Here
is my rendition of the Tamiya 1/32 A6M5 Zero (standard edition) – The kit was
lying about in the closet with the rest of my stack of “nothing to build”. I
started this kit some time in February last year then lost inspiration after
cementing the fuselage halves together and installing the cockpit as I had
started on a 1/32 Hasegawa Oscar and wanted to make a resin copy of the Sakae
engine’s cylinders and backend using the Zero’s. Unfortunately I misplaced
the front end row of cylinders so shelved the whole thing till about 3 months
ago while on a trip to Tokyo managed to convince the kind folks at Tamiya Japan
to send replacement sprues (2 of them) to my favourite hobby store (yellow
submarine at Akihabara’s Radio Kaikan building 7th floor).
Searching
for inspiration again after the brief hiatus, I set to work on the engine yet
again and completed that mass using the very good Eduard set for additional
details. I also had a reference engine rear detail by CMK as a basis for
additional detailing and locators for various hoses, pipes and control rods. The
rest progressed easily with the wheel bays detailed again with Eduard, as
was the cockpit. I scratchbuilt a number of brackets and hose attachment points
but all of it becomes quite invisible inside the dark interior of the plane.
The
gun sight was scratchbuilt using the kit part as a base and replacing the lenses
with 0.1mm clear film and some Eduard photo etch from the leftovers box. I also
installed an “aurora” lens from M-Workshop “
http://www.themworkshop.com/index.php
“ that when you look through the gun sight will look as if an image is
projected on the reflector glass.
Initially
I had the landing gear in working condition to facilitate painting.
Painting:
Paints
used: Gunze Lacquers – Dry fast, go on beautiful and very “hot” meaning
they take to the plastic extremely well and are not affected by other paints
(such as enamels, oils etc) – The downside is that they are very difficult to
hand paint, so everything using Gunze lacquers were shot through my Tamiya
Pro-Con at medium pressure.
First
coat after surface preparation was Gunze Silver (H8) and let to dry for about
fifteen minutes – with the aid of a hairdryer (Lacquers dry from the inside
–out meaning when the surface is dry, it is dry!, as opposed to enamels that
dry from the outside in). I used Eduard’s paint mask set to mask and spray the
Hinomarus and other details including wing walks and leading edge yellow
identifiers, and those pretty coloured bars on the landing gear to give a visual
indication on the state of compression on the oleos.
All
of these were masked off then the first coat of Gunze IJN Mitsubishi Green
straight out of the jar. I lightened the coat with Gunze Tan and randomly
sprayed between the panel lines to give a post-shading effect. Followed by even
lighter coats sprayed at random at LOW pressure and high dilution. Then I
airbrushed H35 IJN gray on the undersides.
Chipped
paint:
Actually
quite simple – I have tried this with ENAMELS
and
FAILED!
But you can look at my results with Gunze Lacquers and decide for yourself….
First step is to get fresh Tamiya masking tape OR wider tape (the Japanese
Yellow coloured stuff) from 3M and firmly pat down on the surface. The edge of
the tape should sit directly on a panel line. One very quick tug should get some
of the paint off. You have to repeat this procedure until the desired amount of
paint has been removed.
Additionally
you can “guide” the chipping by using a scalpel blade and scrape off some of
the top layer till you come to the silver paint. This should be really small
nicks and best along rivet lines or next to panel lines. Cover with tape and
pull again. This should encourage more of the paint to come off. When you are
happy with the level of paint chipping you can take your time with the wash. I
use MIG production’s premixed wash – a brown / black solution that needs to
be shaken up really well before use. This highlights the panel lines and any
rivet holes. I use an old t-shirt to clean off the wash and because Gunze is
REALLY “hot”, have no problem of the original paint being affected.
Typically I then buff the model up using Tamiya rubbing compound again applied
with the t-shirt (do not use much of it as it would then clog up any surface
detail and appear “white” – not good!...
Whole
model was top-coated with Gunze’s Clear top coat (flat) lacquer spray (in the
can) light coats please!
Final
weathering – using a super fine brush and Tamiya Enamels XF-16 Flat aluminium,
I simulated more paint chips – especially along rivet lines to blend
everything in. Exhaust stains were brown / flat black shot through the airbrush
very thin, very low pressure. Followed by tan + H35 also very thin and very low
pressure, finally touching up with flat black (also extremely thin) to cover up
any mistakes.
Landing
gear was finally dropped and super-glued into place just as the ailerons,
elevators, rudder and flaps. The transparent parts were then fitted on and the
plane made ready for the shelf. I still have a couple of tiny parts to put on
like bomb racks under the wings, the drop tank and some other odds and ends.
That will come in Part - 2
Click on
images below to see larger images
I
hope you enjoyed this article. Special thanks to Murayama and Kuroda of
Yellow Submarine Akihabara Tokyo for the weathering idea.
Materials:
Kit:
Tamiya 1.32 A6M5 Zero
Aftermarket
accessories:
-
Eduard Big 1/32 A6M5
-
CMK
A6M5 Zero Engine Details
-
Pas-i-struct
0.4mm round styrene rod
-
0.3mm
solder, G-Wave 0.4mm springs, 0.8mm springs 2.2mm spring set. 1/24 ignition wire
for Car-kits (yellow and black)
References:
Adrian
Click on
images below to see larger images
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