Bob Cleek

Indeed, Vallejo's ranges of different paint formulations (for brushing or for air-brushing) do not have the same range of colours. It is, however, possible to thin their other paint formulations for air-brushing. In this case one should use their recommended thinner(s), as other thinners could break down the emulsions on which these paints are based.
 
I only have a very small air-brush with a 1 cc reservoir and found this sufficient for my relatively small projects. A small reservoir prevents you from wasting paint. As the paint ducts are simple and as I wash out the air-brush immediately after use under running water, I never had the need to use any special cleaning fluids or devices. I don't use it very often, so it had stayed with me now for nearly 40 years ...
 
On pre-thinned paints vs. paint-tubes: it is correct, that compared to the amount of pigment you get for your money, they are expensive. However, me personally, I prefer to pay a premium price and have something ready to use after some thorough shaking. I do not waste any paint in mixing vessels etc. as the bottles have nozzles or pipettes from which just a few drops of paint are transferred into the air-brush. The pre-thinned paints seem to have a suprisingly long shelf-life. Some bottles I had for more than 30 years and they still work.
 
 

Standing water leaves white spots on shellac finishes - as most owners of antique furniture know ... However, dampening a tampon to pick up rotten stone or pumice (which is what is used in traditional shellac finishes) does not do any harm.
 
Alternatively, one can use very fine steel-wool (0000), but has to take care to remove any 'swarf', as it may rust with time. This results in an almost matt finish that then can be polished with a dry cotton tampon to a nice satin sheen, if required.

Chroming, it's very difficult to achieve great results. I tried different products and type of application for years now and I found no solution covering all sorts of parts.
Molotow pens had been great, when I painted car and motorcycle headlights with them, but looked horrible on protruding parts. They seem to settle with a nice and shiny chrome finish in crevices.

There are tapes and foils, like Bare Metal Foil or AK adhesive chrome tape, but they work only under certain conditions, but do look good, when applied correctly.
 
There are Alclad and AK Extreme Metal colors, which look good, when applied correctly. Don't use the AK black primer, specified for their Extreme Metal colors as a base, it never dries thoroughly. Tamiya gloss black, acrylic or even better lacquer are much better suited.
You have to try onto dummies first, because you have to figure out, which results look best, layered efforts or flooding the part in one go.

A solution, I very often come back to are Uschi van der Rosten's chrome pigments. They shine a little less, when applied, but do look right very often scale wise, because too much shine can look toyish on scale models. The extra benefit on pigments is, there is nearly no coat thickness and therefore no loss of detail, the downside is, you have to reach all nooks and crannies to polish out the effect. To me these pigments are among the best, because they are extremely fine grained and cover well, if the underlying surface is properly primed.
 
Cheers Rob

It depends upon the level of quality you want to attain in the model you're doing. There are many faux metal paints to chose from, but they all look like faux metal and not the real thing. If you find them satisfactory for your purposes, then by all means use them. That said, achieving a realistic impression of a bare metal in a scale piece with paint is a difficult thing to do. Nothing looks as realistically metallic on a model as real metal itself. For this, you will have to fabricate the pieces from metal, or paint them with a conductive paint made for the purpose, and electroplate them. Electroplating can be accomplished with simple household chemicals and an automotive battery charger or even a 12 VDC "wall wort." You don't have to buy any expensive equipment or materials. If you want chrome, you can simply electroplate with nickel. (Real chrome can be electroplated, but it's a more involved process.)  If you wish a slightly more subdued shine, you can experiment with zinc or aluminum plating or even silver plating. The mechanics are all the same.
 
There are tons of DIY electroplating and electroforming videos on YouTube.
 
 
 

It depends upon the level of quality you want to attain in the model you're doing. There are many faux metal paints to chose from, but they all look like faux metal and not the real thing. If you find them satisfactory for your purposes, then by all means use them. That said, achieving a realistic impression of a bare metal in a scale piece with paint is a difficult thing to do. Nothing looks as realistically metallic on a model as real metal itself. For this, you will have to fabricate the pieces from metal, or paint them with a conductive paint made for the purpose, and electroplate them. Electroplating can be accomplished with simple household chemicals and an automotive battery charger or even a 12 VDC "wall wort." You don't have to buy any expensive equipment or materials. If you want chrome, you can simply electroplate with nickel. (Real chrome can be electroplated, but it's a more involved process.)  If you wish a slightly more subdued shine, you can experiment with zinc or aluminum plating or even silver plating. The mechanics are all the same.
 
There are tons of DIY electroplating and electroforming videos on YouTube.
 
 
 

After "rough dusting," generally with compressed air, I use a tack cloth to remove all residual dust immediately before applying finish coats. 
 
  (Wow! I didn't expect a picture this big!  )    Tack cloths are cheesecloth impregnated with a long-lasting "tacky" coating. Dust sticks to them, rather than simply being "moved around" by other dusting methods. They are designed to remove all residual dust before painting finely finished surfaces. They are sold at paint and hardware stores and are inexpensive "consumables." If one folds the cloth to expose a clean square of the surface when a previously exposed square surface becomes full of dust and no longer tacky, a considerable area can be cleaned with them. They will dry out if left exposed to the air for long periods of time. Storing them in a zip-lock plastic bag will keep them tacky for a long while. There is nothing as effective for dusting surfaces prior to finish coating. 

