Subject: Re: Tamiya 1/48 Zero
From: "Submissions for ARC" <[email-masked]>
To: "Frank Daniels" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 5 Sep 2007 11:08:18 -0700

Hi,
I just wanted to let you know your article went on ARC today.  Thanks again for sending it in.

Steve Bamford
Aircraft Resource Center
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com

Live like there is no tomorrow;
Love like you've never been hurt.
Work like you don't need the money.
Dance like nobody's watching.
Sing like nobody's listening.
Live like it's Heaven on Earth.

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Frank Daniels 
  To: [email-masked] 
  Cc: [email-masked] 
  Sent: Wednesday, August 08, 2007 5:27 PM
  Subject: Tamiya 1/48 Zero

  Gallery Template #05

  "Tamiya 1/48 A6M2 Zero" 

  by "Frank Daniels"
  -------------------- 

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  This is my recently completed Tamiya 1/48 A6M2 Zero.  It was built mostly OOB with the addition of homemade seatbelts fabricated from lead foil from an expensive liquor bottle.  I also sanded the seat to make it thinner.  The fit of the wing to the fuselage was not great, so I inserted various short sections of scrap sprue to "raise" the upper wing surface to meet the wing root.  I also inserted a spreader between the fuse halves to spread them out and fill in the gaps at the wing root.  I originally painted it with Gunze Sangyo colors, and used the kit decals.  After a coat of Gunze clear gloss, I did my usual weathering and prepared it for the final flat coat.  This is where disaster struck! 

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  Evidently, the gloss wasn't quite dry so the flat coat pooled up on it and left horrible cracks in it.  Repeated thin layers of flat only worsened the problem.  I ended up stripping all of the paint, decals, and clear coats off of it with Isopropyl alcohol and a worn out toothbrush.  All of the panel lines had to be cleaned out individually and most of the filled seams had to be re-done.  After a week or so of this tedious work, I was ready to paint again.  I used a dark brown preshade, and then started building up the paint.  This time, I made masks and airbrushed the hinomarus as the decals were giving me fits trying to conform to some of the little bumps on the wings.  As for replacement markings, I had originally used the kit supplied ones for Saburo Sakai's aircraft.  Luckily, a friend had an extra set of markings from an old Aeromaster set (Thanks Mike!) that were the same as I had originally intended to use, and graciously mailed them to me so I could finish the project.  I used Polly Scale gloss and flat this time, baking it inside a cardboard box at 115 degrees for an hour or two to help the coats cure.  I am very happy with the finished result.  Thanks for checking it out! 
          
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  Photos and text © by "Frank Daniels"

  -- 
  Frank Daniels