Part 2 – Painting (Continue from previous thread)

Hi all.
Now I think it’s better to make another thread which cover the painting process on this u-boot.

First I prime the entire model with Mr. Surcafer 1000 thinned with Mr Thinner (3:7 ratio) . I have to make a painting jig from foam board to support and hold the model while it is painted. I have to spray outside the painting booth as the current booth couldn’t fit the sub. I have to use a fan blowing at the back of me pointing at the window and I wear 3M respirator with multigas catridges which I believe can reduce my exposure to solvents vapour. This is one of my challenges as I have to keep my daugther from entering the room..i have to wait for her to sleep first..normally it end up with me falling asleep beside her….okay..now back to bussiness
This is photo after the primer has dried.


After the primer dried, I carefully scan the entire models for flaws and imprefections. Lucky me that I found a few minor imprefections that can be corrected by sanding with 800 grit sand paper and a few drop of superglue to cover some minor gaps.

I leave the primer to cure for more then 24 hours to begin the next task.

Next I preshade the model with Humbroll Flat Black and later follow with Humbroll Red Brown along the edges, welding lines and borders. This is how it look just after preshading process.


I leave it for another 24 hours and then started the first color. I choose to paint the upper hull first because I think I will make the task a lot easier and will conserve on the usage of masking tape. I use Revell enamels (as suggested in the manuals) for the first color. I laid the paint carefully as not to cover the preshading job that was done a day ago. The process took almost 1 ½ hours which later caused fatique in my finger. They should invented a more ergonomics airbrush!
This is how it look after the first color is applied.




I did the same with the conning tower which I regretted that I forgot to take photos of the tower.

Last night, I masked the first color to prepare for the other 2 colors. Sorry no photos on that…

I will update soon..

Thanks for viewing.

Cheers,
Zaidi

Fantastic Zaidi. Looks like the sub is on-target for delivery after passing the leak test with flying colors. I am bookmarking this thread.

Zaidi....

interesting... now we're waiting for the rest of the setup....
so basically how many layersof paints do we expect to see from this submarine?

:D

kuman

thanks kenny and kuman...

the sub will be paint with 3 basic color scheme....nothing fancy...no cammo..
this is speed up the process...

fade up of unfinished job..now i have to speed everything up...so i choose the easy way

Hello Naval Shipyard,
coming along just fine. I see that you managed to get HHQ secret revell paint stash!

thanks to u..i call HHQ after u gave me the number and they keep it for me...

Nice one, Sil,

Your work (plus countless hours watching U-571 and reading Iron Coffins) has prompted me to start on mine.

Laid the keel and currently dry-fitting the con tower but nothing much else yet. :P

Sil, this is a huge sub, looking good in progress.

Viper, waiting to c yours.

Soon, Vince, soon.... :D

Ah...the shipyard has been very busy Herr Kapitanleutenant after her one sided maiden voyage in your bathtub. :D

Lovely preshading work. Its good that Arg is pinning this thread as it will really be very useful for anyone starting on their shipyard. Danke Herr Kapitanleutenant for generously sharing this very informative build log.

thanks guys for the kind words and your interest in this build...

ok here is another update photo..

the deck after being painted ..


another shot to look at the masking bussiness..(before the third color is applied)


the conning tower. i will install on the deck after final work.




then i paint the third color with revell paints... 2 hours of spraying process. In this stage, disaster happen as the airbrush went berserk... i have to stop and do a quick breakdown maintanance job on the ab.... it went well again but then it come again...the ab will shoot air and non uniform pressure and sometimes it will shoot air only not paint...i have to dismantle the entire ab...so frustrated at the middle of painting job..
after cleaning the nozzle, needle nd others i start to work again..the problem still there but reduced to minimal...arghhhhhhhhhh... i have to do something about the ab later..
anyway, here is the photos of the sub after the third color was applied..still with the black masking tape...




till then fellas...

cheers,
Zaidi

Jessica,
why no PE?

haiya tauke..u missed my earlier thread la..

i told that before..ok ulang tayang

reason for no PE

1. not enough money .. heh(money will be spend of other kit) -failure to anticpate that HHQ is having 40% sale on PE
2. PE will slow the process...as i'm not is very busy with wotk and stuff..i need to finished all kit quickly...using PE will slow me down and i hate that...
3. same as above
4.same as above

not going to HHQ?

