Was advised to use my painting preference to compete for the 1st time in Airfix. MH's Lee told me that a nicely weathered Mustang will be nice for the show.
To get a differentiated look, I decided to open only one side of the gun bays even though I painted both sides already.
Gun bay opens partially as the magazine area has a belt that is too shot. It supposed to be 9 yards long, where the saying originated, the whole nine yards. It looked funny, so I closed the mag area.
The floor board area was masked and painted black and stripped with brown, white, grey and yellowish tan to get the wood grain look.
Finally the cockpit Eduard kit has arrived. I also painted and did up the engine and weathered it. But I have decided to close that part as I have concerns on the kit fitting problems which is not uncommon amongst earlier Trumpeter kits.
Side Wall details painted and ready for marriage.
The sacrificed engine in preference for a good fitting end result.
Gaia black surfacer painted and Ethanol ribbed to highlight the rivets.
Dark grey is used on the whole aircraft to serve as primer inspector for errors and imperfections. Highlights are done in non affected area to check on colour harmony hues.
Wing root and forward fuselage is quite a paint, that even the panel lines did not lined up properly to match and needed to be puttied, sanded down, re-scribed and the screws repunched with 0.4mm diameter hollow point rivet stomper from Hasegawa.
Air intake for the radiator has uneven fit about 0.2mm disparity. This step has to be built up with putty and sanded smooth with details to be re-scribed back later. Tamiya tape is used to protect details.
