Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Finished

This is one of my favorite Shrox designs, big and chunky.
It was a fun build but masking was a chore! There are six different colors required and some tricky masking especially at the underside of the nose cone and the grey around the back end.
The client didn't want the NSFK decal on the tail fin.

To me, the kit supplied stickers would be too thick. Water slide decals are far less noticeable on the surface.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 15, Decals Over Flat Paint?

The olive drab paint was a flat finish. I've never seen a gloss olive drab paint.
I knew decals don't normally stick well to flat finish paints but my home print decals did adhere very well. The picture was purposely taken with the light reflecting off the decal.
This is a water slide decal, the kit comes with thicker, shiny sticker. Glossy stickers wouldn't work at all on a flat finish.
I figured I could spray some dull coat and the shiny decal would blend right in. I've done it many times before with good results.
With the humidity the clear coat fogged up!

I used some rubbing compound to take down the clear coat. The decals was peeled off.

The wing tip was masked off and shot again with flat olive drab paint. DONE!

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 14, Decals and Canopy Sticker

Here's the stick-ons included in the kit. Maybe it's just me, but I hate stick-ons.
That clear border always shows up as a thick edge around the image. This decal could be carefully cut to remove most of the clear border but that wouldn't work with most of the others.







UPGRADE: I redrew the decals, all were printed in black. Here's the decal sheet getting three coats of clear acrylic.



I did use the canopy window decal supplied with the kit. There was no clear border around it and this would be a very difficult mask to pull off.
I was concerned it wouldn't fit around the contour of the nose cone. After burnishing it did lay down well without wrinkling.
But - a problem. I was burnishing it down and some of the blue ink rubbed off! I had to go back and mask the canopy and spray a blue blend in the middle. The blend came out very well.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 13, Nose Tip Mask

Some test cutting was done for the nose tip ring.
A black trim ring goes around the nose cone tip and over the edge of the silver. I didn't want to risk another small mask.

I cut some Contact Paper Blackboard Vinyl with a rigged up cutting compass. I know there are better circle cutters out there but this will do in a pinch. It took a few tries to get the arc width even.

On the left is one of the early tries. The cheap compass did wobble a bit.

On the right is the best ring I made.

On the left you can barely see the mask line between the two previous colors. This was lightly sanded between coats. The sanded paint helped fill what was left of the mask line.

I didn't do a real clean mask, the edge of the silver was going to be covered with the black ring.

The edge of the the silver paint was sanded with some 400 grit wrapped around the end of  a Q-tip.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 12, Nose Tip Mask

The very tip of the nose cone is painted silver.
Before you can mask and spray, the raised paint line between the two colors should be lightly sanded otherwise it will show through the final color.







After checking the length of the mask, some marked Scotch tape was cut on my window.
Cut a smooth arc. It might take a few tries to get something close to the fit the nose cone tip.

I will be using the nose cone sticker provided with the kit. All other stickers were re-drawn and printed up on water slide decal paper.

To double check the tip mask position, I traced the cockpit window onto some copy paper and set it down the nose cone. 

On the left is the curved Scotch tape mask.
On the right is the masking tape and paper wrap overlay. Just the very tip will get a shot of metallic silver paint.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 11, Nose Cone Mask

The nose cone got the half/half treatment like the body did.

Here I'm burnishing down the Scotch tape mask with a Q-tip before spraying the lower half grey.






The underside got shot with a lighter grey than what was used on the rear of the body tube.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 10, Another Mask!

This shows how the leading edge is painted, just the underside is left white.
The area in the corner of the gun tip will have to be touched up with a brush.

This is how the model looks so far.







I had to do another complete mask to paint the rear of the body tube. This was tricky, I had to mask the fin root edges and around the back of the model to the engine tube.

The dark grey mask came out well.
I used a wrap of Contact paper vinyl blackboard material around the engine tube. I didn't want to do another weird paint mask there!

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 9, Mask Reveal and Second Mask

Here's the model after the tan upper body was shot.







Pulling up the tape showed a clean mask.
I was surprised the edge mask on the fins showed a pretty good line down the leading edge.

The front of the wings and winglets get a strip of flat olive drab paint.
This shows the first piece of marked Scotch tape down the leading edges.
Masking tape and grocery bags will cover the rest of the model.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 8, Paint and First Mask

Here's the assembled model before the first white coats.

The rocket got a overall white coat and sanding.
A second heavier white coat followed.

The upper half of the model is painted a light tan. the rocket remains white on the underside much like a WWII fighter plane.

