What's on my desk? Part 97.

The Tabu sheets doesn't come with instructions, so I had to look up photos of the actual car and/or compare with the Tamiya instructions for placement.

There's still some decals to apply on the white headrest/air intake thing behind the driver's seat and a final gloss coat over all this. The rear view mirrors also need to be installed.

The last thing to do will be somewhat difficult. There's a small windscreen that needs a black painted 'frame' on the inside of the clear plastic. Problem is there's no indication of where this needs to go, no molded line to follow. It will require a steady hand and some careful painting to pull this off to my satisfaction... To be continued.

The Bergepanther then. I've sprayed a full coat of Dark Yellow over the hull, avoiding the superstructure. Then this and the spade received a coat of 'worn effect' from AK. I prefer Ammo's 'Scratches Effect', but I've run out of that one.

Once dry it receives another coat of Dark Yellow, and after about 10 minutes drying time you can start damaging the paint. This is still commonly called the 'hairspray technique', because you can do this exact thing using a can of hairspray, with the added bonus of making your model smell nice, too. :-) 

These days almost every manufacturer of weathering materials has some sort of chipping product. It's a bit more expensive than hairspray, but it comes in different gradations, giving you a bit more control over the effect. Ammo has two, the above-mentioned 'Scratches' and a 'Heavy Chipping' to create bigger patches of damaged paint.

Using some water and an initial scratch, the fluid underneath 'activates' and takes away some of the overlying paint. Using different sizes and hardnesses of tool you can make very realistic scratches. Here's the result on the platform:

I concentrated a bit more on the lines that represent the sides of the hatches, and in some places you can clearly see the wood effect peek through.

When using scratches effects fluids, you really need to keep an eye on how it dries. I left some of the fluid to dry in droplets, and when rubbing the paint off, it gave a sort of 'leopard spots' effect:

The sides will receive two more colours of camouflage, so this will get mostly covered anyway, but it's something to keep in mind.

The spade received a similar treatment. I figured this wouldn't receive a coat of primer, so the base coat is Steel. The inside will remain just Dark Yellow:

The outside was apparently camouflaged together with the rest of the tank, so I removed a lot more paint:

While chipping, I got all the way to the white primer (and had to repaint some areas). 'Heavy Chipping' fluid would have been more appropriate here...

I'm going to repeat the hairspray method two more times for the camouflage colours of brown and green, but applied a lot more subtle. I really have to limit myself to fine scratches for this.

Finally, the Buckeye. I sanded down the fillet on the windscreen until it was smooth:

I then temporarily fixed the hood, using tape and masking fluid:

Ready for paint! The Greek Buckeyes were painted in four-colour camo (grey underside, tan and two greens on top), and I'll try for a light post-shade. This is a commemorative scheme, so I'll have to keep it relatively clean.

That's it. 

See you next week!