58326: JGSDF Light Armored Vehicle from Dirt-540 showroom, JGSDF (AFTER)

Model: (Click to see more) 58326: JGSDF Light Armored Vehicle
Status: New built
Date: 17-Jan-2009
Comments: 8

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Roll Call! This post is dedicated to FSABRE100 who gave me the idea of painting polycarbonate on the outside. I guess you could call it “thinking outside the body” ha ha… Incidentally when I ran out of paint and put a wanted/trade post on the forum it was also FSABRE100 who contacted me and traded the much needed TS-70 paint to get the job finished, otherwise it may have still been sitting on the shelf half painted. A big thanks goes out to all TC members who have helped me along the way in one form or another, you know who you are, plus TC itself, cheers all.

Have waited a long time to post this JGSDF, finished it a long time ago but had to wait for a sunny weekend and the time to photograph it properly. Was set with disasters too, got caught out in the rain on 1st attempt and the 2nd time my mini tripod broke so it rendered the Macro as good as useless? 3rd attempt was indoors which went a treat so here is the results of my long awaited profile/post of my first finished New In Box Tamiya.

Here’s an itinerary of the work I did: (I’d get yourself a cup of tea at this point, or just scroll straight to the photos.)

1 ) Built kit fully ball-racing 2 ) Waterproofed all electrical parts and gear boxes using re-sealable bags, zip ties, heat-shrink, hot glue and a little insulation tape. It should be possible to submerge above bonnet height and not suffer any problems at all. 3 ) Cut down bumper so it was the same width as body just like the real JGSDF and sprayed it with TS-70 Drab Olive. 4 ) Matt blackened just about anything that was possible i.e. drive shafts, cups, screw heads etc 5 ) Hand brush painted wheels with Acrylic Mini Xf – 62 Olive Drab, it just looks better than spraying them for some reason. 6 ) Set to work on the body, removed film, keyed it with 1200, 1 coat of PS-5 black spray, keyed again with 1200, another layer of PS-5, keyed back with 1200 and soapy water, sprayed lightly with TS-70 Olive Drab, sprayed a little more TS-70, keyed back with 1200, another layer of TS-70. 7 ) Masked the back end and painted the mud flaps with Humbrol Matt Black – 33, no Tamiya available. Some how a spot of paint got through where it shouldn’t have so that took quite a bit of work to undo, like reversing the masking and touching up with spray about 6 times before you could no longer see it. 8 ) Weathered and detailed the body using a black water paint pencil from my art utensils, drew in all the recess’s featured on the body including drawing round all the rivets. Then got a saucer of water wet my fingers and rubbed the pencil on finger tips activating the pencil then I’d work it into the body till I was happy with the affect. Overall, painting and weathering the body took a ridiculous amount of time due to problems like getting rain on wet paint, my cat leaning on it just after spraying it, depositing lots of his fur. All in all it was a 3 week process and it really tested my patience, but the image in my mind kept up the drive. 9) Stickered it up, kept the stickers to a minimum as I think it looks better and more authentic. This was a meticulous process as I painstakingly trimmed them with a scalpel to get rid of any excess. I even trimmed away the bits between the slats of the front grill sticker. This nearly went irreversibly wrong as when I removed it from its backing it lost much of its structural integrity and the strips slackened and stuck to each other and I had to sit there with 2 pairs of tweezers and carefully prize them apart. It was as I imagine a bit like brain surgery. It took in total just under 2 hours to save and stick the front grill sticker; this was possibly not only the biggest test of patience during the build but one of the most testing in my life. 10 ) I matt blackened the aerial sleeve and painted the tops of the body mounting posts olive drab. 11 ) Using a Tamiya Weathering Kit #87079 I worked the tyres, wheels and the windows too, finally using a cotton bud I wiped away where the wipers would clean the glass. 12 ) Made myself a cup of tea and whilst sipping it sat there staring at it for about half an hour.

Thank you if you read all of my chronicles of this build, I could of wrote more as there was lots of problems and set backs but I don’t think there would be enough server space. Cheers all and comments are welcome as usual, hope you like.

If you liked those pictures, you should see these...
JSGSDF (BEFORE)

JGSDF (AFTER)

Comments

ukzz4iroc

f100sabre

7.2inchdriver

smoothrider

Wyoming

CASE1

GEMINIJETS

Fernado Alonso

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