Here are a couple of smokes I had on my to do pile for a while now....they were both popped and in need of some TLC.
The older "flat top" yellow smoke was a nice M18 Yellow smoke, with most of the original paint and stencilling, but alas, because it was "popped" there was some paint loss, and a lot of it readt to flake away.
The newer style was also a yellow smoke, but the body had no paint left on it...
I rotary brushed both down to bare metal, then wiped them thoroughly with acetone to clean/degrease them. I figured there was no way I could duplicate the stencilling, until I remembered I had in my stash of stuff a couple of Japanese 1:1 scale model kits of grenades (they make highly detailed 1:1 kits since they can't own ANYTHING over there!) one of which was an M18 smoke, which had decals for the stencilling...
I found it, and there were decals for an M18, and for an AN-M8...so I decided to do one of each.
I painted the M18 with olive drab, the AN-M8 with SAC Bomber Green (probably not quite light enough, but I figured it would do), masked the tops, and painted them. Then I hit the bodies with Glosscote, as the decals were older, and fairly thick.
Honestly they were a real pain, I had to soak them in a lightly diluted white glue after soaking them off to help ensure no silvering, then hit them heavily with Micro-Sol once on, and had to work hard to keep them adhered properly until dry...there still is a little silvering on the lot number on the AN-M8.
Once dry, another shot of Glosscote, then a few mist coats of Dullcote. The original fuzes back on, and not too bad...at least they aren't bare anymore!
The older "flat top" yellow smoke was a nice M18 Yellow smoke, with most of the original paint and stencilling, but alas, because it was "popped" there was some paint loss, and a lot of it readt to flake away.
The newer style was also a yellow smoke, but the body had no paint left on it...
I rotary brushed both down to bare metal, then wiped them thoroughly with acetone to clean/degrease them. I figured there was no way I could duplicate the stencilling, until I remembered I had in my stash of stuff a couple of Japanese 1:1 scale model kits of grenades (they make highly detailed 1:1 kits since they can't own ANYTHING over there!) one of which was an M18 smoke, which had decals for the stencilling...
I found it, and there were decals for an M18, and for an AN-M8...so I decided to do one of each.
I painted the M18 with olive drab, the AN-M8 with SAC Bomber Green (probably not quite light enough, but I figured it would do), masked the tops, and painted them. Then I hit the bodies with Glosscote, as the decals were older, and fairly thick.
Honestly they were a real pain, I had to soak them in a lightly diluted white glue after soaking them off to help ensure no silvering, then hit them heavily with Micro-Sol once on, and had to work hard to keep them adhered properly until dry...there still is a little silvering on the lot number on the AN-M8.
Once dry, another shot of Glosscote, then a few mist coats of Dullcote. The original fuzes back on, and not too bad...at least they aren't bare anymore!
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