Wow I can’t believe it’s been 5 months since my last blog post! So much for my resolution to be posting more!
Honestly a large part of the lack of updates is probably related to the fact that I haven’t actually been doing much hobby work this year. I’ve been so busy with work, interstate (for work) and overseas (for play) trips, and suffered some mild hobby burnout from working hard on a couple of commission projects earlier in the year.
I’ve decided that part of the hobby burnout has come from taking on another massive project: a 28mm scale mecha. I’ve got the legs about 60% done, but know just how much work will be required the finish the project and honestly I just don’t have the drive to do it. So as a solution I’m going back to BFG projects! They’re a perfect size in that I feel like I’m making good progress when I do them.
But before I get back into some modelling I had the sudden urge to paint up one of my Zeus Light Cruisers (oh my God it’s nearly a year since I finished the model!). So I cast one up, washed off the release spray residue and cleaned it up – I was pleasantly surprised at how little cleanup work was required . Here’s the part where I stuffed up:
Before painting the model it needs to be undercoated. I’m following Vaaish’s guide to ship painting (but with different colours) so I figured I’d also do a black undercoat. The only black spray I could find in my supplies was some Super Cheap Auto Export brand Matte Black enamel which I was sure I’d used on models in the past, so after mostly assembling the Zeus model I stuck the three sub assemblies (hull, left fin, right fin) on wires and gave them a spray. Easy. It went on nicely without leaving any texture so I figured I’d done well.
24 hours later I went to start painting and immediately realised the problem with the Export paint undercoat: it rubs of easily. Very easily. Just handling the parts was making it come off over my hands. It seemed like it wasn’t dry enough, even though I figured I’ve given it plenty of time. Anyway I tried to start giving it a “filler coat” of watered down black acrylic but found that the acrylic was drying with a “clumpiness” and texture I didn’t like. So I decided to cut my losses and strip the model.
At this point I remembered I had an unused can of quality Tamiya surface primer sitting on my bench! It’s grey but I’m doing a light colour scheme anyway so it won’t matter…
So I dropped the Zeus into a jar of methylated spirits this morning before I went to work. I’ve has great success with metho as a paint stripper on models in the past, however I was aware of the risk of a bad reaction with the resin Zeus model. I can always cast another one so it’s worth the risk. I arrived home tonight and fished the model out, finding that although a lot of the paint had stripped off (I reckon another 12 hours would have finished it off), the feared reaction had taken place and the resin had gone all soft. It’s possible that the resin will harden back up, but in it’s soft cheesy state I accidentally broke a few bits while scrubbing the paint off with a toothbrush so won’t waste any more time on it.
In closing, two lessons were learned: use decent, known good primer, and don’t strip Resin Addict kits using methylated spirits (they use the same resin as I use for my Zeus model).
Well I’m off to demould the replacement Zeus model. Here’s some pics to show the damaged model:
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