1/144 Leigh's Aeropostale Boeing 737-200 group build

[F-27pax]

Another day, another three coats of white lacquer. I've masked the wings since they're going to be Boeing grey. There's not much visual difference between the before and the after pictures here, except for the three coats of white lacquer. I bought a two litre tin of the stuff from Darby's six or so years ago, and there's still plenty left. It goes on like a dream. I'm off to Melbourne for the tomorrow so there might not be much to report at the end of the day tomorrow.





That''s all for today fellow plastic addicts.

[F-27pax]

By the way, here's the decal sheet for the Aeropostale 737. It has decals for a -200 and a -300 and since I'm not going to be using the -300 side of the sheet it will be free to a good home. Let me know if you're interested.

[tor lives]

She is coming along superbly young man!!!
This is going to be an amazing line-up of 737s at Model Expo next year.
I would certainly be interested in the spare decal sheet if still available.
TOR

[hrtpaul]

Looking great there Leigh. Keep up the nice work. I think it was you that I bought 2 bottles of Boeing grey off a few years ago. We'll I'm finally gonna use it on my 732

[F-27pax]

Continuing on... Here's it is back from the paint shop after two coats of decanted Tamiya TS-26 Pure White, the difference in shade between the finished white and the white primer is not visible in this photo but quite marked in real life.



Next comes masking the fuselage. I use the Aizu 0.4mm tape which is about the only thing that works for me on curves in 1/144. I back it up with a good dose of Humbrol Maskol to keep the tape in place and also prevent any paint getting under the tape any further than 0.4 mm. The other thing I like about Maskol is that it never (in my experience anyhow) pulls of layers of paint it's covering when it comes time to remove the masking.



The trouble with Maskol is that it peels away very easily so I protect it, as much as possible, with Tamiya masking tape. For some reason the tape that comes out of the little dispensers peels off Maskol without damaging it so it is possible to place that tape very easily and accurately with a few tries. On the other hand the larger rolls of Tamiya, which is paper, pulls off Maskol very easily, so I have to be a bit careful about which tape I use where.



All this being done, it's off to the paint shop again. This time, some Boeing Grey which I got the local automotive paint shop to make up using Xtracolor Boeing grey enamel paint as the source colour. On with two coats, which dry very quickly and with (to me) jut the right amount of sheen.



Thus ends today's lesson.

[Adam the Akrodude]

Very cool!

[F-27pax]

It's the next day and time to start masking for the metallic bits and pieces. The tail decals I'm using have a cut out bit allowing for the metallic leading edge so I thought I'd best make sure they match up when it comes time to put the decals on. I usually use a paper copy of the decals for this kind of things, and here is what that looks like.



I then use some tape to indicate the boundary and then mask against that, as in ...



And here is the tail masking more or less sorted out.



Now I come to the impasse that ended my day's activities. I'm not sure about the bare metal leading edges on the wings and tail planes. Logically they should follow the moulded slat line, but that is not always the case on airliners, and what about the tail? I tried to find some photos on the interweb but photos of aeroplanes taken from above are hard to find. Does anyone have suggestions or good photos as a guide? Otherwise this state of indecision will overcome me.

Talking of which, does anyone have any good suggestions about the Corogard panels. I've got some decals I bought but they are grey and corogard isn't grey. I got my local automotive paint shop to make some corogard based on Xtracolor X331 but while the tone is right the particle size is too big for 1/144. I have only one tin left of the Xtracolor paint and I am DESPERATE!! Any suggestions?

Back tomorrow, if I can get over this mental roadblock.

[Ansett A330]

Don't know if this is what you need but it is from a brilliant Airfix -200 to -100 build over on Britmodeller :

[F-27pax]

Thanks! I'll work from this. Onwards and upwards. What was the RAAF motto again?

[F-27pax]

The next day, and more work. Looking at A330s suggestion and doing a lot more trawling of the interweb, I find that not all 737-200 wings are the same. I came across a photo of an Argentine airliner on which the bare metal parts on the upper wing are as the drawing A330 gave us say. On the other hand, a photo of an Aeropostale upper wing (taken from the rear so it says nothing about leading edges) doesn't have any of those bare metal parts. I am thankful for this because it means less masking, and I hate masking.

Masking takes for ever.



But the painting takes no time at all. First, a light coat of white primer.



Next, I gave some thought to what version of bare metal to use. Of the various options I decided that the Aeropostale 737s look well maintained and the leading edges nicely polished so I decided to go the Tamiya TS-83 route. So, first is the Tamiya TS-14 gloss black.



Then, a nice coat of TS-83.



Time for a rest and to let everything dry and set properly.