The Little World

When in doubt, do it the way the original was done. There was generally a reason for this and you may have stumbled upon it again.

Case in point: doing the second blue paint coat on the PRU Lockheed P-38 Lightning. The first coat had cured for a day, and the second one was due to go on and sit in the warm curing box.

That was fine for the underside – it could be supported by the patented pieces of foamcore board. But when it came time to flip it over and do the topside, I was unwilling to trust the fresh paint to the jig. Even if it felt dry, I could see the weight of the model digging the wings down into the foam. The question was how to support the aircraft safely.

Well, Kelly Johnson had that problem when he designed the Lightning and his answer was the tricycle landing gear. Why second guess him?

The gear wells were already filled with foam board as masking blocks for the underside spraying, so I just thrust three dressmaker’s pins into the foam about where the landing gear legs would be. Presto, the ship stood upright and could be mounted on the painting turntable. The spray could even lick around under the contour to unite with the bottom layer.

It’s also vaguely suggestive to a fevered mind for the future. If I need to support models for “in-flight” pictures, why not pick the landing gear positions to support the planes. There must be thin piano wire that can be similarly pushed into foam blocks and clamped into multi-position holders.