HG 1/100 Wing Zero WIP

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HG 1/100 Wing Zero WIP

So I built this kit a couple years ago but found an old thread over at ZeroGunz where I posted some of the WIP. I am going to migrate over here for completeness. I apologize in advance for tense changes and weird grammar as I am just going to piece together past thread posts to make this WIP.

On this kit, my primary goals were:

Practice modding to make painting easier
More modding in general, trying to come closer to MG quality
More weathering practice (looking back, I must’ve decided against this goal)

For modding, a few things that interested me and seemed different in the MG and HG kits were:

MG kit wings are a bit different. The side feathers are separate, and the inner wings have a part that pulls out. The HG kit has non-separated side feathers, and the inner wings have to have a part manually switched out rather than sliding it out.
MG feet bend in the middle, HG do not
MG has compartment for the pilot, HG does not
MG kit back skirt moves, HG does not

Modding

Here are a couple of mods that I did that will make painting easier.

The first is modding the head so I can paint the face and add it in later. I haven’t done this before, but I think it was actually very easy on this kit. I did not get a photo before the mod, but basically it has some male ends that stick out on the side of the face at the top that would slip into female parts inside the head to hold the face in. I just chopped them off.

That should be enough – just have to glue the face in place afterwards.

The second mod was also just as easy. The shoulder guns slid and locked into place inside the blue chest part. There was a part in the middle of the shoulder gun container that held it in. Chopping these off let’s me glue the blue for seamline removal first, and paint the gray separately. Just have to glue the guns in after it’s all painted.

Did not get an ‘after’ shot for this yet, but just chop off the nub seen in the second picture above, on both sides.

In addition to these, I did some other basic mods for shoulder armor and similar items, so that they could be slid onto the arms after everything is painted.

Next I started working on the inner wings. Want them to open and close like the MG kit. First, I removed the pegs inside the wings that block the inside from holding the expandable part when closed…

Before:

After:

Next, I cut off this extra part of the expandable wing part. I would have liked to keep it all, but I have no idea how I could do that while allowing it to close fully and be stored inside the wing as well. So, I cut off this extra part that hangs out. It doesn’t expand as much, but at least it will be built in rather than a manual process.

Next, I glued part of a tree to the inner wing to use as a peg (not shown), drilled a hole in the expandable wing and placed it over that peg (shown), and glued a peg inside to “stop” the wing from expanding too much, which would show the part that was cut off. I wanted it to stop at the appropriate place.

The above step introduces several issues. First, I had to glue a peg back in the same spot where I had removed one earlier to fit the wing in. I think on the next wing, I will simply drill a bigger hole in the expandable wing and slide it over the peg that is already present…That may be easier. Second, I need a better technique for “stopping” the wing from expanding. The peg that is visible in the above photo has already bent and broken out of place (after completion of the wing). I had drilled a hole in pla-plate and glued the peg into that pla-plate, then down to the inner wing. However, it still wasn’t sturdy enough I suppose. Luckily, it’s a pretty tight fit so the expandable part doesn’t really move on it’s own..I just have to be sure when I position it I don’t pull it out too far or the cut region will show. But it doesn’t move out further on it’s own, so I suppose I can leave it as is.

Finished result, glued and ready to be sanded.

That expandable part now opens and closes. Woo Hoo! Hopefully my work will be better on the second inner wing since I now know what I am doing.

Did a small mod to the outer wing. On the MG kit, the little side feather things are separate and move independently. On the HG kit, they do not – there is one for each side. However, there are two connectors on each side, so why not separate them, at least into two?

So, I separated each side feather into two independent side feathers. However, based on the peg / connector locations, that left one feather that was twice as big as the other. So, I then cut it to look like two individual feathers, although I did not cut all the way through. This way, the large one is still one piece, but it looks more like separate feathers.

