1/48 Tamiya Hughes 500C

Gallery Article by Thomas Brückelt on June 18 2019

 

      

Here is my Hughes 500C made from the old, but very nice Tamiya-kit. The parts fit perfectly, really amazing for such an old kit! Further 3 figures are included (one seating pilot and two standing passengers). 

To make the upper windows dark, I used the plastic tint spray from
foliatec.com

https://www.foliatec.com/shop/en/lacquerssprays/interior-lacquers-and-sprays/60/plastic-tint-spray-150-ml?c=14 

You can use it for small transparent parts or very dark tinted windows. The surface is getting rough, so it works like a diffuser and you won´t see details anymore. 

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I bought the kit on ebay some years ago, without decals. I decided to make the G-BPZL because I like its paint scheme. 

I painted the area of the registration on the tailboom in silver and printed the red area around the letters on clear decal foil. After I attached the decals (two layers) on the silver painted tailboom, I had to paint around the letters with a thin brush in the dark red. 

I found some helpful pictures of the G-BPZL in the internet. According to those I built all the details (antennas / Nav-lights) from scratch. I built the lower part of the swashplate and gave some more details to the tail rotor. 

Further the landing gear legs were replaced and adapted from my Academy models. The kit has the short legs, but the G-BPZLs legs are longer. 

I painted the model with enamels and brush. The main rotor was sealed with silk clear varnish. For the rest I used shiny clear varnish. 

Greetings from Germany

Thomas Brückelt

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Photos and text © by Thomas Brückelt