How to finish your planewith aluminum foilStory and photos by Bucky Sheftall

FOIL

ED L

IGHT

NING

L ike other incurable perfectionists in our hobby, I was discouragedby modeling natural-metal finishes. Metallic paints never seemedconvincing on anything much larger than a 1/48 scale landing

gear strut.About a year ago, I saw pictures of an aluminum-foil covered B-58

Hustler, and I was enthralled. I just had to try aluminum foil.There are two ways to apply an aluminum foil finish. The easier

method is to use a commercial adhesive foil product, such as Bare-Metal Foil (see sidebar on page 29). The more difficult way is to usehousehold aluminum foil and apply adhesive yourself. This not onlytakes more time, but it creates more problems: applying the rightamount of glue, keeping dust and dirt out of the glue,and so forth.

In either case, the application of foil is achallenging task, but the effect is worththe effort.

I use household aluminum foiland apply Microscale’s MicroMetal Foil Adhesive with abrush. I will concentrate on basicfoiling techniques in this article,especially the foiling of com-pound curved surfaces – asurface curving in more than onedirection (a sphere is a perfectcompound curve). The P-38 hasplenty of compound curves.

Bucky Sheftall’s 1/48 scale HasegawaP-38J Lightning is covered with aluminumfoil. The markings for “Si Si Señor” camefrom AeroMaster sheet No. 48-350.

Technique

1/48 Scale

Getting around it. The harsh real-ity of foiling is that you are trying toapply a two-dimensional material to athree-dimensional object. Householdfoil has almost no “stretchiness,” and canbe torn or wrinkled if forced around asharp compound curve. Bare-Metal Foilstretches better over curves.

While it is desirable to minimizejoints by using large pieces of foil onlarge, flat areas, such as wings or controlsurfaces, small curved items should becovered in small pieces to avoid wrinkles.

For my example, I’m going to foil overthe teardrop-shaped P-38 150-gallon fueltank first. There are plenty of curves here;it has a round cross-section, a blunt nose,and a radically tapered tail. Sweat beadsbegin to form on my brow just looking atthe drop tank!

Ready … set … foil! The first stepis to sand away all imperfections from theparts. Foil is not going to cover seams orirregularities – it’s only going to makethem look worse!

Once you have smoothed the item,wash it with soapy water so oils don’treduce adhesion of the foil. Remove anylint or sanding dust anywhere that couldbe conspicuously trapped by the foil.

If you are using Bare-Metal Foil, youcan skip this next step. When usinghousehold foil, cut a suitably sized pieceand lay it on a clean work surface with thefoil’s matte side facing up. The fluidadhesive spreads better on the matte side.Don’t worry about the overly shiny side ofthe foil; you’ll be taking care of that later.Fold 1⁄4" of one end over on itself to serveas a handle.

Material list

• either Bare-Metal Foil (regular “chrome” is best) or the thinnest aluminum foil you can find

• Microscale Metal Foil Adhesive• a couple of flat artist’s brushes,

maybe 1.5cm (about 1⁄2") wide• glass, Plexiglas, or coated, lint-

free cardboard work surface• scissors• sharp hobby knife blades or

razor blades• fine steel wool (0000)• cotton swabs• round toothpicks• rubbing alcohol• facial tissues

July 2002 www.finescale.com 27

Apply Micro Metal Foil Adhesivewith a flat brush. Keep brush strokesroughly parallel, pushing away from thehandle to spread the liquid in a thin, evenlayer, 1. Be careful not to let any dust geton the foil, especially while the adhesive isdrying. When the milky liquid dries to aneven Scotch-tape-like clear matte appear-ance, the pressure-activated adhesive isready, and the foil can be applied to themodel.

One piece at a time. Cut a strip offoil slightly longer than the tank and awidth (varying with the shape of the tank)maybe one-sixth of the circumference.The fraction is not important, just try tokeep the edges straight along the axis ofthe tank. Lightly press the strip onto thetank at the midpoint, and adjust the posi-tion, 2. As you can see in the photo,wrinkles are already evident and will like-ly get worse as you work the foil down.

