How to Paint a Model Aircraft

One of the trickiest and most time consuming parts of building a model aircraft is giving the model a quality paint job. You want the paint job to be unique to your own aircraft and to express your own creativity. To accomplish this you will need to learn the correct way to paint a model and also take your time to make sure it gets done right.

Things You'll Need

• Paint
• Paint brushes
• Primer
• Paper towels
• Ink
• Masking tape

Instructions

1. Tear a few pieces of masking tape off a roll and put it over clear, transparent parts of the plane. A few of the places you might want to tape up would be the cockpit canopy and landing lights.

2. Take a spray can of primer and spray down the whole body of the plane on both top and bottom. Hold the can about a foot back from the model and make sure you coat the plane evenly.

3. Apply a base coat of paint to the model plane using either spray-can paint or a brush. The base coat is the basic background color of the aircraft.

4. Highlight some of the raised parts of the model aircraft. Use a slightly lighter shade of paint than what you used for the base coat.

5. Add water to the base color, a little at a time, until the paint is very thin. Fill in all the crevices and cracks in the plane by putting the paint on the tip of the brush and allowing the paint to "wash" into the cracks.

6. Allow the model to dry for at least 24-48 hours. Once the plane has dried you can apply decals or paint designs on the plane.

Resources

• Airplane Model Kits
• Model Paint Supplies