Fuslage Complete

Completed the fuslage today, plane starting to take shape.

U-96 Photo Shoot

Complete!

Well today I completed the U-96 and am glad to have accomplished another kit. While this is one of the smallest kits I have built so far I'll admit the low time to build (524 minutes or 8 hours 44 minutes in this case) is attractive versus the typical 30-40 hour range I experience with larger kits however I found it to be less fun to build as the parts are very tiny and there is not as much detail. Weathering also proved to be difficult and I find that on a shelf with other scale models it does not look as impressive due to the small size. Overall I like the kit but would probably prefer building it in a larger scale.

Flag

The submarine has been sitting on my workbench for a little while now with only the flag remaining. Its a decal that you fold in two and is supposed to go over a pole but it fell off before I was able to spray a flat coat. I decided to try and just glue (gel) this very thin flag to the pole with super glue and it worked to my surprise. It adds a nice punch of color to this otherwise very bland paint scheme.

Fuslage

Started work on the fuslage, always enjoyed doing such sections as flat wooden parts become a three dimensional object.

First Parts Finished

Today I completed the first parts of the F4U Corsair, both stabilizers are looking good...

Starting a New Build...

Started building a new kit today, decided to commence with the planes vertical and horizontal stabilizers.

Weathing (again)

With the U-96 reassembled I decided to keep the weathering much simplier. While some of the Tamiya Panel Accent Color remains I did not want to add more so I used a staedtler 0.05mm black marker to add hole markings accorss the hull which I think turned out pretty good.

New Decals

Fortunetly for me the base decals came in English and German. While I preferred the word "U-boot", the word "Submarine" will have to do if I want to correct the weathering error I committed a few days ago.

A Weathering Disaster...

After spraying a glossy clear cost to seal up the decals it was time to weather the kit. Seeing all the rivets along the hull I figured that this kit would be a great candiate to try out the Tamiya Panel Accent Color. While instructions were vague I looked at several videos online and used some thinner to clean it up with some q-tips but was not getting great results. I decided to buy some Tamiya X-20 Lacquer Thinner and try again the weathing but to my horror I noticed that the paint started to come off as well as the decals in the base! Even the glue started coming off which is wht the conning tower and railings are all detached!

I suspect that the gloss coat got worn off but my several attempts to remove some of the Tamiya Panel Accent Color which led to the paint coming off. I also think that this kit is perhaps too small for the Panel Line Accent Color as there are only a few millimeters between each row of rivets along the hull. I have never scrapped a kit and I don't want to begin today! I guess this is a nice learning experience...