Squadron Haunebu II - the troublesome build - being finished...

J

Jack10

Guest
Haha can tell it's been a tough build mate looking forward to seeing it finished though, this build has opened my eyes to a side of the Nazis I knew nothing about. Watched a documentary about their experiments with building a 'death ray' towards the end of the war yesterday was very interesting stuff.
 
J

Jens Andrée

Guest
I bought a tube of burnt umber thinking I was going to give it an old-school weathering treatment but I soon discovered that my artists oil paint was in fact acrylic, and it was now too late to back off so it's been 6 hours of slow and painstaking weathering with acrylics - but I do think it worked out in the end?!
I did start with the lower hull to get some practise and if I failed it wouldn't show so much. Let's not forget that this project has been plagued from the beginning...

This scale model is too big to use Tamiya panel liners, that's why I decided to use oil paint. The acrylic oil paint that is... ;)

HaunebuII-weather1.jpg

HaunebuII-weather2.jpg

HaunebuII-weather3.jpg

HaunebuII-weather4.jpg

I'm going to use slightly less burned umber on the upper hull and I've now got the experience to make a better job.
This is the first time ever I'm using this method and I've still very much have got the learner plates on when it comes to paint and weathering department! I do believe in learn by doing and after having the confidence booster from the paint job, that I have to say that I'm rather proud of as my first ever masked splinter camo, I decided to put in the effort by doing a totally manual weathering job and not just rely on ready mixed panel liners etc.

I've only used burned umber - and a tiny bit of sponge chipping effect around the landing gear hatches, so there's a lot of weathering still to do. I might do some general washes or filters but I think I will use those products sparingly because you can ruin a paint job very quickly when doing too much weathering. I'm very junior in this department so better use too little than too much!

I might start the upper hull tonight but when using acrylic "artists paint" you have to finish everything in the same sitting, otherwise it'd dried and you can blend it with water any longer. As it is now I do a couple of lines then I dry brush them and finish with brushing them with water. If I'm please with the results I make a couple more lines, otherwise I paint over the lines again and do the same process until I'm happy.

I had problems with the decals too and one simply "fell apart" and had to be discarded :sad:
I've made the surface on the model rather rough, or dull, since my experience with military vehicles is that they all have the same surface texture as an old black board we used to draw on in school. Very coarse texture. This I've pulled off well but it made it harder to move the decals after placing them, even with decal medium under. Lesson learned I guess.

Anyhow, here's tonight's progress!

Cheers :smiling3:
 
J

Jens Andrée

Guest
I simply don't know what a 1946 space-going aircraft would look like with regards to wear from heat, friction and weather - and the upper hull is quite different with regards to smaller panels and bigger rivets so I had to change my approach. Many times...
Here is some work in progress anyway. I've tried to make the weathering seamless, i.e. not just weather certain spots but wet blend all of the weathering all over the surface to make it look plausible, in my head anyway.
One problem that happened last night was that dry+wet brushing my acrylic burnt umber started dissolving the Vallejo varnish and it cause some issues. I've sorted them out but it took extra time and I didn't get to bed until after 06:00 this morning because I had to fix everything before it dried. Tonight I've worked on making it a bit "dirtier" due to the above wear I think would happen, but where I go from here I don't know. If any of you have a suggestion I'd be very happy to hear it! :smiling3:

HaunebuII-weather5.jpg

HaunebuII-weather6.jpg

HaunebuII-weather7.jpg

HaunebuII-weather8.jpg

I hope I can get to bed earlier tonight and I should because tonight I've been working with enamel weathering products so they take a bit longer to dry, but we'll see?

I also don't want to do too much weathering but it feels like it's missing something major at the moment so any advice is welcome!
 
T

Tony

Guest
Looks very nice indeed Jens. Weathering looks spot on in my eyes - not too much mot too little - just right.
 

colin m

Moderator
Staff member
Moderator
SMF Supporter
Joined
Dec 26, 2008
Messages
8,572
Points
113
Location
Stafford, UK
First Name
Colin
Well I know she was a 'Bee with an itch' to start with, but it looks stunning here. Great work. The history (be it right, wrong, confused etc) makes this an even more interesting build. On that subject, I don't think I've ever seen one of these built before.
 
J

Jens Andrée

Guest
Thanks a lot guys for your kind words!
It's surely been a troublesome project instead of what I'd planned, but I'm happy I decided to try to salvage what I had instead of just binning it.
I guess it's a build that's a fair bit outside the norm compared to the classic Tamiya or Italeri range, but as a complement to all of my "what if" German panzers it's the dot over i! ;)

I had planned a detailed diorama but due to the nature of the project I just want to finish it as soon as possible so I think I'll just make some sort of black "box" and park it there.

I wasn't sure my weathering was going in the right direction either, nor my paint work - which had to be altered due to the lower hull kept cracking, but I've learned a lot building this project and my paint & weathering skills have certainly improved so now I might actually dare to start painting the other 12 or 13 builds that are on the desk at the moment?

I've decided not to put all the electronics inside the build due to the same reason above why I want it top be finished ASAP, but there's still time to change my mind whilst building the "box" to put it in...

Cheers! :smiling3:
 
J

Jens Andrée

Guest
HaunebuII-diorama1.jpg


Base/mini-diorama has commenced and my cunning plan failed even before I'd passed the start line...
My plan was to create a base with three walls and create graphics for the three walls that looked like a 1945 secret Luftwaffe hangar, print these images and wallpaper the three walls with these.
The failure was that my old photo printer is dead since long ago because I refused to buy new cartridges simply because they were 6 months old - not that they'd been used!?! The plan was to use the laser printer instead since these images would be in grey scale anyway. Sadly the toner in my laser printer was more or less empty, and the copper drum seems to be dirty and creates a couple of vertical lines on the printouts...
It looked really bad to put it simply. o_O

I made the base just to make something and I cut out a piece of plywood 450 mm x 450 mm and I glued a layer of EVA foam with the crosshatch pattern on top to create a surface texture that can be dry brushed with some grey colour. I also made a large quantity of wheel blocks (you know the yellow wedge shaped blocks they use to "park" air planes) to sort of hold the model in place when placed on the base.

I also made a couple different items that could be used to monitor/charge/fuel the Haunebu II but when I tested them on the base they looked out of scale so they were scrapped. I think I will leave the base empty for now until I find something relevant in 1/72 scale. I only build 1/35 normally so I don't have anything at the moment, but perhaps some sort of utility vehicle and some figures would complement the model?

To "celebrate" that I'd actually finished building this heap of a model I gave myself a bonus build before I went to bed and I've now also built a 1/144 scale Landkreuzer P.1000 Ratte. Hilarious build with the most problematic PE handrails to date, but after some swearing and some strategically placed masking tape the CA glue session was eventually completed and there was a quick, but fun, build :smiling3:

TakomRatteBuild3.jpg

TakomRatteBuild4.jpg


I just love the two Maus that was included in the kit because it shows what a ridiculous monster the Ratte would've been if completed, but it's a fitting bonus build to celebrate the Haunebu II - another monster! ;)

I'll paint the base for the Haunebu II tomorrow because now it's time for bed. Making breakfast for the kids in three hours...

Cheers,
Jens
 
Top