On the Bench 305: Robert Schuller’s Beatles!
I finally found an affordable set of the 1964 Revell Beatles Kits on eBay! The first task I did was to freeze the Fabs for a half an hour or so to disassemble them. They came apart fairly easy because the previous owner used Elmers Glue on them. The original paint jobs were actually quite good.
One thing that was difficult, is that the 55 year-old styrene was very brittle on some areas, so I had to be very careful. Next up I bought a can of ELO ( Easy Lift Off, not Electric Light Orchestra) paint remover at my local hobby shop. I let them sit for a couple hours soaking in it. After a while, I used a soft toothbrush to get in all of the areas of the models. The stripper worked very well. Doing this took a couple of hours.
Once the stripping was finished, I washed them in soapy water using dish soap.
The next step was to fill any missing plastic. I like to use Plumbers Putty and Elmer’s Squeeze And Caulk, available at most home improvement stores There were a few pieces that needed filling, Ringo’s leg, Paul’s stand and John’s arm, being three examples. Once the putty was dry,( usually good to go in an hour or so,) I used fine sandpaper for a smoothed finish . I also had to replace a few missing pegs on the guitars, using the putty to make replacements.
I had to decide what color too use for the Fabs suits, so I did some research online, and found some good clear pictures of The Beatles in their collarless suits.
For airbrushing I primed them with flat white. For the suits, I mixed a light grey using iridescent white for the base color to give the suits a slight shine. For the black trim on the suits, I used a combination of brush and Sharpie ! For the shoes, I used a matte black. On the soles and heels, flat black was applied. Liquitex colors are my go to paints.
The flesh tones were done with Tamaya flesh, with a white and pink wash. Their hair was mixed matching the proper color, and then dry brushed and washed with clear acrylic. On the shirts and ties, flat white and black were used.
For the base, I picked the stage color from the Ed Sullivan appearance ! For the signatures on the bases I used a sgraffito effect to remove the paint.
The guitars were a challenge. Again I found a lot of good reference online. The guitars were airbrushed according to reference. The strings were dry brushed using Liquitex Silver. After I was finished I used clear acrylic for gloss for the shine. I was not satisfied, so I started over using lacquer for a much better look.
The pin stripe was not going to be easy. I though no way I can paint those skinny things. So I came up with the idea of using dental floss and Elmers Glue, and applied it ! They came out nice !
Ringo’s drum kit looked kind of chincy, so I looked online to see if there was one to scale. I did find a perfect match with the Academy 1/8 Model Drum Kit ! What a nightmare that turned out to be! First I ordered a set from Korea on eBay, never got it, issued a refund. Second set ordered from a site in Minnesota , never got it, eBay refunded me. This is going on 2 months now, so I decided to look on Amazon, and found one cheaper, and received it in one week.
The kit was a the hardest model kit I have ever built ! Bare bones assembly in which all of the tension rods were too small for my sausage fingers ! I used a combination of Super Glue and Testors glue with tweezers ! Wow. The cymbal and high hat stands were so fragile, I had to use a hot glue gun to adhere ! It took me a good 12 hours to complete.
I thought the guys needed some mics, so built two with coat hanger wire, screw anchors, and bottle caps for the base.
All in all, it was fun to build. I am guessing I put around 40 hours into all four, and drum kit!
Bob Schuller
See more of the completed model here
