Skinny_Mike
Well-known member
Hello all! Back with a little more progress on the spider! Unfortunately I didn’t get done in time for the end of CTA3, but life has a way of keeping us from the bench sometimes.
The next step was to get the cockpit finished up so I could install the canopy. First step was to modify the Quickboost seat. The seat I planned to use is a Quickboost ACES 2 for an F-15. The YF-23 seat was also an ACES2 seat and was reclined at about the same angle. To make the resin seat work though I needed to add some seat rails as the kit seat had them molded to the seat itself. I ended up borrowing some rails from an aftermarket F-16 cockpit I had sitting around, and it worked quite well.
After that I painted the seat. I used Ammo black for the seat, and Tamiya Nato black for the parachute pack which is fabric. Other varios paints for the details. I didn’t really go all out since the canopy would be closed.
The HUD on the YF-23 like many of the parts, was taken from other production aircraft, in this case the F-15. The kit part is made up of the HUD glass in clear plastic, a separate frame and the projector window that is attached to the glare shield. Once the HUD was installed, I also installed the seat.
After that, the canopy was installed in the closed position. Hobby Boss doesn’t give you the option of having it open. Then everything was masked for priming.
I primered the model with Tamiya primer straight from the rattle can. Then I checked all the seams, and reworked all the problem areas. I used Mr. Surfacer 500 for the rework since I could apply it with a micro brush for fine control.
Since the model would be a single color I needed a way to make it look less like a toy. I’m not planning to do a wash on the panel lines because they are all very shallow and I figure I will have issues with a wash so I was thinking of doing a preshade. After a little more thought I decided to give the black and white method a try. Pictures of this aircraft show it as being a little blotchy from fading in the Edwards AFB sun so I thought the Black and White technique might represent that.
I used Vallejo Black Primer over the panels and Ammo’s Single Shot White Primer in the panels.
The bottom only got the black preshade. This gives a little contrast, plus I could experiment a little bit.
Next up was the Gray. I used Ammo’s FS36118Medium Gunship Gray, sprayed on in light layers. Here’s the top:
…and the bottom:
I am really happy with the end result. Exactly what I was going for.
I lightly sanded the paint with some 6000 and 8000 grit polishing pads and sprayed two coats of future this afternoon, in preparation for decals. This one is getting close.
Thanks all for watching!
Mike
The next step was to get the cockpit finished up so I could install the canopy. First step was to modify the Quickboost seat. The seat I planned to use is a Quickboost ACES 2 for an F-15. The YF-23 seat was also an ACES2 seat and was reclined at about the same angle. To make the resin seat work though I needed to add some seat rails as the kit seat had them molded to the seat itself. I ended up borrowing some rails from an aftermarket F-16 cockpit I had sitting around, and it worked quite well.
After that I painted the seat. I used Ammo black for the seat, and Tamiya Nato black for the parachute pack which is fabric. Other varios paints for the details. I didn’t really go all out since the canopy would be closed.
The HUD on the YF-23 like many of the parts, was taken from other production aircraft, in this case the F-15. The kit part is made up of the HUD glass in clear plastic, a separate frame and the projector window that is attached to the glare shield. Once the HUD was installed, I also installed the seat.
After that, the canopy was installed in the closed position. Hobby Boss doesn’t give you the option of having it open. Then everything was masked for priming.
I primered the model with Tamiya primer straight from the rattle can. Then I checked all the seams, and reworked all the problem areas. I used Mr. Surfacer 500 for the rework since I could apply it with a micro brush for fine control.
Since the model would be a single color I needed a way to make it look less like a toy. I’m not planning to do a wash on the panel lines because they are all very shallow and I figure I will have issues with a wash so I was thinking of doing a preshade. After a little more thought I decided to give the black and white method a try. Pictures of this aircraft show it as being a little blotchy from fading in the Edwards AFB sun so I thought the Black and White technique might represent that.
I used Vallejo Black Primer over the panels and Ammo’s Single Shot White Primer in the panels.
The bottom only got the black preshade. This gives a little contrast, plus I could experiment a little bit.
Next up was the Gray. I used Ammo’s FS36118Medium Gunship Gray, sprayed on in light layers. Here’s the top:
…and the bottom:
I am really happy with the end result. Exactly what I was going for.
I lightly sanded the paint with some 6000 and 8000 grit polishing pads and sprayed two coats of future this afternoon, in preparation for decals. This one is getting close.
Thanks all for watching!
Mike
