Dash7ATP

Dale,

If you are planning to finish with a real metal finish, you will probably need to glass it first anyway. You CAN finish it with the shinny Monocoat aluminum finish and get pretty fair results. It all depends on just how particular you are on getting a really scale finish.

If you just use Monocoat, you can just iron it on as you would any monocoat finish, right over the balsa. For the best results, mark off the panel lines prior to beginning and do each panel  seperately. You WILL have to do this with the very thin real metal coverings as well. It's just that  they are so thin they show everything including the grain, so you should glass the model prior to using them.  The primed finish would have to be perfect, or paint ready, prior to appling the Flightmetal of whatever you chose to use.

If you go with aluminum Monocoat, you still need to be very carefull with your prep. prior to putting on each panel, Buff it lightly with 0000 steel wool, keeping your strokes all parallel. By varying the direction of the buffing, or the amount of buffing with the steel wool, you should get very realistic panel effects. 

While I don't have any actual experience with the real metal finishes, I have done several models with Coverite's Prestochrome. This yields a very shinny finish ,as in like a polished aluminum real plane. Think show planes here. It's really too shinny for the average P-51. AND, it requires a perfect glassed finish prior to application.

I think you should first ask yourself this. What did the prototype aircraft look like?  If it is just weathered aluminum, a painted aluminum finish might look about right.  I glassed my P-47 and painted it with KlassKote epoxy aluminum last year. I used half and half satin and gloss catalist for a non shinny finish. Then I buffed the paint with 0000 steel wool, masking each panel and doing them in different directions. The paneling effect was quite good, I think.

Hope this helps.

Dash