AH-64A Hellenic Army

Maciej Bellos
I decided to give this chopper another go. So the first thing was to check how the masking tape would fare after 5 years in waiting. Well as you can see in my last poto, it didn't fare well. The glue of the masking tape dried and decided to attach to the canopy rather than stay put with the tape. Nothing that good old isopropyl alcohon can't handle. About a quarter later and some earbuds the canopy was clear.

Since then I attached some bits and pieces here and there, snapped off some other bits and pieces and now it's time again to mask the canopy and proceed with the paint job. The colour will be FS34031.

Maciej Bellos
I managed to paint the beast.
- First step: prelighting with Humbrol 148 Radome Tan
- Second step: preshading in larger areas with Humbrol 30 Dark Green
- Third step: preshading with Humbrol 33 Flat Black

Then I applied the base colour FS34031 using Model Master 2024 US Army Helo Drab.

It still needs some correcting here and there. After that I might try some postlighting.

Comments and recomendations are welcome.

Christian Ristits
Very convincing paintjob, i am sure it will turn out great!

Maciej Bellos
Thanks Christian! I am flattered, considering the gems you create. That MiG-31BM is great with all it's weathering.

Christian Ristits
Thanks, you are very welcome!

Maciej Bellos
Done with the corrections. My postlighting is barely noticeable. Ready for the glosh varnish.

Maciej Bellos
Decaled. I had real trouble with silvering and despite my efforts it still appears in some places like the tail decal. I used tons of Micro Sol which really helped. For example the tail numbers even with a lot of gloss varnish, they exhibited more than 50% silvering. I thought it would be a disaster and was kind of disappointed.

Micro Sol is a rather strong agent, and if used abundantly it reacts with the gloss varnish (Humbrol Clear) and creates some nasty white areas (as you can see on the tail). It is corrected by applying more Humbrol Clear after the decals have properly dried.

Pin wash coming up next and then I will probably spray extra thinned paint over some of the stencils to dim them out. The stencils on the greek Model A Apaches are barely visible.

Maciej Bellos
Stencils dimmed out and I applied the first coat of matt varnish. I think it's OK, but it might need another coat.

Maciej Bellos
Finished! Almost 20 years after I started it (I didn't work on it all this time, though). All the bits and pieces were put in place and I snapped a few photos of the complete thing waiting for the weather to clear up and take some better ones.
One thing is for sure, it will be a long-long time before I tackle an Apache again. I snapped all of the antennas at least one time.
All comments are welcome.

Michael Phillips
Wow, that is a beautiful Apache Maciej! The paintwork is very nicely done, and the bright blue Greek markings really look cool against the dark green of the base paint.

It is really cool to see such a long term project completed. 20 years is crazy!

Spanjaard
really nice. took some time😉, but nice result. i have some models waiting to be finished for similar amount of years 😄 but right now, that i am back on modeling after quite a few years break, i feel more like doing new ones, got a few in the stash 😛

Maciej Bellos
Thank you Michael. Yeah, 20 years is crazy, and I have another one that I started somewhere around back then.
Thank you Spanjaard. It took about half my life! I will sure do some new ones, the only thing is that the new ones tend to become old ones, as I model about once a week for about 2-3 hours or so. Hahaha.
I am glad you like it. It's a nice addition to my display case.

Spanjaard
the problem for me is also the stash keep growing over the years, at the current speed, i may need to live until 100 to finish then all (stash not that big, but i am a slow builder 😛)

Maciej Bellos
Hehe, if I up my rate to 3 kits per year, I still need 13 years to use up my stash, provided that I don't buy anything.

Spanjaard
sure, you will not buy anything in 13 years.... 😄
yes, that is what we all tell to ourselves....😉

Nikolaos Kouzinis
Nice job Maciez

Maciej Bellos
Thank you Niko.

Łukasz Gliński
Nice build and interesting topic, though not my scale

Maciej Bellos
Thank you Łukasz! It was an interesting build. Lots of additions to make it a decent looking AH-64A.
The final photos have been added.
Now back to Łukasz's favourite scale, with two unfinished kits on the bench.

Ed Froix
Awesome!

Maciej Bellos
Thank you Ed!