MisterKit WW1 Acrylic Paints
By Matt Bittner
The Paints
MisterKit, out of Italy, so far has released paints for two major airforces of WW1 – Germany and Britain. Their next release will be paints for Austria-Hungary, followed by and somewhere further in the future paints for France. There are 10 paints in the German line and 5 paints in the British line.
Paint Test
When
I received the paints, I decided to test them along the lines of strength
and durability. I found an old sheet of Squadron styrene lying around
gathering dust. I dusted it off and put a strip of tape down the middle
to divide the sheet in half. I wrapped one side in "Saran Wrap" ('cling
film') and washed the other side in the normal way I wash kits - first
with dish soap and then with Polly S' Plastic Prep. Once dry I removed
the "Saran Wrap" and sprayed both sides with the Fokker Turquoise. I let
it dry at least 24 hours (like I normally let my models dry between applications
of different colored paints) and then removed the tape down the middle.
This left me with two sides - one "unwashed" and one "washed", which I
marked on the sheet with a 'W'.
I
then applied a strip of masking tape right off the roll to both the "unwashed"
and "washed" sides. I also stuck a piece on each side of "de-tacked" tape,
meaning I stuck the tape to my forehead before the plastic sheet to take
some of the "stickiness" away. I normally do this when I mask over acrylics
to avoid pulling up paint. After letting the tape sit for approximately
10 minutes, I removed the tape. The results were what I was expecting.
On the unwashed side, both "types" of tape ("normal" and "de-tacked") pulled up paint. On the washed side, only the "normal" tape pulled up paint. Believe it or not, this is exactly how Polly Scale behaves as well.
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In the other photos of painted kit parts, I took some spare parts I had lying around for the Revell/ESCI Albatros D.III; Airfix Albatros D.V; Revell Fokker Dr.I and Revell Sopwith Triplane. There are two images for each wing - one side shows the original part color, while the other shows the MisterKit paints applied to that part. All but one German color and two British colors are shown on these wings. The missing German paint is called a light grey, and the two British paints are a red-brown and the British Clear Doped Linen.All parts received at least three coats of brushed-on paint. A couple took a little more – like the green over the darker plastic. Unfortunately I ran out of time before I could add a couple more coats of the German Pale Underside Blue and you can see the kit color showing through.ConclusionWith the number of acrylic paints not as numerous as their enamel brethren, it is refreshing to see a new paint manufacturer. In fact, I am a convert and will be buying mainly MisterKit paints from now on. Sure, I will still buy Polly Scale when there is no close match in the MisterKit line, but from now on I'm a MisterKit devotee.My thanks to MisterKit for the review samples.
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