Revell Blue Angel #1

Rough sanding and filing of stuff...yikes.

Rough sanding

The nose on this thing was defective from the factory, so I had to sand it into shape.

Trying to find the right blue. This is MM French Blue, which the kit calls for, but isn’t dark enough. I have Tamiya X-4 Blue on order. You can see where I glossed the nose, the front Left wing extension and the Right taileron in this group of photos.

Trying to find the right blue. This is MM French Blue, which the kit calls for, but isn’t dark enough. I have Tamiya X-4 Blue on order.

Trying to find the right blue. This is MM French Blue, which the kit calls for, but isn’t dark enough. I have Tamiya X-4 Blue on order.

Painted with Tamiya X-4 Blue thinned with Isopropyl Alcohol. Color looks right, but mistakes were made.

Orange Peel, a few streaks and had to prime my wing tips again over the French Blue so the yellow would show up better. Gear doors are not good, but still much much better than when I started. Once the wingtips are painted, I'm hoping some fine sanding will get it in good shape for clear coats.

The brake is still kinda rough around the edges. Lesson learned.

putty work leaves much to be desired, but determined to get better with more practice.

Started Decaling - First time using Microscale's MicroSet and MicroSol with decent results. This is an old kit I had in the closet forever, but I feel like I want something a little "hotter" than the MicroSol to get those decals to sit down in some of the details. Also, Revell's decal map is not true to life, so I have some more painting to do. Once I get the canopy on, I'll finish the yellow stripes on the top.

Didn't see it until it was set, but the Blue Angels script is a bit too low. Also noticing that the Intermediate Gauzey Agent from AK is not shiny enough for this.

The yellow strip is several smaller decals pieced together. The yellow stripe was aligned better after this picture was taken. The kit was designed and molded for doors open/gear down, so the decals are in pieces. Also, because the location of the arrowhead is not mapped accurately, you get a gap between the arrowhead decal and the first section of yellow stripe that will need to be painted. The first section of the stripe decal has a locating hole for the antenna, so you can't really slide it up to make up the difference. It's been very evident that this kit is not of the same quality as my Kinetic F/18 Blue Angel.