Starship Modeler Discussion Forums

For primer I use either automotive or Kyrlon. I use the automotive if it is a resin piece. My undestanding is that you prime for several reasons. First to find problems and second to give it a base coat for the main coat of paint to grab onto. Once you fix any problems, then you prime that area agai...

I have noticed that when I do prime a kit, that most of it comes off when I wet sand it (400 grit). May be I am putting it on too light of a coat?

So, I know you can't put on too much for you may lose some details, so how heavy of a coat should you put on it.

???
Whats that?

Same type of chalking that you would use for sealing windows and doors.

Thanks for the ideas.

Will try the future or poly.

How do you preserve pieces of wood from decaying when used for a diorama?

Seal it with dull coat or soak it in a glue/water mixture?

I have a lot of interesting pieces to use, but I need to be able to save them for future use so I need to find something to preserve them.

Thanks

Here is what I got when I used pheneal seal to attach the fiber optics... I had to use globs of it to secure the fiber strand. On the plus side, it was flexable enough to allow for bending, but on the negative side, it had some trouble sticking to the painted surface ( I had sprayed the inside silve...

Use Microscale's Liquid Decal Film

I have heard of this stuff. Have not seen it at the stores, so I guess I have to chase it down on the internet.

Someone told me that a good thing to do, prior to cut out the decal is to spray it with dull coat. They told me that what this would do is keep the decal in tact and not tear when you try to remove it from its backing.

Can anyone confirm this?

Thanks for all the suggestions!! Another thing I had trouble with was with the fact that the decal is so large which made using the microsol solution on the surface of the model another issue. Maybe I should had put it in a spray bottle and srayed that solution on the kit? I felt that I was using to...

Need a little help with after market decals. Purchased a set for the Romulan Bird of Prey and when I placed the decal in the water, it curled so fast that it caused the portion of the decal that did not get into the water as fast to curl with the paper - thus cracking the decal. One problem I have w...

Ok, this maybe dumb, but I have never seen this question come up.

Do you re-prime the primer after your have sanded it? Sometimes when I sand the primer smooth, the color of the plastic comes thru. So I was wondering if you would re-prime it and then lightly sand it again?

I sand with 400 grit.

So, I guess that I would be better off to prime it and then paint it black and then paint it with the Alclad?

My understanding is that before it can be sprayed on, it needs to be sprayed onto a black surface.

If the kit is modeled in black, does that still count?

I am currently working on lighting the Bird of Prey with FO and I planned on using silcon to hold the FO in place. When I get back from the IPMS is when I would be trying this out.

Thanks for the suggestions. What I have done is used a hair dryer on high and pressed the fibers down "gentley"! This seems to be doing the trick!

Working on the Romulan Bird of Prey and will be lighting it with FO, but due to the thickness of the FO, I need to bend them and keep them in that pose so that the led can do its thing. I can't bundle them due to the space limits of the kit. So, I was wondering if I heat a strand will it hold the be...

So, if I understand... Durham's Rock-Hard water putty is better to use than Hydrocal? I can get both, not in very great quanities... so either of these products would work then.

Ok, this is along the same subject. I picked up some of those molds that you make rock formations and the guy at the store told me that the hydrocal (that the molds recommends) does not work well and to us plaster of paris. Well, I did and either the mix had too much water or the humidity in the air...

Well, that is an idea of something to do... different color to one strand.

Which is better, using one thick strand of FO or using a combination of smaller diameter ones to light a window area for instance? What made me ask this question, I came across an article where they used several thinner FO strands than just one thick one. I wondered if using multi strands gave a bet...

Well, yeah, you could, but,...

Do you want that kind of high voltage connected to your glasses?

Yeah, if you want to "shine on you crazy diamond."

Couldn't resist!

As for that album cover, I would suspect it to be photographic effect.

The freezing idea someone told me about at a show. Figured on giving that a try first.

Never thought of doing that?

Tried using the back edge of a knive to scrape some of the glue away, hoping that it would loosen the piece, but no luck.

Got an old kit that has some pieces glued on wrong. Figure that it was glued on with regular model glue. What is the best way to remove the piece without damaging them?

I did a search and failed to find any listing in the archives on this subject (as strange as it may sound).

The filter I was going to use was the type used for a furnance. So, is 200 air changes per minute good thing?

I was at Lowes today and noticed that for $100 they sold a dust collection unit that is essentially a squirrel cage with the motor on the outside. It has a cfm listing of 4700.

Now wood dust is very flammable thus, this should work as a fan for a spray booth which is what I am thinking? What also is a plus is that the adaptors for connecting the ductwork are already present on this system (4â€￾ pipe), so that is one less thing for me to build!

Now, the spray booth that I am building measures 2’x2’3’.

My questions are

1. For the spray boot that I am building, will 4700 cfm work for it?
2. Why would you not use this a venting motor for the spray booth?

If i go with that (windex) do I let it soak overnight?

Thanks for the ideas!

Just started using an airbush and messed up my styrene kit with a very lousy paint job. Got runs and orange peel effect, so I have to strip this kit and start again.

The paint is Poly scale.

Now to take the paint off, will castro super clean work or do you recommend something else?

A guy in my club is a big fan of using pastels for weathering. The thing he tells me is that what you buy in the craft stores are not too great. The pastel chaulks are to be of top quality (in my book meaning pricey). Very cream like in texture. Very fine dust comes off of the stick when you scrape ...