Undercarriage units
ZM provides well detailed units that even include the hydraulic lines posed realistically. The separate wheel hubs and tyres are all excellent and fit together like a dream and make painting and assembly much easier. I used a different ‘silver’ than the airframe, this time using Xtracolor Duralumin. Later they were weathering with a thinned mix of Alclad2 Dull Aluminium and Pale Burnt Metal that combined gives a nice light brown dusty appearance.
Tyres are painted dark grey and then dried mud and mank worked into the tread pattern using AK’s Earth Effects. This is simply applied liberally all over and left for a day for most of the spirit to evaporate and then using a clean tissue wrapped firmly around my forefinger the excess carefully removed leaving the dirt in the tread pattern – I think this looks pretty effective on the finished model; it is also consistent with the base I have planned that is dusty and similar to that found at a forward operating base with rubble strewn all around – more of that later.
The completed undercarriage units fit very well into their bays if you follow ZM’s instructions. I couldn’t however get the leg doors to locate while they had the moulding lug attached where they join the wing so I just cut it off and glued the door to the twin pins protruding from each leg.
Alclad2 airframe
I used three main shades for this, spraying in the following order:
- Mix of Aluminium (75%) and Airframe Aluminium (25%)
- Duraluminium
- Transparent Smoke
