I used 2oz cloth on the leading edges of the wing, fins, and all around the nose to protect it from dings and other hangar rash type stuff. For the 2oz cloth I used zpoxy. Before I did anything else I sprayed some polyurethane all over the plane for a protective coat to protect against warping for the next process. On the finish I used 3/4oz fiberglass and the Polycrylic/Talcum method for the fiberglass weave. The polycrylic is water based so it will soak into the wood and make it expand a little that is what the polyurethane is for. After filling in the weave and sanding it down to a nice finish, I sprayed camoflage grey all over the plane for a base coat. Oh BTW I used model Master paints for all of this. Then I used Flanker blue/grey and Greyviolet 47 for the camo scheme. After that I used insignia red for the stars, Flat black for the engines and nose, and let that all dry for 1 day. Then I sprayed 2 coats of semigloss polyurethane all over the plane once more for a gloss finish as well as a protective one. Let this dry for at least two days before doing anything else to the plane. If you start putting in the engine and other equipment, you will most likely mess up the finish becasue the polyurethane has not fully cured even though it says fast drying. Be careful not to spill nitro on it though because it will eat the finish right off. Exhaust oil is fine but not straight nitro to the finish. As for the time frame, this plane was the easiest to build so far. The formers are 1/4" thick balsa that do not break while building and the wings are small enough that it only took a week to get them together. The skin for the plane is precut so no guess work there. Over all it was an easy build. The thing that took the longest was the airbrake. Mainly because I had to figure out what I was going to do and I hated to cut into the top of it.