how do you guys go about re-scribing panel lines on aircraft, all the videos i see are of guys doing it freehand which has not worked well for me, so do you use some sort of tape as a guide? i tried using tamiya yellow tape but it did not work out so well so i was thinking of using their thicker white tape, what do you suggest?
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Remember the old label maker from the sixties? I used to use that label material. I’ve used brass shim as well. I also have a PE template with aircraft related panels in two scales.
And for armor as well as aircraft, I’ve been known to fabricate a jig or template out of styrene, and cement it very sparingly to the model. Then I lightly scribe around it until I’ve gone as deep as I want, and remove the styrene piece.
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is that the label makes where the tape was thick plastic and punched the lettering into it and it appeared white? if so, do they still make that stuff these days?
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I looked it up on ebay. Looks like they do!
Damon.
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is this the stuff?
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I believe that’s it. I saw individual rolls & multipacks for just the tape on Ebay. Granted this was US ebay,
Damon.
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The Dymo paper in my local officeworks appears to all be the skinny paper type rather than the thicker plastic. I’m wondering if they changed how they work?
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Used Dymo tape today to do the door on the old Airfix O-1. Cut a piece into 3 thinner strips, attached, scribed and then used a little Tamiya ultrathin to clean it up.
I’ll also use a steel ruler for longer lines. It’s not often I rescribe lines, usually only if I really need to. As for doing curves, yeah still haven’t found a way to do that.
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Is that the Birddog kit that is missing the odd shaped window that has to be added? I think I have it in my stash but I can’t find it.
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A missing window? You never I’ve never noticed. And I’ve built several of these over the years. Bloody undercarriage is always the first thing to go.
I’ll have a look at that though. I know the O-2 has a funny shaped window on the pilots side.
One of them does. I bought three different observation aircraft a few years ago and can’t find them now. But yes - the window had an odd shape and either had to be reworked of totally added. I can’t remember which.
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Mig has one too, if you can’t find Dymo tape
https://www.migjimenez.com/en/tools-brushes/5845-scribing-tape-straight-edge-5mm-x-3m-amig-8246.html
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Dymo tape comes in two varieties, one where the letters are physically stamped into the plastic, turning it white, the other where the printer actually prints letters onto a thinner kind of plastic. It’s the thicker variety that most modellers use I think.
If you can’t get hold of that (and I don’t find it all that practical in many situations, it is rather stiff and has a strange, sticky, glue), use a steel ruler to cut a strip of very thin plasticard. Attach it along one edge using tape and scribe along the other one.
For non-straight lines, a neat trick I learned from Chukw who was very active at the old site, is tracing the shape you want to scribe onto tape and then transferring that to thin plasticard that you then tape back onto the model.
I even have a photo of how I did it on a Dragon Ta-152, almost 15 years ago 
!
Finally, tools: there are lots of different scribers out there and I think most work well. The Olfa P-cutter was an early one that I still like a lot even if it is big and clumsy. For restoring panel lines across the spine of a fuselage, where just a tiny bit is missing, a fine-toothed razor (easy to get nowadays from Special Hobby) does the trick. With a steady hand (and a bit of luck…) you don’t even need any kind of ruler for it.
Scribe on!
Magnus
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I think it might be the old Testors 1/48 O-2 originally tooled as the civil model. I’m still scouring images of the O-1 on case it did too.
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I use stencil vinyl for the cricket. Specifically Oracal oramask blue. It is thick enough to guide the Scriber while still being pliable to follow curves! It cuts nicer than the dynamo tape so you can it to follow whatever line you need. You can also get a big roll of it for like $15 and it will last a long time
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I’ve just ordered some of this from Japan because it was cheaper than buying from the USA 
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Amazon in the US has for $10 US with free shipping.
Might solve a problem for me. I started to scribe an old Monogram Colonial Viper and completely borked it.
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I doubt it’s free shipping outside of CONUS
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