Having done various other test prints on the Form printer I have come to the conclusion I will have to do 1/36th scale rather than 1/48th. The front canards are literally like wafers at 1/48th it they are scaled properly, also the panel lines are much more difficult to reliably resolve. I am being a bit of a perfectionist over this, but I want you guys to have a kit that doesn't disappoint.
Also the screen models were 1/36th or 21 inches long so it is kind of fitting.
The 1/36th part was pre-UV curing and scrubbing which will get rid of the particles clinging to the surface.
I was kidding myself that the 1/48th stuff was working, the panel lines would literally disappear with a coat of paint. The parts like this will probably be better in the Makerjuice resin as it feels more like standard plastic and is not brittle, and seems to have less post UV cure warping.
These parts print fast enough that I will probably include printed parts rather than castings, as I can print 8-10 in not much more time than 2. Also with them being so thin even tiny bubbles in the resin would mess them up.
Think I might have to go with a photo etch master for the engines as even at 1/36th I'm struggling to get the results I want. The thin relief parts are a single laser pass, this resin actually cures too easily, I should try with the Makerjuice resin - might get better results.
Middle one of these is close but still rough looking. Excuse the fluff, pre-uv curing they are tacky and pick up everything, especially when you drop them on the carpet!
Tried a paint test on a 1/24th tailplane piece
This is Peugeot Tuanake Blue code KDL (Dolphin blue is the name the gave it on the Peugeot RCZ over here) with a gloss clear coat in daylight, hard to reproduce it correctly but IRL it looks right
Excuse the obvious mess up on this, used a bit of standard masking tape and the high solvent clear coat melted though.
This is silver base on front black on rear with the blue and gloss clear coat on top, all out of rattle cans. I think a mixture of grey, silver and black pre-shading of the panels will emulate the look pretty well.
Also in low light it goes near black as the original does.
There is some pre-ringing (and a bit of underextrusion) in the prints on my Cubex printer, it causes a few micron step before a panel line. I happens under deceleration, tried printing slower and it still occurs, don't think I will even get rid of it unless I printed so slow it would take about 20 hours to just print a tailplane!
The practical solution is to over-extrude about 10% then just sand until you get a flat surface. ABS wet sands real nice, you can use quite high grit and the surface doesn't get messed up. It means the 2-3 people so far who want a 1/24 or 1/18th kit will have a bit of manual labour to finish the parts.
Here's a pic of the Form clone in action
I moved all the hosted pics in this thread to google drive after Dropbox got locked out from too much usage, have gone back through the thread and fixed the links.
Main folder with all pics
drive.google.com
If you go in there you will find Firefox.mp4 which is a screen recorded fly around of the model for you guys to enjoy.