Well PE or no I think its coming along very well Jessica...oops...I mean Herr Kapitanleutenant Jessica. The preshading on the upper deck planks look good too.

if i'm going pun it's too late la to get the PE...i got no plan to go for HHQ as i already got what i need for now... unless u want to sponsor me with some paints..hehe (i heard u utilised both ur hand carrying the goods down to ur car...)

and tauke beachbum, just imagine i'm in the sub with miss jessica ..just the the of us.. (of course the will be other chief and cook ..)..great sail!!

how was that movie filmed in Sarawak?
BTW, Zaidi, at least get the paints. Its cheap. Discount on paints don't happen often.

what movie??

i cant make it this weekend...have to go somewhere... poor me...somebody should get me some paints...hehe

btw, no more progress for a while..yesterday and the other day before, i try to troubleshoot my airbrush...i spend so many hours cleaning and tuning the needle and the nozzle but it still wont work normally... after carefully observered with my magnifiying glass i can say they something wrong with the nozzle...maybe clogged. the needle is in bad shape... i will try to get replacement for these 2 things..as for now the sub has to be grounded .........

will get back as soon as i got the ab fix!

cheers,

zaidi

Guess you can call it a break after a war patrol, Zaidi. :)

I know how frustrating it can get with the airbrush. Had a similar disaster when I was painting my Tomcat for the F-14 event. Did a silly thing of wiping my nozzle with tissue paper. Tissue fibres clogged the ab and I ended up having to pick the fibres out bit by bit using the ab needle itself. Anything else just wasn't successful (sewing needle was still too large for the opening) :( Caused my entry to miss the F-14 event but at least the ab is working now.

right now the replacement parts are on their way from sub base and will be arriving on the rendevous point somewhere on the water.... lucky me coz the airbrush that i use can be easily get the replacement parts... i just hope they will arrive before CNY

Meanwhile, a did a few handpainted on some small details on the conning tower... and while talking to beachbum the other day, i mentioned about my daughter that he thinks can airbrush better than him..but i cound snap a photo of her using the airbrush coz papa didnt use it..so while i was painting with my brush, she wanted to do so.. here is her pic..a future lady modeller



mind u the pic is taken somewhere over 1 am... !!!

till then

Aaah...a photo of the real engineer in the house. The engineer specializing in re-engineering her father's completed kits. :D

I kid you not Gentlemen, this little lady can definitely out airbrush me anytime. How about some photos of her playing 'masak masak' with your Gundam or putting them to sleep?

Woman engineer in training. I see that she likes pink also. I wonder how the U-Boat would look in pink despite seeing Capt Kirk's recent Yellow Submarine box art.

[off topic......]
FYI, that's purple la..not pink. I got that purple color as a free gift and the shop tauke wont let me choose the color..that's why la i got purple paint.
well pink is her fav colors (as well as other women..) at least she still got a girl touch inside... thanks god.. wait till u see her playing masak2 with my SD gundam... she even try to change gundam diapers...

SD Gundam diapers? That's interesting. Perhaps you can share with us some SD Gundam diapers next round.

hahahaha..right now what we got is just imaginary diapers that my daughter made up... :D

Guess your daughter might be moving on to scratch-building next...starting with Gundam diapers :lol:

hello............

dah lama tak update nih!!! here they are

the airbrush sparepart arrived from rainbowten a few days after CNY... but due to my tight schedule, outstation job and some other personal matters, i only have time to continue the build last week...

all 3-tone cammo color have been applied. The coning tower still havent glue yet to the hull. This will make thing a lot easier during detaling job and some more weathering job...
I painted the wood decking with vallejo paints.. well it doesnt look like real wood..may be i will try to try touch up a bit ...
this is the conning tower on the table and place at where it was supposed to be..





the rest of the photos are verious shot at various angle with a few lighting setting...
i did some initial weathering and post shading...
will do some more....

here are some photos...















as usual, comments/tips/suggestions are welcome! :)

Looks good Zaidi, one thing though... Not sure whether if it is the picture or my eye but the weathering streak on the holes (I think the rust colour) is too red. Adding some brown will surely tone down the red a bit.

Whoa..beautifully done. Even preshaded the mounting stand and I like how the wooden hand rails are done.

