STEP BY STEP
1 Using a piece of tape, start on the edge of the wasp stripes. Wrap a single piece around the whole bonnet so you can cut off any surplus afterwards. Narrow tape will follow the form of the bonnet curves and wrap around any detail.
2 Once you’ve covered the edges of the paint line, fill in the middle. This is where your odd widths and lengths come into play. Don’t worry about it looking untidy, we need to effectively cover all the area not to be painted.
3 Cover window areas well. Use your short section and narrow widths to allow you to infill the glazed areas. A set of tweezers can help here in accurately positioning the tape and making sure its fixed down at the edges.
4 The body splits into three sub-assemblies. Double-check that the required areas are covered and that the tape edges are sharp and well affixed. Checking is crucial – you don’t want paint bleeding or feathering underneath.
5 I sprayed outside on a warm day, with no breeze. Make sure the paint is well mixed by shaking the can for at least a minute. Also, try to get the can to a sensible room temperature – don’t spray outside on a winter’s day!
6 Wait until the paint has cured before you remove the masking. A good few hours is best but overnight is better. Now for the moment of truth: it’s really satisfying seeing the new livery come to life as the masking tape is removed!
7 Here I’m scraping the top coat from the handrails using a sharp scalpel. You could use thinner on a cotton bud, but there’s the danger of splashing it onto the new paint, so be extremely careful!
8 Even more satisfying than the earlier unmasking is seeing the glazing coming out unblemished. This is why it’s critical that you don’t rush the masking. Once happy, reassemble the model.
9 The beauty of creating a freelance livery is you can use decals from any source. These waterslide numbers were left over from an ‘O’ gauge wagon kit. Use Micro Sol setting solution to unsure the decals adhere correctly.
10 You can stamp your own identity on the model. I added some extra embellishments, including overhead wire warning flashes and some decals from a 1:72 scale P-51 Mustang kit. Tamiya’s satin sheen also helps decals adhere.