Previous Project:
Macross Plus YF-21 in 1/72 scale from the animated series "Macross Plus".

Current Project:
Black Tiger & Cosmo Zero Fighters in 1/72 scale from the animated series "Space Battleship Yamato", or Star Blazers as it was known in the U.S.

The molds for these kits were probably made in the early 80s, and have the kind of Bandai toy-like quality one would expect. Unfortuately, there are no alternatives available that I am aware of. Still, the overall quality of the kits is fine, and requires only a little bit of work to make better. The biggest shortcomings are the soft surface detail and almost complete absence of cockpit details. Both of these issues will be addressed in succession. Overall assembly is very simple, and the directions and decals provided would suggest a younger target audience which would most likely use the completed kits as toys. I won't be doing that, so will put a bit more detail and care in their construction.

Most of the major pieces are simply two halves that need to be glued together. This applies both to the Tiger and the Zero. The Tiger is extremely simplified, and is basically a series of clam-shell joinings. The rear fuselage is simply a top and bottom half, as is the forward fuselage. Same goes for the Zero, though there are more complex angles on that kit. One of the downsides of such simple molding is the difficulty of adding detail. Since the 6 main cannons on the Tiger were little more than tiny divots, I chose to cut into the sides of the kit and slide in replacement Evergreen styrene tubing. The tubing was then filed to shape, and the surrounding area filled with gap filling super glue.

The cockpit for the kit comes with a 2 man insert that would suggest the pilots have no bodies below the waist. These gentlemen made their final flight into the great round file below my desk. I have no replacement pilot figures, and since I'm currently unemployed, won't be buying any. This means an empty cockpit. Based on the data I was able to find, however, it appears that both the Black Tiger and Cosmo Zero are single seaters. This made it easy to replicate the contents for both at the same time. Each cockpit has a scratch-built seat built up from several layers of sheet styrene carved to shap, then filled with a bit of contour putty. The cockpit tubs were filled with similarly layered and carved sheets used to add control panels and view screens. The control panels themselves are Illustrator images printed out on a HP color printer.

One of the toy like qualities found on the Zero was the mounting points for the external fuel tanks under the wings. I sawed off the original boxy attachments, and will replace them with thinner styrene sheet pieces. The external tanks had matching mating points in the middle of each tank, so these too had to be modified. Since I had enough left over tubing from the Tiger modificatino, I cut two lengths of tubing and sandwiched them between the salvaged front and end pieces of the kit supplied tanks.

Both kits benefited from rescribing panel lines. Most were raised details, but a swift sanding and careful cutting recreated them. I also purchased a Verlinden 1/72 scale aircraft panel scribing template. This is an excellent investment (though I got it while I still had regular income...), and has really added to the detail of both aircraft.

OK, after several weeks of assembly and priming (waiting for good weather so I could spray outside), I've finally managed to get some color paint laid down on the fighters. Since I'll be alternating work on them from this point forward, but such work will be exclusively painting and decaling (and using the same methods on each kit), I'll cover the progress on each kit concurrently. Below are a series of snapshots showing the 3 kits I'm building. The big one is the YF-21 that had also been waiting in the wings for a re-primer. Since I'm now using Tamiya acrylic paints, I've had to be more thorough in masking off bits of the kits. Since the paint is essentially a water based paint, it won't cover as well as an enamel or an oil based paint. Blemishes and oversprayed "mistakes" will show through easily.

The first color painted was white, and that was on the underside of the Black Tiger. Next came yellow. The kits are shown masked for the application of this color. After airbrushing the plain yellow (plain unmodified yellow, straight from the bottle, though thinned of course), I made a slightly darker variation by adding just a drop of dark brown. I used this to accent the panel lines that were covered by yellow. It produced a slight two tone weathering effect. The same technique was used for the red on the forward fuselage of the Cosmo Zero (though I used a drop of black instead of brown).

Work has progressed on the kits significantly in the past few weeks. By now you may have noticed some pictures of my "previous project", the YF-21, slipping into the "current project" page. That's cause I'm doing them all at once. It's called "Multi-tasking" in the business world. Anyway, I've done the final paint jobs for all 3 planes except for the canopy frames on the Zero and Tiger. I have also applied a wash in the panel lines to pull out some detail on the kits. The wash was made of a mixture of 5 parts water to 3 parts acrylic Tamiya paint to 3 parts dishwashing liquid. The dishwashing liquid increases surface tension, which prevents the wash from pooling in one place, but it also prevents adhesion to the previous coats of paint. So, once the wash is dry, it can be wiped off the model with a q-tip or soft rag. Only that which is in a deep panel line will remain. Caution: Don't try this on a kit without a gloss finish, as the matte finish will give the wash something to grab hold of, and won't come off.

They YF-21 is about finished, all it needs now is a dull coat. The Tiger is also about finished, needing only a few more decals on the underside of the fuselage. The zero needs a black stripe down the center of the nose starting at the back of the canopy. Until I do this, I won't lay down any decals on the front of the kit. Also, I have to paint and install the 3 reaction control thrusters and auxilliary fuel tanks. Once these planes are finished, they'll go into the gallery, without any further "bench" details. Until then, here are 3 progress shots.