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Tuesday, February 28, 2023

Quest Icarus Build #Q2006, Part 3, Parts Prep

The plastic coupler end had a molding nub that needed to be sanded off. If left on it could scar up the inside of the lower body tube.

The coupler is molded in red. At the center there is a thin shoulder that would show as red on the white and blue finished model. That center shoulder ring will have to the painted white.


The upper body tubes had a red outside layer.
The kit face card shows this tube as a medium blue. I wish this was a white tube!

I picked the best two tubes to be on the "show" models.


The tube seams were filled on the two show models. The flight models didn't get the same fill.

The tube on the right shows the red after sanding the CWF filler. The red layer was really thin! These will need some gray primer and sanding to cover that spotty red.






The nose cone mold lines took some scraping and filling to get a smooth finish.

Here I'm using the backside of the knife blade. No sense using the sharp side of the blade and dulling it.

4 comments:

  1. Interesting that they used a prefinished tube - I guess this could give the builder the option to skip painting the body tubes. Still, it seems odd. The Icarus does have nice lines, it’s a good looker for a 3/4FNC rocket.

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    Replies
    1. Hi Openroad,
      I did need to match the face card photo, these builds were for Quest. That lead to the extra painting steps. I wonder if the red tubes were from another kit when the blue Icarus supplies were low. Other manufacturers have done this. Centuri would often substitute different nose cones.

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    2. The inclusion of red tubes sort of reminds me of plastic models from Matchbox that have parts molded in different colors (which may not necessarily match the color scheme of the subject). Painting sometimes became a challenge with those kits -- especially for those parts that were molded in red.

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    3. Hi Naoto,
      The nose cones I use in my Odd'l Rockets jet kits are from Apogee and molded in yellow! It's a difficult color to cover up. A little yellow tinge shows through unless primed and a white undercoat are added before the final color. I mentioned to Tim (at Apogee) that the nose cones would be better in white plastic. That would better fit uses by scratch builders.

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