Think I've got enough to paint?

[stefanj]

We got advance word of a layoff at work yesterday. I was in a rattled mood last night, and started looking around for things to do, both immediately (to take my mind off of things) and long term, in case I was sacked.

I made three trays of brownies -- as my supervisor puts it, "chocolate prozac" --- to hand out at work. That took a half hour; once the goodies were baking I needed more to do. I dragged a box of "in primer" kits out of the storage area. I added three more I had on shelves and bookcases.

Line-up attached! I hope to paint these this summer. Some have been waiting for years to be finished.

(Actually, the Deep Space Explorer just needs a rub down and it will be ready for decals.)

The horizontal model is a BT-80 Ranger clone.

The rest:

Deep Space Explorer. Semroc Jaguar. Semroc Rawhide (?). Homebrew Centuri Explorer. Astro-1. Original Estes ARCAS I rebuilt and reconditioned. Tin Tin unmanned moon rocket ("Destination Moon"). Semroc Scorpion. Semroc Starfire from Semroc parts. Home-brew Jaguar.

* * *

As it turned out, I didn't get laid off. But I still hope to paint these this summer.

Stefan

[A Fish Named Wallyum]

Glad to hear of your continued employment.
As for the rockets, I've got the parts gathered for a Deep Space Transport based on Maxi Honest John that I bought off Scott McCrate back in 2001. It's never quite gotten beyond the planning stages, so technically I guess it's still a Maxi HoJo.

[Ltvscout]

Glad to hear of your continued employment.
As for the rockets, I've got the parts gathered for a Deep Space Transport based on Maxi Honest John that I bought off Scott McCrate back in 2001.
Now that I'd like to see, a Maxi-DSP.

[stefanj]

I made good progress on all of those in-primer models.

The upscale Ranger is complete. It is painted with an approximation of the paint-job shown in the Estes catalogs from the mid-60s to 1970. It's actually impossible to tell from the B&W photo what color that was, but I assumed it was red. The stripes are black PVC tape.

It is not a "top shelf" sort of model. The fins are grainy and the tube is puckered. But it looks impressive. I flew it once in-primer, on three C11-7s. It flew really well. It can't take Es, but I'm going to go for three x D12-7 this summer.

The paint jobs on the others turned out really well, except for leakage along the fin edges. I should have used a higher quality tape. There are also a few specks of lifted paint. I'll fill those in with White-Out, which does a good job of filling gaps.

I discovered the wonder of Polishing Compound. Oh, MAN! That stuff really turns up the shine.

Now, the painstaking tedium of cutting roll bars for the Explorer and Jaguars. (I made first pass at a roll bar for another, unshown red Jaguar. Came out kind of shabby.)