Well done! This will certainly be an eye catcher.

Imran,,

it's some of the initial preshading which i did last night...yeah i agree with u...actually it's hull red color...thinned heavily and applied with my airbrush...i will add some more color layer by layer to reduced the reddish tone and also the creat uneven look of the rust and water mark...

thanks guys and Poohbear too...the wood effect is still not perfect...
you also have a very pair of good eyes...yes i preshade the mount stand..but i still didnt like the color so i will repaint the mount with other color and porbably it would be dark green color....

Wow!! Zaidi,

Watched this thread from the time she went for sea trials in the bathtub (I too always can't resist the temptation to try my boats in water) to the present and I must say you've done a great job.

I'm not partial to submarines but I can imagine what a good display it can be in any living room especially when it's that size( Kenny, don't get any ideas ah!). :lol:

When you get down and dirty with the final weathering, that's what I'll be waiting for.

Are you bringing it to the AGM?

Richard.

thanks for your comments Richard..although i didnt understand the size and kenny thing.. :)

i just hope i can finish the weathering job by the end of this month because this uboat is also part of the DDD2 campaign in armorama....

well, to bring this sub in the AGM would require me to do special tactical transporation device which also donkey-poo resistance coz im afraid one of our fellow good old buddies will take donkeys along. So better keep her safe at home...

alamak, tak syioklah
you have to bring this in so that we can see how big your submarine is!
BTW manyak cantiklah brader. casing must cost a bundle later too!

negative Mr Loo...
still tak siap...i wouldnt dare to bring it for public appearance until it has finished....

No pressure brader,

Better you finish it first. I can understand the logistics of transportation.

As for Kenny thing, look for it in the AGM thread. It's together with some Ferret thing. :lol: :huh: :blink: :huh:

Richard.

Most excellent progress Herr Kapitanleutenant. The preshading showed up well. She'll be a real beauty when all the weathering is in place. Will you be adding a guitar string or fishing line for the antennae wire between the net cutters and the conning tower?

beachbum,
did u meant for the whole anthena system or only the one connecting the tower and the Y-shape connector/insulator??

up till now i still havent sure yet whether i will use the supplied sewing thread for the anthena or to replace it with other options. The thread is too thin for this scale.

i think to use fishing line but i still havent found the right size for it....
as for the guitar strings, i have not so many stock left for string no #1 and #2 and the steel string maybe pose difficulty to fix it onto the net cutter and into the insulator/connector thing..
and i also think about bigger thread...mayeb the one use for knitting kind of thing..probably CKLoo wife have plenty stock of it and advice with shop to get the thread...

for the anthena/wiring from the Y-shape to the tower, i will use whether steel wire or the no 1 guitar string...

thanks for yoyr comments though!

:)

Yeah Sil its the Y-wire assembly leading down from the tower to the wire cutters at the bow. I don't think its advisable to use thread as I have read elsewhere that the hair on the thread will unravel and stand up. Some people have coated it with clear but I'm not sure that will hold.

Best bet will be either guitar string or fuse wire. The very thin copper wire found in telephone cables will be good too and its pretty flexible. The other option as mentioned is 4 lb or 6 lb test fishing line. Fishing line will need some priming with non-acetone base paints for the basecoat to stick. Actually tying it off is not a problem as they're knots that resemble closely to the actual way the real antennae/radio cables are tied in.

Beachbum,

now i'm confused...did u mean the cable from the Y-connector to the tower or u meant for the whole cable system??

look at this pic


if u refer to the pic, the cable from the Y-thing can be done with any fine wire...but if u refer to the whole system, then i think a bigger sewing thread or fishing line can be used..

Sil actually I meant the whole thingy. As you say the thinner one below the Y-cable can be done with thin wire (i.e. telephone copper wire, fuse wire, etc). The thicker one involving the whole Y-assembly can be done with either guitar wire, thicker gauge copper wire or fuse wire or fishing line (6lb test should do it).

Ideally thin braided wire would be best. The only one I can think of is the steel leader line that attaches from the fishing hook to the fishing line. Its used when catching fish with very sharp teeth. I've seen a couple long ones but I'm not sure if it will be long enough. Since I've not even started mine these were just some stuff I was thinking of how I would do it.