Burnish the strip onto the tank with acotton swab, 3. Increasing the pressurewill activate the adhesive. The wrinkleson my tank weren’t as bad as I thoughtthey would be, and they were easy to rubout with toothpicks and steel wool.

Lightly sand the edges of the stripwith 1,000-grit sandpaper or an ultra-fine sanding stick. Sand perpendicular tothe edge and push away from the edge ofthe foil strip. This will feather the edge,reducing the “cliff ” and allowing theoverlap of the next foil segment tobecome nearly invisible.

Continue laying strips, 4, until theentire tank is covered, 5. Thin (1⁄8"-wide)strips can be burnished over the promi-nent raised fuel tank seams.

Reducing the shine. A rub down(front to back) with 0000 steel wool givesa “grain” or patina to the too-shiny foiland makes it look more like real aircraftskin. The steel wool also helps obscurethe fine edges of the foil segments, 6.

After the tank and its pylon are com-pletely foiled, wash it with warm soapywater to remove finger oils (which canoxidize on the foil and leave dark grayfingerprints) and remove the grains ofaluminum dust generated by the sandpa-per and steel wool. It is essential toremove this dust before the next step.

That’s the basic technique for foiling,which is repeated over and over, withslight variations according to the shapesof the parts, 7 through 10. Larger or flat-ter parts are easier to cover.

Tips for better foiling. When foil-ing a wing or stabilizer, wrap thetop-surface foil over the leading edge, 11,

Nothing looks more like aluminum than aluminum. Adhesive-backed aluminum foil isavailable in many hobby shops, or you can add adhesive to household foil.

1 If you aren’t using Bare-Metal Foil, you’ll need to brush Micro Metal Foil Adhesiveon the matte side of household aluminum foil. The folded-over edge on the foil sheetserves as a handle.

2 Applying foil to compound curves, such as those of this P-38 drop tank, is the mostdifficult part of the process. Here’s how to start: Cut a thin strip of foil and lightly pressit onto the tank along the middle.

28 FineScale Modeler July 2002

so the seam is on the under-surface whereit is less conspicuous, 12.

Burnish foil over raised or recessedpanel lines, and use those lines as trimpoints between pieces of foil. Use only asharp blade to cut the foil along the panellines. The adjacent piece of foil overlapsthe panel line and should be trimmed inthe same manner.

To cover small intake scoops such asthe one on the side of the P-38 enginecowl, make a slit along the leading edge ofthe scoop before burnishing the foil. Thiswill allow the foil to conform. Cover any“bald spots” with little “toupee strips” offoil, then burnish and polish with steelwool as usual, 13.

If you find small unfoiled spots, coverthem with small patches of foil, or touchup with slightly thinned aluminum paintafter the model is finished.

Bursting bubbles. If you find an airbubble under the foil, slit it with a sharpblade, then burnish it with a toothpick.Be careful not to snag the edge of the slitwith the toothpick, causing the foil to rip.Rub steel wool over the area, and thebubble and the slit will disappear.

It’s usually a good idea to foil sub-assemblies before attaching them to themodel. Keep in mind, though, that the

Bare-Metal Foil

If you don’t want the hassle ofapplying adhesive to foil, you canobtain ultra-thin aluminum foilwith a pressure-sensitive adhesivealready on it. Bare-Metal Foil wasone of the original foils for model-ers, developed in the early 1970s.Other brands of self-stick foilshave come and gone, but Bare-Metal Foil is still around.

Bare-Metal Foil is an alu-minum alloy that has moremalleability than standard house-hold foil, and it’s thinner, too. Itcomes in 6" x 12" sheets, mountedon a waxy paper. You remove it byscoring through the foil with asharp blade, peeling the foil fromthe paper with tweezers, andtransferring it to the model.

In addition to the regularchrome finish, BMF is also avail-able in ultra-bright chrome, mattealuminum, black-chrome, realcopper, and gold-colored versions.