This mask took a while to figure out. I used Scotch tape just on the bottom surface. The upper squared edges of the wing would get the tan paint. Only the bottom face of the wings and lower half of the body would remain white.

Here's the top view.
Notice the clear tape running along the leading edge of the wing. the edges of the fins would get tan paint.
It's very important to have smooth, clean surfaces for a complex mask like this.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 7, Details and Fin Tips

The small antenna pieces are glued onto the lightly etched laser lines.








The dowel guns are glued onto the wing tips.

The wing tips are glued on at an angle.



The dihedral guide pieces are glued together looking like short stairs. It is set under the wing to get the correct down angle of the wing tips.

The 1/4" diameter launch lug had the seams filled before gluing onto the rocket. Here I'm cleaning up the ends like I would with a regular body tube. The inside edges got a wipe of CA glue.


TIP: After priming and sanding the ends were cleaned up using the taper of a sharpened pencil.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 6, Assembly

The body tube and nose cone got a shot of primer/filler and sanding.
The nose cone seams were almost non-existent. Only a bit of primer was left after sanding.

The instructions tell you to apply a ring of glue 3" inside the main air frame tube. You also should add some glue to the inside of the rear centering ring. The rear ring is flush with the end of the tube.
I used my sanding block to be sure the ring was even, flush with the body tube end.

The wing fins are glued on, the interior fin tangs are glued onto the engine mount tube.

To apply some pressure and better seat the root edges, I used some rubber bands around both outside edges of the wings.
Sight across the back to be sure both are in line with each other.

The forward winglets go in the opposite way you would think.

Again I used rubber bands to apply a moderate pressure while the glue dried.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 5, Balsa Filling

The large wing fins are two-piece.
In Step 15, the instructions would have you glue on the rear fin piece after the engine mount and main fins are glued in. I didn't see any real reason to glue the rear fin piece afterwards. It just meant more joint filling if you waited until Step 15.

After the CWF was sanded smooth I did some test fitting before gluing in the engine mount. The root edges of the fins are a little above the body tube. Some light sanding of the fin tangs brought the root edge down.

This is not a problem, I'd rather have the fin tangs a bit long for a custom fit.

The balsa is taped down to a piece of cardboard for a spray of filler/primer.

TIP: On the forums I read about others doing many coats of primer and sanding to fill balsa. As mentioned before, I do just one coat of CWF and sanding then one fairly thick coat of Duplicolor Filler/Primer and sanding. That's all you should need to fill the balsa pores.
Sure, the Duplicolor Primer/Filler is more expensive than the $1 a can crap from WalMart. One can goes a long way. One coat of the good stuff sure beats four or five coats and sanding between coats of the cheap stuff.

These are the wing tips and forward fins.

On the right is the sprayed and dried grey primer/filler.
On the left is the primer/filler sanded down. Notice most all of it is removed with sandpaper on a block. The only primer/filler that remains has filled whatever grain is left after the initial CWF coat.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 4, Engine Mount

UPGRADE: I changed out the standard BT-50 engine tube for a heavy wall BT-50H tube. I never thought the BT-50 tubing was very strong, especially when you are using 24mm and composite engines.

This required me to widen the center hole in the centering rings. It's easy to do with a 24mm engine casing and some 220 grit sandpaper.

1/4" of the engine tube is exposed out the back of the engine mount. I filled the body tube seam.






The Kevlar line is tied around the upper end of the engine tube. The end goes through the notch in the upper centering ring.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 3, Engine Mount

UPGRADE: The engine hook wasn't spring steel. It reminded me of some Quest engine hooks from the past.
It didn't pass the "bend test" and was tossed. I replaced it with a spring steel hook from BMS.

The burnt faces of the centering rings were sanded clean with some 400 grit sandpaper. The back face of the rear ring will be seen on the finished model so it should be smooth.

The engine hook and Kevlar notches were cut but not all the way through. A rectangular diamond file was used to knock it out.

Mentioned earlier, the face of the rear centering ring is flush with the end of the body tube. It will be seen and needs to be smooth for some masking.
The wood grain got a coat of CWF and smooth sanding.

Apogee Shrockets Skonk Wulf Build, Part 2, Fin Fill and Fill

You'll want to sand off the hold down ticks and square up the fins for a better, full contact glue joint.

A second piece is glued on the leading edge of the rudder.
Notice the tall thru-the-wall tabs that will glue to the engine tube.

TIP: I've been using the leftover balsa sheets for a slightly elevated drying area.

The balsa pieces have just got a brushed on coat of CWF. I didn't paint the thru-the-wall tabs.