplanes in a few cases. They were also used in maintenance training schools for a time and I've seen pictures of them in standard olive drab/neutral grey camouflage in a Chanute maintenance school hangar.

The Filipino air arm fought bravely with their P-26s against the Japanese in the early days of the Pacific war, also.

Scott

[No.1]

Thank you mate

[Second Air Force]

I dug out the little P-47 I am using for practice with my NMF methods. Most of the surface preparation is done now. Next will be painting the anti-glare panel and dusting a little primer on the various seams to verify that there are no gaps. This Tamiya kit fits so well that almost no filler is necessary.

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

Scott

[No.1]

Tamya is perfect for this! I like it

[Second Air Force]

I made a lot of extra work for myself when I was painting the yellow chromate on the wheelwells and the cockpit green. This was originally going to be an O.D./neutral grey paint scheme but I decided to use it as a NMF practice kit. I've done a lot of sanding to smooth the yellow and green you see sprayed all over. If I'd known I was going to do NMF I would have very carefully masked off the skin so I wouldn't have oversprayed it.

S

[Letipapa]

 

[Second Air Force]

I finally got back to this project yesterday evening. I originally wanted to use both Metalizer and foil on this kit. I practiced with a little foil and found that the very delicate engraving of the Tamiya kit is nearly obscured by the foil. Since I didn't want to hide the beautiful molding I decided to go entirely with Metalizer. Here is a series of shots after applying the aluminum before buffing began. The little sheet of cloth on my hand in photo 1 is the polishing pad I use.

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

These two are of the masking of the rudder. All of the primary flight controls were masked off before buffing the surfaces so as to get a contrasting sheen on the various parts. The same process is used to get the different shades on the other parts of the airplane.

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

I'll do some different shaded panels next installment.

Scott

[No.1]

Always forget to ask- how the paint apply on the metal foil?

[Second Air Force]

I have painted BareMetal foil many times, but usually to use it for canopy framing (I'll show my technique for that soon). I simply sand with very fine sandpaper and paint whatever color I need. As far as painting it on the airplane, it can be done but you MUST use very "unsticky" tape or liquid masking agent for masking or the tape will tear and lift the foil when you remove it.

Scott

[No.1]

Thank you mate

[Second Air Force]

As promised, here is one method I use for canopy framing using painted BareMetal foil.

I first cut off a swatch of foil big enough to do the canopy I'm working on. Then I tape it to a popsickle stick and sand it lightly with 2400 grit sandpaper. When I paint the fuselage top color I paint this foil at the same time. To apply it to the canopy I just use a metal straightedge and a brand new X-Acto blade to cut the foil into strips the right width for the frames I'm working on.

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

Then it's a simple matter to pick up the strips and apply them to the canopy.

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

 Occasionally I need to touch up small areas where the paint might come off and leave the silver, and in some cases I actually scrape the paint off in high wear areas to replicate chipping/flaking paint. Here's the little training P-47 canopy after framing but before final installation and touch-up:

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

One word of warning when using this method--if the canopy interior can be seen on the finished product the framing will be silver on the inside. In that case it may be better to mask and paint the framing rather than using the foil method.

Scott

[No.1]

I like this way and maybe the same could be used for interior. My method is old fashioned but I would like to try tis one.

[Second Air Force]

Here's a quick photo after making some contrasting panels by buffing. I'm not entirely satisfied with it as there is very little difference in the panel shades. I'll probably mask and respray some panels with a slightly different shade of aluminum.

HOW TO: Natural Metal Finishes

Scott

[No.1]

This is correct, even new samples show great difference in the panels shade