3 Burnish the strip onto the part with a cotton swab, then go over the edges with anultra-fine sanding stick.

4 The next piece of foil overlaps the first and then is burnished in place.

5 Lightly sanding the edges of the foil helps the next piece hide the overlap.

6 Once the covered tank is scoured with 0000 steel wool, the seams between thepieces of foil practically disappear.

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areas to be bonded must be free of foil.You can touch up the glue joints with bitsof foil after final assembly.

Sealing the foil. After you “grain”the foil with steel wool, wipe away excessadhesive with a tissue dampened in rub-bing alcohol. Next, wash the entire modelwith warm, soapy water, wipe away excesswater, and let the model air-dry.

Apply several coats of Future acrylicfloor polish with a flat, carefully cleanedbrush or with an airbrush. Future sealsthe foil, protects it from oxidation, andforms a primer coat that is needed underany additional painting or weathering.(Enamels, artist’s oils, lacquers, or acrylicpaints don’t adhere well to bare foil.)Future also adds to the luster of the metal,and forms a perfect surface for the appli-cation of decals.

Try it, you’ll like it! To me, foil isthe most realistic natural-metal finish.Well, outside of scratchbuilding fromsheets of aluminum, that is. FSM

Meet Bucky Sheftall

Bucky Sheftall (seen here pass-ing the torch to his son, Levi Riku)cut his modeling teeth in the late’60s and early ’70s on Aurora,Monogram, and Lindberg planeand armor kits. Bucky watched hisfather make spectacularly detailedNapoleonic figures. After a ten-year hiatus, Bucky returned tomodeling in the late ’80s.

When he isn’t modeling, Buckyis a professor of English at TokohaGakuen Tanki Daigaku, a privatewomen’s junior college in Shizuoka,Japan, where he has lived andworked since 1987. He is also apublished English textbook authorand a Japanese/English translatorfor Hasegawa Seisakusho Co. Ltd.His work has appeared in ScaleAviation, Model Art, Tamiya News,and other print and on-line publi-cations.

7 The rear of the Lightning’s central pod is another curved area. The foil is lightlytacked in place.

8 Burnishing begins with a cotton swab …

9 … and ends with a round toothpick that pushes the foil into and over surface detail.

10 With the foil burnished in place, the edges can be trimmed with a sharp blade.

30 FineScale Modeler July 2002

REFERENCESAero Detail 28: Lockheed P-38Lightning Nohara Shigeru andOsamu Sato (English text by Scott T.Hards), Dainippon Kaiga, Ltd.,Tokyo, Japan, 2000Famous Airplanes of the WorldNo. 30: Lockheed P-38 LightningMitsui Ichiro (ed.), Bunrin-do,Tokyo, Japan, 1993Fighter Command Jeffrey L. Ethelland Robert T. Sand, MotorbooksInternational, Osceola, WI, 1991P-38 Lightning in Action LarryDavis, Squadron/Signal Publications,Carrollton, Texas, 1990The Lockheed P-38 LightningWarren M. Bodie, WidewingPublications, Hiawassee, Georgia,1991P-38 Lightning in Detail & Scale(Vols. 57 and 58) Bert Kinzey,Squadron/Signal Publications,Carrollton, Texas, 1998

SOURCESSelf-adhesive foil Bare-Metal Foil &Hobby Co., P.O. Box 82,Farmington, MI 48332, 248-476-4366, www.bare-metal.comAdhesive Microscale Industries, 18435Bandilier Circle, Fountain Valley, CA92708, www.microscale.com

11 Large, flat areas are a little easier tofoil. Here a strip has been gently laid ontothe horizontal stabilizer. Excess foil willwrap around at the leading edge.

12 Now the foil has been burnisheddown, but it has yet to be scoured withsteel wool.

13 Foiling over small scoops can be done with small strips of foil. Slicing through thefoil at scoop openings allows the foil to work around the holes.

Bucky’s foil-finished fighter looks like it is made of aluminum. But the metal is only skin deep.

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