What am I building now?

[Bigkev]

Bloomin' Heck Kitey,

That is a seismic shift in Varnishing, Only thing I can think of is that the thinners may have reacted to the varnish, maybe with heat or humidity.
I've seen varnishes 'bloom' before given a faint whitish hue to a paint scheme, but nothing on your scale.
Are you going to strip it back to bare plastic and start again?
Keep us posted, just sorry such a pristine gloss finish has been ruined.
Keep your chin up matey,
Cheers,
Bigkev

[bridlufc]

I had the same problem with Humbrol  Clear Matt Varnish, (hawk, spit) hence my animosity with anything to do with Airfix/Humbrol

Bridlufc

[Haddock]

That's a bit frightening Kitey. Never seen anything in the modelling press that tells us why it happens, or what to do to prevent it.
Haddock.
Used to get the same thing, but not as bad, when applying marine varnish to a yacht. The only remedy was to strip it back to bare wood and start again. It was put down to damp in the air, bit awkward when the flippin' thing is afloat.

[Kiteman]

Since posting the disaster I have thought deep and hard about what could have possibly caused this. The varnish came out of a rattle can on all occasions. As I varnished the paint coats, before chroming the model up, I did it outside the house on a warm sunny dry day and sprayed in the shade to avoid the varnish drying too fast. That went well and gave me the pristine finished shown in previous photos. The devil varnish came from the same can , again sprayed outside, but at the end of a day that had been very wet with high humidity. Now from what you guys say I can only assume that the spay has dragged in moisture particles from the air that have reacted with the varnish, causing what we see. Does this theory sound feasable???

[Roger]

Certainly sounds feasible

[Kiteman]

So, what to do now??? I have my Options down to 4 choices:
1) Chuck the thing in the bin and forget it.
2) Strip everything off and start anew.
3) Leave it as it is and build the rest with a similar finish and put it in a winter setting.
4) Try to do something about the situation but not Options 1 - 3.

With nothing to lose I opted for option 4. Bearing in mind the the vast majority of the frosted Chassis will not be visible when the model is completely assembled I concentrated on the wings (fore and aft) and using toothpaste gave them a good rubbing down. This was followed with car scratch polish and the result can be seen in the photos. Not the pristine finish that I had but acceptable for a car that has been used somewhat and is not just out of the showroom. So I decided to stick with it and have attached some bits and bobs so that it is beginning to look summat like a car now. I do hope that nothing else goes wrong with this model. See what you think.

[MSea]

Option 5 -- finish it looking as it is without the gloss finish and say its a model made my MSea and they always look like that.

[Bigkev]

Hi Kitey,
I think what you have done to recover this model, is nothing short of marvellous. It looks good now, so just put it on the learning curve of modelling.
Have faith in your skills, they are all there for us all to see, and seeing you succeed!
Cheers, and well done!
Bigkev

[Haddock]

                  Looks good to me. I bet if you tried to get that look you wouldn't be able to do it, so a happy accident. (I seem to get quite a few)
Haddock.

[Kiteman]

I think that this is the model that doesn`t want to be build.
After photographing the model (in the living room) for you guys I left the model on the dining table overnight. On the next day we had our usual bunch of children as we do daily (we are day parents). At sometime during the morning Mrs Kitey was in the bedroom doing stuff and I in the living room with 4 two year olds when the telephone rang. I briefly went to the kitchen to answer the phone and less than a minute later appeared one of the kids with two of the wheels from my model in his tiny hands, looked up at me and uttered the word "kapputt". Still holding a conversation on the phone and with my blood pressure through the roof I dashed from kitchen into the hall to be greated by another child with most of my back axle assemble in her hands and part of the exhaust in her mouth. A third child appeared in the living room doorway with the chassis. The forth child was stood by the dining table by the self build ladder that they had build out of a toy fire truck and a dining stool with wheels in her hand. On the table were strewn bits of suspension and steering linkage.
I will not describe here how I felt or I may be moderated, but I rapidly finished the phone call and tried to recover what I could from children, dining table and floor whilst resisting the burning temptation to glue the kids together with super glue.
My fault I suppose and the kids can`t differentiate between a toy and a model. I don`t know quite how I managed to forget that it was on the dining table.
You have to love them don`t you........bless their little cotton socks.

[Haddock]

Not much anybody can say, in public anyway.
Haddock.

[zak]

Oh joy and delight.

[MSea]

You have to get children to that amount of damage to your model -- I can do that amount myself to my own models and frequently do !!!!

[Bigkev]

Oh Heck, Kitey,

The dreaded child syndrome strikes again. If you can rescue it, do so. If it is a total loss, then put it all on the learning curve of modelling experience.
I was lucky with my kids, never lost a model to them, but I did to the dog, who decided the front end of a Junkers Ju-88 was more tasty than his food.

Just try to think ahead, and prepare for the improbable to happen, ...........it usually does.

This model only goes to show what a great modeller you are,....................................the kids couldn't get enough of it!
Commiserations, but really good modelling skills apparent.
Cheers,
Bigkev   

[bridlufc]

I love kids but I can't eat a whole one, they give me wind. 

Bridlufc