Noob question about plastic structure kits

[gavino200]

I have a few plastic kits that I'm about to start building. One is a Walthers kit and the other is a MID Build kit. I'm planning on painting these structures before the structure is fully assembled. 

 

My question is about subsequently gluing the parts together. I've always thought that the plastic has to directly touch "naked" plastic, for the polystyrene cement to work. It solvent melts the plastic and sort of welds them, as I understand it. 

 

So do I need to carefully mask off the parts where the glue will be applied and the bond will be made? Or does it not matter if the plastic parts are completely painted?

[marknewton]

Unless you're using a very aggressive solvent like MEK, I'd recommend keeping paint off any joints or mating surfaces. Apart from making a better bond, it will prevent the glue or solvent from crazing or blistering the paint along the joint.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[cteno4]

Gavin,

 

you can usually scrape the paint off most joint surfaces by dragging an X-Acto blade along the surface at the perpendicular. Usually just takes off the paint from the plastic and roughs the surface up to boot a tiny bit which always helps with glue bonds. Many times wirh edge joints you just get a tad of overspray on the bond edge and you can usually scrape this off easily.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[cteno4]

Forgot to mention to get into dado joints a micro chisel scalpel blades like a #61 are handy to scrape with

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/MYCO-GLASSVAN-Mini-Surgical-Blades-Carbon-Sterile-12-BX-6100-6200-6400-6700-64/131462344952?var=430818583030

 

jeff

[marknewton]

Good advice from you, Jeff. Those blades look useful, too. 

 

Thanks, 

 

Mark.

[Lawrence]

I would always recommend washing all parts in warm soapy water then rinsing well in clean water, this removes any releasing agents or grease from the parts before painting. Humbrol make a product called Maskol, this could be applied to small areas which will be glued prior to painting then peeled off one the paint is dry.

[cteno4]

I’ve used the good old liquid tape for nails for similar things. Basically just a thick latex and peels off easily and does not seem to leave any residue. Maybe the same stuff as the maskol. It’s really nice on the surfaces that masking tape does not adhere well to (ie bumpy detailed areas). You can over paint and then cut your mask line and remove excess like you can with tape.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/6ML-Peel-Off-Liquid-Tape-Latex-Tape-Peel-Off-Base-Coat-Nail-Art-Liquid-DIY-Nail/391465052287?hash=item5b2522a87f:m:m1kl8xL5Bpa9S-RQU2_xtBg

 

one odd masking thing I have had was at corners where I stuck masking tape on the one edge to protect it but has some sticky side protruding out at the corner. When I removed the tape the paint along the corner really adheared to it, much more than a regular surface mask along the edge of a mask line. It made a horrid edge. If I had just sliced the paint along the edge it would not have happened. I think the paint just cured really hard to the sticky side sticking out. Learned me to mask just to the edge or trim off the extra sticking out.

 

jeff

[cteno4]

13 hours ago, marknewton said:

Those blades look useful, too. 

 

 

I love them, really handy as little chisels and of chop off little bits in odd situations. The do need a tiny handle though, they don’t sit well in a standard X-Acto handle. The scalpel handle is pretty expensive for these blades, but tattooing to the rescue! These small handles work fine, just have to widen one slit with a thin cutoff wheel with the dremel as these scalpel blades are a bit thick.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Microblading-Tattoo-Machine-Tool-Permanent-Makeup-Eyebrow-Tattoo-Manual-Pen-NJ/113351700723?hash=item1a6449b0f3:m:m-duV-3CvaK5tcheBiuLNNw

 

btw these little handles make decent pin vices as well for small bits. I use to get them for like 10mcents on ebay auctions but most of those have gone away lately. I’ve also drilled a few out to 1.6mm to hold the 1.6mm dental burrs as they make decent micro files.

 

micromark sells a handle and one each of #61, 62, 67, and 67m blades for $15.

 

https://www.micromark.com/Micro-Knife-W-1-Ea-4-Blades

 

The 67 are useful in odd spots as well to dig stuff out and much tougher than X-Acto tips. The 61 and 62 are the more useful ones. They use to come up quite a bit on ebay and I got a few boxes in one batch for like $6 or 7. But they make great little goodie gifts to other club members! 

 

Few other nice chisel blades.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/MYCO-GLASSVAN-Chisel-Surgical-Podiatry-Blades-Carbon-Steel-12-BX-312-313-314-316/131861733722?var=431209556538

 

gavin May know of some other exotic scalpel blades of use but they may be hard and or expensive to buy...

