I love love love the realism of this Model A! Especially the welds for the top chop. So much attention to detail!
Checking back in to say I gave it a shot for a few days to no avail. Someone used the old school Testors and plenty of it. I'm surprised the glue didn't warp the plastic. So, I'll see how my masking job on the windows turned out.
A question, please. I had a co-worker (pro auto painter) that did my model parting. After he moved on I sort of gave up on modeling. I dig building again but sorely lack painting skills, my spray can jobs range from fair to not bad but at my age and lack of dedicated modeling space I have no intention of springing for an air brush set up. Here's the question...what do you think of polishing color molded kits and then shooting them with clear? I was given the AMT coupe pictured below in orange. As a change, I'd like to keep that orange but not screw the car up with a mediocre spray can job. To me, a bad build is not better than no build at all, and I'm not casting aspersion on anyone else's builds or abilities. Thoughts?
@Alex Gaynor I've been away from model building for many years due to work hours. I've never owned/used an airbrush. I started out as a kid brush painting bodies. Eventually got into spray cans from Testors and Pactra. Probably started with Auto Parts Store Duplicolor and the like after reading about automotive paints in Scale Auto Magazine. I had to learn to use the right primer so the automotive paint wouldn't melt the model car plastic. That was all fine, but spray can paint jobs have a high likelyhood of having 'orange peel'. Might be OK for inner fender braces and such on a 1:1 car, but orange peel looks pretty bumpy on a 1:25th scale body. The solution I found and will use again on my next model is Micro Mesh Polishing system. It delivers a result that I find pleasing enough. Its a series of fine abrasives, much smoother than regular sand paper, that when used in order of roughest to finest, help knock down the majority of high spots of an orange peel job. Start with 3200 grit, then 3600, 4000, 6000, 8000, then 12,000 grit. You mentioned "polishing" the colored body, then spraying with clear. To me, that limits you to one solid color. And I have to wonder if the rattle can clear won't exhibit some orange peel. Since you plan on polishing anyway, why not pick whatever custom color you want, rattle can it, then polish it? Best of luck.
Thanks for the reply and your thoughts. Of course I've experienced orange peel with some of it being extreme enough to redo the car and in a different color. Call me crazy but it seems that a couple of colors from both Krylon and Rustoleum (2X) are prone to adding to the orange peel problem. I've attempted to lightly wet sand by using 2000 grit but still manage to sand through the color. Maybe Micro Mesh can help here. In some of the model photos posted here and other sites the orange peel is so pronounced that I couldn't live with that. I'm not quite sure why anymore, but I never really liked using model specific spray paint. As far as sanding out mold lines and then polishing (Dupont or Turtle Wax white compound), well, I'd like to go with that orange plastic as the orange paint that I've tried has come out more amber over a light gray primer. I've been pretty happy with my results in modeling in the past, when I had that paint help, and now that I'm back into it I'd at least like to be satisfied. Again, thanks.
I polished and waxed this Johan OT bare plastic about 30 years ago, still looks great. The newer Testors and others seem to spray at a higher pressure than previous and I find myself spraying from a much further distance and using a good clear (still need to try out the airbrush that got forever ago). The '39 is Duplicolor engine paint (no clear) with a 2000 grit wet sand and polish. The reflection is the ceiling light.
The Plymouth looks killer and that's the look I was hoping to achieve. Also, what do you consider a good clear? Hard to fathom that the '39 has a spray can paint job.
The Jalopy Journal
