so here, to avoid any confusion is the background story.The kits are 1/48th Zeros. One is a Fujumi A6M2 intended to be painted up as an aircraft from the Zuikaku at the time of the Pearl Harbour attack, using the excellent decals provided in the kit. The other is a Hasegawa kit of a Nakajima manufactured A6M2-N Rufe floatplane fighter of the 802nd Flying Group.
I started both kits in 2011, just before I joined this esteemed forum. My logic in building both kits together was that they were the same colour and so would require less individual painting sessions. Everything was going well, I completed the interiors and engines, got everything together, sorted out the joins, particularly the enormous gap front and rear of the wing on the Hasegawa kit and masked up for paint.
Then things went horribly wrong
Due to a dodgy batch of paint and some problems with my appalling old Badger air compressor (now binned) there was a big problem with the finish. Basically the paint all went powdery and dropped off in patches. I tried to rectify things a couple of times but, in the end, lost heart and put the models in my loft room (read toy room
) out of sight and out of mind. A couple of months ago I got them back down and started working on the paint. I rubbed back all the offending paint over a period of a few days. Then they were sidelined again while I've been busy with other things. Today, however, while I had the airbrush out to paint the Swordfish I thought "Why not?" and applied a nice coat of fresh Tamiya IJN Grey to the pair of them followed shortly after by a coat of Klear ready for decals. I'm feeling a lot better about these now. This is how they look at the moment.
I do have quite a few pictures of the entire build and I'd be happy to put them on the forum if anybody's interested.
