Heller 1/75 La Reale De France

[kpnuts]

Hi all well since I've nearly finished the Spits and the Lanc I thought it was time to start back on the Corvette and this little beauty that I've just taken delivery of, I must say I thought the 1/6 bikes box were huge but even they pale into insignificance when compared to this beast.









That said the box could be half this size



















The moulding detail is beautiful























The instructions however could do with some work, one written page in english everything else is in French.



















and why put these on the top where they could get creased like this, if theyed been on the bottom this would not have happened





Hopefully I can iron them out.



I have taken a very stupid chance and bought a very (well I think its very expensive) guilding kit just for this. I gulp, am going to try useing real gold leaf wherever the ship has gold. I have never guilded anything in my life so we will see, have I wasted my money, am I going to ruin this kit, stay tunefor the next exciting episode.

[kpnuts]

Well here is my first attempt at guilding.









not sure wether to do a wash to highlight the detail or not, dont know if it will kill the shine on the gold, and if I did what colour should i use.

[harron68]

I wonder if there are model ship sites or You Tubes on using a wash of thinned paint over foil. One safe thing to try would be a thinned wash of water color paint with a dot of dish soap to break surface tension. let it dry then with a bit of towel paper and or Q-tip wipe off excess. If you like it, I suppose you could leave it or try doing similar with a slow drying water based acrylic wash.
That's just my off-the-top thinking. I'd check you tubes for something since it's easy to narrow searches. Googling for it may not lead anywhere and takes time. Good luck!

[kpnuts]

Thanks Harron
well I've got to the first problem with guilding, getting a crisp line, mind you I still yhink it looks good

[harron68]

Lovely hull. Your gilding looks good, considering how small the pieces are. The challenge reminds me of using bare metal foil (BMF). There are videos and step-by-step tutorials in both model vehicle and airplane sites. Burnishing is the step where the "wrinkles" are flattened with a Q-tip lightly rubbed over the surface. How much one can rub and how hard depends on how well foil adheres to the plastic. I'd check on foiling and using BMF. Also, gilding picture frames uses the same technique and sometimes has intricate carving, which is like your situation.

[kpnuts]

Thanks harron
Well here is todays efforts, got to say this will be a long long build, but unless I ruin it, it will be a beautiful ship.

[kpnuts]

Hi all here is a bit of an update. I have a big problem with this kit and dont know how much further I can go with it. there is supposed to be 2 sprues number 17 and 2 number 18 but there is only 1 of each, I have emailed Heller and asked for the missing sprues to be sent but have no idea what their customer service is like I'm hopeing they will send them as the kit is useless without them and I will have to bin it otherwise. so will do what I can and hope they will send the parts sooner rather than later.

[kpnuts]

Here is an update these rib bits are very confusing, dosnt help ther are no english instructions for this bit.

[kpnuts]

I am having all sorts of problems getting rid of the loose flakey bits that you just cant seem to brush off, so I've decided to try guilding the whole part then painting over the guilding.
I've started by sizing all the parts for guilding






then guilding the whole lot






Now painting it





also I decide to put a wash over some of the solid gold parts to highlight some of the detail

[kpnuts]

Hi all here is last nights work.

[kpnuts]

Hi all here is todays efforts

[kpnuts]

Hi all well I've done all the flure de lys on one side (think I've gone cross eyed doing them)

[kpnuts]

Hi all here is tonight's bit

[kpnuts]

Hi all well I'm afraid this is as far as I can go till the parts come so hopefully they will be here soon.
I cant glue the two boxes on yet as I would not be able to get the other cannons in so this is it for now.

[kpnuts]

Hi all well I'm back on this one again.