Before:

After:

Note: In the after photo, I think the large one on the left side is a little rough. However, I’ve tried to fix it up a bit, but as you can see that one feather in the middle is getting a little thin so it’s hard to keep cutting it down to try and improve it….maybe I can fix it up a little with some putty. That was the first side that I did, so it doesn’t look as good as the right side IMO. Hopefully I will do some better cuts on the next outer wing.

Next I tried just two feathers on the sides…

I separated them thinking I would add another connector on each side and use that, but when I went to trying to add the connector I cannot seem to do it. I guess I’m not good enough at scratch building stuff! I tried building a little box in the back of the wing to hold the connector, but I haven’t been able to do it yet. The surface is curved and rough, so I haven’t been able to cut and glue pla-plates down that are sturdy enough (it’s very hard for me to cut the pla-plates so that they match the curve of the wing exactly, which I think is needed for a strong seal with glue).

After that, I thought if there were three on the right side and two on the left side that would look fine to me. So, since I couldn’t get another connector added, I tried just gluing the third feather in place – it just wouldn’t be adjustable. However, after gluing it and putting putty around the edges and everything, I found it still wasn’t a very strong connection and would break off pretty easily, so I just removed it.

Next I worked on making the back skirt move. First step, saw it!

Next, chopped this piece off the back of the skirt (used to hold the side skirt). I will use it later.

Took the back middle part, chopped out an area with saw and used a spare piece from my Tallgeese kit. The piece was the same as the skirt piece for the front of this kit. However, I’m not sure why I had it left over from the Tallgeese. It wasn’t for a skirt piece for sure.

Fixed middle area so that I can attach side skirts again (using the piece I cut off of back skirt). Also used a strip of pla plate to glue it to.

Finally, I added a round pla plate piece to the skirt, in order to insert it into the hole.

Started working on legs and feet. I added some more details to some foot armor. Below is a before and after shot.

I then want to work on the back of the feet. Added a little section and will put some mesh wiring over the opening on the bottom

Before:

After:

Finished the back of the leg by adding the wire mesh (from mechaskunk). I found this stuff pretty hard to glue and I had to find some super strong super glue to get it to stick – any advice on glue? Normal model glue didn’t like the wire mesh much. The super glue worked alright, but I almost glued my fingers together several times trying to glue mesh in small little areas.

Then I just did a little pla plates and scribing on upper body, although I need to work on it a little more to make it cleaner.

Decided that the chest needed some work as well since I didn’t really like the front…So why not use some more mesh? Grinded it out….

Put the mesh in (this was the hardest part that took forever…hard to glue, especially since I had already glued the torso together so I couldn’t unsnap it..) Need to use a small needle to clean out some of the mesh holes if possible from putty, if I can find one that fits through them.

I did manage to clean up a lot of the putty from the mesh, although there is still a little bit there. Technique used: a small needle! I found one small enough that fit through the mesh holes, so I just pushed the putty through all the holes and cleaned it up. I do admit I should be far more careful using putty in the future though, I’m not good at controlling it.

Around the edges it is a little more rough. The whole reason I had to add some putty was to get a little around the edges since the mesh didn’t quite go all the way to the edges. The problem I had was working from the outside – I couldn’t get a piece big enough to cover the entire thing to go through the hole and glued in place working from the outside, so it ended up a little thinner than it needed to be and I added a little putty around the edges to try and make the gap disappear. However, it is still noticeable, but I don’t know how I would fix it. So I think I may just add some different color to the rough parts and try and make it look like some weathering or dirt or something.

What I definitely learned though is if doing mesh, it’s best and almost required to work from the inside of the armor to get it clean, at least if I am the one doing it. I think that would allow you to cut a piece bigger than is needed so it covers the hole easily, gives you room around the edges to glue it in place, and putty wouldn’t be required at all and it would glue well (the mesh was pretty hard to glue since normal model glue wouldn’t melt it to the plastic). Trying to squeeze it in behind the armor from the outside of the armor is really hard.

Added a little pla plate to arms….

Figured the feet looked weird…I liked the pla plate I did earlier on the foot armor, but then the actual foot looked too plain and didn’t match the armor…so I added some more to the feet.