The rag can be dipped in water and it works just as well without the mess of cleaning up the sticky linseed oil and rottenstone and/or pumice left after hand rubbing. I never use anything but water when hand rubbing finishes.

It depends upon the level of quality you want to attain in the model you're doing. There are many faux metal paints to chose from, but they all look like faux metal and not the real thing. If you find them satisfactory for your purposes, then by all means use them. That said, achieving a realistic impression of a bare metal in a scale piece with paint is a difficult thing to do. Nothing looks as realistically metallic on a model as real metal itself. For this, you will have to fabricate the pieces from metal, or paint them with a conductive paint made for the purpose, and electroplate them. Electroplating can be accomplished with simple household chemicals and an automotive battery charger or even a 12 VDC "wall wort." You don't have to buy any expensive equipment or materials. If you want chrome, you can simply electroplate with nickel. (Real chrome can be electroplated, but it's a more involved process.)  If you wish a slightly more subdued shine, you can experiment with zinc or aluminum plating or even silver plating. The mechanics are all the same.
 
There are tons of DIY electroplating and electroforming videos on YouTube.
 
 
 

It depends upon the level of quality you want to attain in the model you're doing. There are many faux metal paints to chose from, but they all look like faux metal and not the real thing. If you find them satisfactory for your purposes, then by all means use them. That said, achieving a realistic impression of a bare metal in a scale piece with paint is a difficult thing to do. Nothing looks as realistically metallic on a model as real metal itself. For this, you will have to fabricate the pieces from metal, or paint them with a conductive paint made for the purpose, and electroplate them. Electroplating can be accomplished with simple household chemicals and an automotive battery charger or even a 12 VDC "wall wort." You don't have to buy any expensive equipment or materials. If you want chrome, you can simply electroplate with nickel. (Real chrome can be electroplated, but it's a more involved process.)  If you wish a slightly more subdued shine, you can experiment with zinc or aluminum plating or even silver plating. The mechanics are all the same.
 
There are tons of DIY electroplating and electroforming videos on YouTube.
 
 
 

That will get you a bit ahead of the game, but if you really want to get way out ahead, quit buying hugely overpriced rattle cans and spraying the paint out of them to load your airbrush. Instead, use canned paints and thin them to suit. (1-Shot Lettering Enamel is especially good, although glossy and will require a bit of flattening solution.) Alternately, you can use tubed artists oils and acrylics, mixing your own colors (or buying ready-mixed, if you wish) and thinning with the appropriate spraying conditioners and solvents for use in your airbrush. In terms of quantity, rattle can paint is very expensive stuff.

The rag can be dipped in water and it works just as well without the mess of cleaning up the sticky linseed oil and rottenstone and/or pumice left after hand rubbing. I never use anything but water when hand rubbing finishes.

Greetings John,
Depending on how much work you might want to do, I've used aluminum rod and tube to make railings, stanchions, cleats, ladders, masts and booms. One can find very small diameter tubing, and I also used both the aluminum wire and pour spouts from salt containers. The two images attached show my results using these materials. I used CA to glue the parts together. For the mast and boom I squeezed the tubing carefully, with another smaller brass tube inside it, to obtain the oval shape.
Hope that helps!
Anchor's A Weigh!
John Fox III

To get a bit ahead of the game.  No matter what the model (ships, armor, cars, aircraft) I only spray automotive lacquers (Duplicolor from Amazon) that I decant from the spray can and mix the colors myself.  No thinning necessary and they spray beautifully.  Easy clean-up with lacquer thinner.  Try it.  Cheap too.  They also have sanding primers (fills scratches) and thin primers in white, gray and red oxide.

Shine  on finished wood can be reduced by rubbing it with rotten stone.  This is sold as a fine powder.  A lint free rag is first dipped in linseed oil.  The rag is then dipped in the rotten stone.
 
Roger

From the Blue Jacket Shipcrafters' post: 
Fine braided and twisted wire is readily available, although it may require a bit of toning down for modeling use. It would take a magician to turn in a Liverpool splice in 1 mm wire, but a socket terminal could certainly be fashioned from copper tubing and soldered on.
 
 
 
Here's a photo of Balclutha's wire cable standing rigging and turnbuckles. Her are simply doubled and seized as shown. Note the metal rod that runs through the top of all the metal thimbles which is intended to prevent the wire from untwisting under load. The turnbuckles are coated in painted canvas boots.
 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine. 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine. 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine. 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine. 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine. 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine. 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine. 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine. 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine. 

If there were such a thing as a standing ovation on the internet, we'd all be jumping up and down on our seats. Thanks so much for sharing your work with us. Your progress was a pleasure, and an education, to watch. Keep safe and know that all of us in the West are rooting, and praying, for you and for Ukraine.