 

cheers

 

jeff

[gavino200]

15 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Forgot to mention to get into dado joints a micro chisel scalpel blades like a #61 are handy to scrape with

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/MYCO-GLASSVAN-Mini-Surgical-Blades-Carbon-Sterile-12-BX-6100-6200-6400-6700-64/131462344952?var=430818583030

 

jeff

 

I just ordered a pack of 61s. thanks. 

 

The 64 is my all time favorite blade btw. I use it all the time. I can't think of any modelling applications for it though. These things are designed to fit on a special narrow handle. They look like they'd also fit on an Xacto handle. If not I'm sure I have a Beaver blade handle somewhere. 

[gavino200]

1 hour ago, cteno4 said:

I’ve used the good old liquid tape for nails for similar things. Basically just a thick latex and peels off easily and does not seem to leave any residue. Maybe the same stuff as the maskol. It’s really nice on the surfaces that masking tape does not adhere well to (ie bumpy detailed areas). You can over paint and then cut your mask line and remove excess like you can with tape.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/6ML-Peel-Off-Liquid-Tape-Latex-Tape-Peel-Off-Base-Coat-Nail-Art-Liquid-DIY-Nail/391465052287?hash=item5b2522a87f:m:m1kl8xL5Bpa9S-RQU2_xtBg

 

one odd masking thing I have had was at corners where I stuck masking tape on the one edge to protect it but has some sticky side protruding out at the corner. When I removed the tape the paint along the corner really adheared to it, much more than a regular surface mask along the edge of a mask line. It made a horrid edge. If I had just sliced the paint along the edge it would not have happened. I think the paint just cured really hard to the sticky side sticking out. Learned me to mask just to the edge or trim off the extra sticking out.

 

jeff

 

I've discovered this stuff also works well as masking. And it's reusable. It's also handy for holding small parts on thin dowels while you paint them.

 

https://www.amazon.com/CraftyCrocodile-White-Simply-Tacky/dp/B00WAB0PS4

[gavino200]

20 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

 

gavin May know of some other exotic scalpel blades of use but they may be hard and or expensive to buy...

 

 

Nope. I do everything with either a 64 or a 15. Occasionally I'll use an 11. 

[gavino200]

The Humbrol Maskol does look like it would have some useful applications. It looks a lot easier to work with than liquid tapel. 

 

 

[cteno4]

looks like the same stuff to me. from the constancy and how it applies in the video its the same as the liquid tape they use for nails. exact same application for nails models!

 

jeff

[gavino200]

Thanks guys. I just put together my first plastic model in about 35 years. It was fun. The model was very simple and doesn't need to be painted in sections. The next one I'm going to tackle is a Walthers crane. I'm sure I'll get to incorporate your ideas. 

[chinbeard]

Anyone know of good  'How To's' on painting structures, I'm ready to begin work on my Greenmax buildings and I've not worked on anything so small. I've run searches with no luck, I suppose I could find a ton of stuff if I had some Japanese language.

 

[bill937ca]

You can find a fair amount if you Google Greenmax and the kit number.  In Google Chrome you can right click to translate to English.

 

Some examples:

 

http://www.gm-store.co.jp/blog/blog01/archives/55562

 

Greenmax 2123 engine shed

 

http://www.gm-store.co.jp/blog/gmstore-staff/archives/22061

 

http://www.gm-store.co.jp/blog/gmstore-staff/archives/22102

 

http://www.gm-store.co.jp/blog/gmstore-staff/archives/22167

 

http://www.gm-store.co.jp/blog/gmstore-staff/archives/22210

 

http://www.gm-store.co.jp/blog/gmstore-staff/archives/22255

 

Greenmax 2144

 

http://www.gm-store.co.jp/blog/gmstore-staff/archives/19606

 

Prototype Tokyo Metro Fukugawa Depot 

http://funini.com/train/tokyo/metro/fukagawa/index.html.en

[cteno4]

Yeah the greenmax are a pain to paint those windows! Being mounded in makes them hard to paint different. I’ve used careful hand painting, paint markers and masking tape, but none have been perfect! Gavin’s trick of using clay in the windows to mask them off is pretty cool and I want to try it.

 

i have been meaning to try using the silhouette cutter to cut nice masks for greenmax walls/windows as it’s setup to use scans to then creat cut templates from them.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[gavino200]

The trick that Jeff is talking about can be found in this thread. 

On 12/24/2018 at 5:49 PM, chinbeard said:

Anyone know of good  'How To's' on painting structures, I'm ready to begin work on my Greenmax buildings and I've not worked on anything so small. I've run searches with no luck, I suppose I could find a ton of stuff if I had some Japanese language.

 

 

The trick that Jeff is talking about can be found in this thread. How is the painting project going?

 

http://www.jnsforum.com/community/topic/14375-airbrushing-techniques/