Painting-
Some parts, like the wings and tail, where left off as I painted. These really did fit so well that there was no need to put them together and this aided in being able to do the camouflage scheme.
You are presented with three distinct paint schemes in the kit. All of them are colorful and make great markings but I can’t leave well enough alone. I wanted to do a natural metal airplane, especially after doing the new Master Class Model Building Video, so I searched my decals and came up with a Trimaster sheet for the He-162 that had exactly what I was looking for. “White 6” was a typical airplane with the front of the fuselage unpainted with puttied joints and a nose panel painted in some color. The wings and tail assembly were painted prior to assembly on the real airplane so building it the way I did it was the way the real one was.
I actually built two of these kits (hey it’s Tamiya so you know it will be easy) so I needed another scheme. I decided to use one of the kit markings for Oblt. Demuth with the kill markings on the tail, “Yellow 11”. This had the red, black and white marking around the nose.
I know what the German painting instructions call for but every color photo I’ve seen from the period on the He-162 showed them to be painted in dark colors. So despite what Tamiya called for I elected to use Brown Violet and Dark Green. I’m not going to call them 82 or 83. There is confusion with that method and I’m just a model builder so from here on out BV will be Brown Violet and DG will be Dark Green. Tamiya recommends a Light Green, here after not mentioned as LG. Simple and understandable.
Prior to painting, I had to fill the proper panel lines so that the putty would be correct. The real airplane had its panel lines filled so I filled them on the NMF machine. I left them alone on the camouflage machine. I used Tamiya putty and filled the panel lines, not all of them just the ones that weren’t used for servicing. Both models were washed with Dawn dish detergent and left to dry.
Both airplanes received a coat of ALCLAD gray primer, which is my primer of choice.
NMF aircraft- The whole aircraft was painted with ALCLAD II Aluminum. Once that was dry, I masked over the panels that needed to be and sprayed Model Master RLM 76 on the lower surfaces. BV and DG were masked in time. The nose was a darker color and I thought it might be primer red. If it isn’t prove me wrong as the tonal qualities of the red arrow and the primer looks really close to me. The whole model was sprayed with Mr. Hobby GREY can, NOTE GREY
CAN, Clear Gloss to seal everything. Next I painted Gunze Mr. Surfacer 1000 onto
the panel lines. Once dried, I used Micromesh and lightly sanded the surfacer to
“smooth” it in like real putty was.
“Yellow 11”- Preshading with
Model Master RLM 66, the model was ready for the camouflage. I purposely thinned
my paint extremely thin and sprayed it on so that I could see the preshading.
This replicated the thin application of the real thing. RLM 76 was sprayed
first. I used hard masks with Tamiya tape and then sprayed the BV and DG. I
masked off the red, black and white nosebands even though Tamiya gives them to
you as decals. Once everything was dried, I sprayed Mr. Hobby GREY can, NOTE
GREY CAN, clear gloss. This will become important in a little bit.
Decals-
The old Trimaster decals fit worked like they were suppose to and snuggled down
perfectly with Solvaset.
The Tamiya decals were a little
thicker but they reacted well with setting solution and there was no problem to
be seen. The decals were sealed with a coat of Mr. Hobby GREY can, Gloss Coat.
So far, so good. I was on a roll and
would be finished shortly, or so I thought.
Disaster and nasty words-
After letting the decals dry for about a day I sprayed Mr. Hobby BLUE can Flat
Coat. Now if my history lessons were correct the blue and gray fought the
American civil war. Well the BLUE and the GREY fought the civil war on my paint
jobs as well. The blue separated, (I thought it was the gray in the civil war),
and did not work at all. At first I thought no problem another coat and it will
be fine. No it did not help. Sand with micromesh another coat of flat and still
not much better.
Swearing in every language I knew
and some I didn’t, I sat down dejected in my model room and thought how could
this happen to me. Well I’m just a Joe Smuck and if I could read Japanese I
would have seen that you couldn’t mix the blue and gray overcoats. What was I
thinking? It is plainly written there on the label, in Japanese gibberish, but
there none the same. With thoughts of seeing how well the model would fly I
elected to strip the model. Luckily I was barely able to save the NMF fuselage.
I did not spray over the aluminum so it didn’t go to hell. I was able to save
the tail and with micromesh, most of the fuselage.
Using Polly-S Paint and decal
remover, I removed all the decals and paint back to bare plastic.
Now what? I am almost out of kit
decals. I ended up using some Aeromaster decals for the stencils. I also ran
across a color picture on the Internet of a machine captured by the British at
Leck. It was an unassuming machine with just a tail number. Feeling beaten down I elected to not put the kill markings on, not to put the red, black and white nose bands, just a plain jane run of the mill He-162.
The photo clearly shows the front of the airplane with an RLM 70 Dark Green with the panel behind the pilot as DG and the rest of the fuselage BV. The right wing was RLM 70 as well so I went to town with that and was finally able to see a nice model that represented the chaos of the final months of war.
Both kits were then airbrushed with Model Master Acrylic Flat. I tested a wing first of course. Little gun shy you can understand.
Final touches-
Adding the wings, tail assembly, pitot tube, the engine pods, and gear doors and the model was completed. Weathering was kept to a minimum of a burnt umber wash to the panel lines.
Conclusion-
Like the real airplane there are compromises in the kit. Some things are plug and play (wings and tail) and others require you to cut things (the wheel well covers). However, this kit is leaps and bounds better than the Trimaster/Dragon kits for easy of construction and precise fit. Despite my self-induced paint error, the kit was a lot of fun. I’ve since bought another one to build again. Yes it is a small airplane and ugly, but as far as a model goes, it is hard to find a better engineered one.
Highly recommended.
Thanks to Tamiya for the review kit and it can be purchased at most hobby shops.
Floyd S. Werner, Jr.
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