Final Touches on the Outer Dome

It's been difficult to find time, but I was able to squeeze in final painting of the Outer Dome.

It's been raining a lot here in Southern California lately, so I've also been delayed with final painting for that reason as well.  But the planets aligned and I was able to paint!

Since I had already done all the masking, it was a quick few minutes of work to get the metallic gunmetal color painted on the Outer Dome.

I was VERY careful and made sure to make multiple super light coats rather than only a few heavy coats. I was definitely worried about paint bleeding through the masking I had done, especially since it was a couple of weeks between when I masked and when I actually got to paint.

I let it cure overnight, and went right for removing the masking the next day. It was a tedious process, but then again I may have been a little too cautious when removing. I REALLLLY didn't want to mess up the red paint underneath.

Look at that!

I have to say, it came out perfect.There was absolutely no bleeding onto the red parts. Very crisp and clean paint job.

It looks very Sith-like with this scheme... wasn't anticipating that, but I'm digging it. 

It was now time for the final clear coat. I spent a good amount of time considering the type of finish I wanted,and in the end went with a Satin textured finished. 

This muted the colors a bit, and gave a rough cement-like finish to the Dome. I think this gives it a more hardy, durable feel, which a military droid should be, right? It also looks like it will protect the paint from pretty much all but the worse damage.

In the mean time, I've been starting to acquire detail parts for the leg assemblies (3d printing like crazy!) as well as the body frame! Frame should be here next week, and then still waiting on the Holo Projector mount and control system, which will be the final part assemblies for the dome.