National markings the hard way. No decals!

[Clifford Bossie]

One of several details I have worried about on our F-84 is the application of national markings. Realizing that I would most likely have to paint them myself I looked up the diagram in T.O.1-1-4 to figure out how to paint them from scratch. There are more details there than I knew. Diagram:



As a way to check my proportions I drew an example in Corel Draw:



And to see how well I interpreted them I them drafted an example on butcher paper. This is a full size 15" national insignia:



Never being too sure of my assumptions I took that drawing to the airplane and taped it in place. This way I was able to step back and compare the placement to photos:



Once I was satisfied that I had aligned my draing I marked the location and replaced it with a template I had cut out from the same paper. Once I was sure it was where it needed to be I sprayed the back of the template with an adhesive and secured all the areas to make the blue background and sprayed on Lowe's best effort at Insignia Blue. I used an airgun here:



At this point it still looked good:



Next, mask off the star and bars and spray the white. There was a good amount of paint seeping under the masking for the bars, so I should have used an airbrush instead og the air gun. Overkill I guess. For the star I used my trusty Paasche:



A little touch up and then the red bars:



The end result looks convincing:



And only three more to go....

[Chappie]

Looks good. Getting the job done the old-fashion way I'd say!


Chappie

[Jollygreenslugg]

Lovely work, Clifford. You've done wonders for the old girl.

You didn't happen to get a full shot of the aeroplane before you added the red stripe, by chance? I'm kinda tickled at the thought of an F-84 with pre-1947 insignia!

Cheers,
Matt

[Clifford Bossie]

Lovely work, Clifford. You've done wonders for the old girl.

You didn't happen to get a full shot of the aeroplane before you added the red stripe, by chance? I'm kinda tickled at the thought of an F-84 with pre-1947 insignia!

Cheers,
Matt

Indeed I did! It does look kind of cool:

[spookythecat]

Extra work for sure but it looks great!

[The Inspector]

Looks great! hint, don't spray @ 90 degrees to a masked edge, tilt the paint container so you are shooting across the edge mask away from the masked edge onto the field being painted, use a 'dust coat' to start with, let it dry (45 minutes) then build coats from your container slowly and lightly and the coats will come out much nicer and leave a couple of days between countermasking so you don't rip semi dry paint off with the tape (even SCOTCH BLUE). Another trick to prevent 'creep' is to 'clear off' the finish before you mask for the next color, finish the color you are shooting, when dry hit the whole field with a medium coat of clear (Red Devil clear epoxy works great) then mask for the next color, that way if you DO get blow under, a light application of thinners with a Q tip will remove the blow under and the epoxy should be pretty bullet proof to the thinner use.

An old painters trick is to take a Q tip and dampen it with WD-40 and apply a VERY VERY light coat of WD-40 right up to the edge of your tape mask (no triple shot Lattes`, no AC/DC!), the paint should become hydrophobic to the WD-40 and pull back slightly from the tape edge leaving a nice, tight, good looking edge.
Practice this on scrap to be sure everything works together and doesn't turn the tape adhesive gummy or cause the paint to 'fish eye'.

[CrewDawg]

Just don't paint invasion stripes the way the Inspector said, do it the authentic way, with a MOP or at least a big paint brush!!!!!

Sorry, I couldn't resist!

Honestly, I'm going to have to remember those tips Inspector, thanks for the expertise!

[The Inspector]

Dawg,
I agree on the invasion stripes or any other field applied markings, but I know Clifford wants a first class job and those were simple things picked up over the years as doing multiple layers and colors can make you say unhappy things and cast disparaging and veiled doubts on your co workers and their ancestors and their breeding habits, done there, been that!
And lots of those tips were learned painting my many motorcycle helmets over the years as well as small aircraft. Red Devil clear epoxy won't yellow out under lots of UVA/UVB exposure. Just be sure everything will play well and not interact by doing test panels first.

[Steve Nelson]

Great work! The extra effort to "get it right" really shows!

SN

[CAPFlyer]

Dawg,
I agree on the invasion stripes or any other field applied markings, but I know Clifford wants a first class job and those were simple things picked up over the years as doing multiple layers and colors can make you say unhappy things and cast disparaging and veiled doubts on your co workers and their ancestors and their breeding habits, done there, been that!
And lots of those tips were learned painting my many motorcycle helmets over the years as well as small aircraft. Red Devil clear epoxy won't yellow out under lots of UVA/UVB exposure. Just be sure everything will play well and not interact by doing test panels first.

Come on man, be honest, you never really worked with paint all that much. Everything you touched was just polished metal from the Metal Armada. Only thing painted on those was the wheel rims and a cheat stripe.

[The Inspector]

Painted an awful lot of CESSNAS and PIPERS when I worked @ RSTOL, a few boats, assisted on a hydroplane paint job, a few cars, helmets, parts of motorcycles-not to mention thousands of plastic models
Know what you get when you follow CESSNA Alklyd Enamel mixing instructions? 1% skim milk, per the manual' leading edges may take up to 40 or more coats for adequate coverage', got two weeks? I'll paint your wings, that's why we went to Dupont IMRON.
Did lots of paint job inspections for customers @ BADWRENCH including that horrible Peter Max Millenium scheme on a CONTINENTAL triple 7, gawd way too much egg yolk yellow!

[b747cf]

Great Paint job Clifford it looks like the one we had at Baker Aviation School in Miami in the 70's.










Mark Fidler

[TROJANII]

After you painted the blue background and masked for the white bar, if you spray a dry coat of the blue, it will be the color that bleeds, instead of the white. Then, after the blue dries, paint on the white.

[CAPFlyer]

Did lots of paint job inspections for customers @ BADWRENCH including that horrible Peter Max Millenium scheme on a CONTINENTAL triple 7, gawd way too much egg yolk yellow!

I remember that abortion of a paint scheme. I thought the first Peter Max planes were bad. That one took the cake, platter, and oven.

[The Inspector]

Even worse, I got to 'interface' with the arteest, a completely self absorbed poseur.
Really liked working with the Reps from MDC (we did some factory overload new paints on MD-80's) those guys were sharp as a room full of razor blades, very forthcoming, if you listened, with info, hints, and tips, much appreciated as I'm always into learning and I learned a bunch of nit noy but important stuff from them!!