1/48 Dragon Ta-152H-1-Slingin' Paint-12/02

No color applied yet but believe it or not there's been a ton of work going on as of late. The wings are now mated with the aircraft and after a LOT of working them in with the fuselage by way of sanding and filling, I'm about done except where the wing roots join the fuselage at the top of the wing at the leading edges (you can see the putty at the wing root). All I have to do is work that in and that part will be complete. I also got the nose piece attached to the front of the aircraft and after looking at the prop and spinner out of the Dragon kit and not liking what I saw, I went with the ZM prop assembly and spinner. This was a massive improvement because the spinner in the Dragon kit is the wrong shape and size and the blades on the ZM kit are proportioned more accurately than those that the Dragon kit offers.



Next up, engine cowling and landing gear door prep and then I think we're off to masking the engine & cockpit off for color.

  It's pretty much the same as alot of aircraft of that period Les and it's probably the angle that the aircraft is at. I'm waiting on a couple of masks for the wheel wells and the front of the aircraft and then I'm going to have to come up with something to mask that engine off. I'll sacrifice a spare canopy to mask off the interior/ cockpit. Should be within a week or so that paint will start going on so in the meantime I'll probably start working on the landing gear and engine panels. 

Thank you Dale. It is indeed a lot of work to get wear and tear built into the paint work on these warbirds as well as armor/ military vehicles. 


The last couple of days at the bench have been spent on re-working the engine cowlings. These are two piece panels that are hinged in the middle to give two folding leafs to gain more access to the engine area on both sides of the engine. Dragon has put both leafs together to make a single opening panel. What I did was cleaned up the injector pin marks on the inside of the panels and cut about 80% of the way through the join of the two panels to give the proper open look of these panels. Untouched panel on the left and the modified panel on the right.



I started by making passes through the join line with an X-Acto knife and when I got most of the way through the panel I used the troweling tool to make a V into the plastic to where the bottom panel could be opened and glued to the top panel with a clean joint.

  Thanks Bruce! I just couldn't leave 'em the way they came in the kit. If I would have left them alone you wouldn't be able to see any of the engine hardly. 

Well folks, I've got her all sealed up and ready for color coats. Wish me luck. 

 I started on it a little this morning but realized that I didn't have one of the three colors that make up the camouflage. I've since got it coming and it should be here in the next few days. 

Thank you Jeremy. 

Alright gents, all of the primer and marbling prep work are starting to be shown in the painting effect going on in the color coat here. Ultra thin layers of paint going on to allow the marble effect to bleed through representing a worn color coat. 

I'm using Vallejo Air colors for this BTW:

Joe, you pop my brain every update when you do these builds