Andy T's 1/48 ICM I-153

[Andy T]

Thanks Ian.

Sorry everyone, more of the same :tears-of-joy:

Main colours are all on now and I've tried a new lacquer clearcoat / gloss varnish which I'm pretty impressed with. S M S Premium Super Clear.

It's only had one light coat straight from the bottle to unify the various gloss, satin & matt paints before decals but it already has a decent sheen. With a few coats it might end up replacing my usual Mr Color GX-100, which seems to be getting harder to source (like many other Mr hobby products)







I'll give it a bit of time to breathe then start wrestling with the decals.

If you look closely you may see the holes I've pre-drilled for the rigging. I'm hoping that makes the process easier!

[Mickc1440]

Really nice paint job Andy, the yellow is really striking

[Andy T]

Thanks Mick. I messed up with the yellow band on the fuselage, it's too wide, but it's staying now lol.

[Andy T]

Decals are now done, matt varnish applied and all the bits & bobs are painted ready for final assembly.



And bearing in mind Jim's topic about paints, here's the selection I've used on this build. A combination of MRP, Mr Color, S M S, and Tamiya LP.

[yak face]

Wow , quick work andy , looking excellent. The three pane windscreen shouldnt be too hard to make with a bit of clear plastic packaging , ive had plenty of practice with the old , dodgy kits that I seem to be drawn to that always seem to be missing them !!

[Mark1]

Its looking good.

[Andy T]

Thanks chaps.

I've done exactly that Tony. I wouldn't say it's amazing but it's better than nothing :smiling4:

I've "prewired" the upper wing with ez line. At least I'll only have one end to fiddle with in the confined space. I've also rigged the lower wing while access was good.

[Steve-the-Duck]

I think your windscreen looks dam' good. As well as the whole 'plane!

[Neil Merryweather]

I think your windscreen looks dam' good. As well as the whole 'plane!

.....What He said!

[Tworrs]

What they said :smiling2:

[Easyrider5258]

Nice job and like the nice sharp masking on the camo, what did you use for that? getting some bleeding on mine

[Andy T]

Thanks again chaps.

I had a bit of a nightmare last night while fitting the upper wing. I must have squeezed the wings together a bit too much and snapped one of the struts.

So there I was, in the middle of cooking a meal, rummaging around on the floor to find the missing piece, running to the kitchen to keep an eye on our food, trying to get the strut in place before the rest of the glue hardened up.

Slightly stressful but got it sorted :tears-of-joy:

Nice job and like the nice sharp masking on the camo, what did you use for that? getting some bleeding on mine

Just Tamiya tape Mark.

For most of the black to green areas I selected a piece of the right kind of width and cut wavy edges on it. Once in place I rub it down firmly with a finger or cotton bud and spray the first couple of coats lightly to help seal the edge.

That usually works okay for me but a tip is to spray a light coat of the underlying colour first, or even a clear varnish, which will seal the tape edges and if it does bleed underneath, won't be seen.

For the underside I cut the tape into 1mm strips so I could bend it easily and follow the pattern.

I'm lucky that I've had a lot of masking practice in the day job. This is something I did for a mates motorbike yesterday, to match the plain black knuckle guards into the new graphics I'd put on the bike. All masking tape, 4 colours mixed by eye, and plenty of smoke & mirrors lol

[Neil Merryweather]

What a finish!

[Andy T]

Cheers Neil, he was pretty happy with it :smiling3:

I'm putting it all down to Iwata :tears-of-joy:
Mini LPH80 for the colours, midi W300 WB for clear.

[Jim R]

All looking great Andy. Cockpit looks fine. Very neat paint job. As for the yellow being too wide - looks fine to me and whose to know anyway?
Your 1:1 job looks superb. No wonder you can mask models :smiling: