A while back (last year I think) I scored a secondhand Tau Tigershark AX-1-0 (the one with railguns) from someone. It was partially built (not that it has that many parts anyway) but in really poor shape. The casting quality was pretty ordinary and the builder hadn’t done any mould line removal (in this case mould slip scraping and filling).
Since it was far back in the project queue, the Tigershark sat in its box until last weekend when I felt a sudden surge of inspiration. This came in the form of watching some videos of Adam Savage’s (of Mythbusters fame) workshop and all of the cabinets full of cool stuff he has! I looked over at my cabinet and other than the SAW, Fiddler and Mega Dread it’s only housing the mass of partially painted Warhound parts and some books (glass cabinets are a great way to store things dust free!). I wanted my cabinet to be adorned with more beautiful miniatures, so I grabbed the one that I figured would be the quickest and easiest to assemble, plus is the biggest unbuilt model I have: the Tigershark!
Cleanup wasn’t as painful as I’d expected. A bit of cutting and everything fit nicely. Some Milliput to patch up any gaps and we’re good to go. As this is a very static display model, I glued the cockpit (which also functions as an escape pod) shut and to the hull. Same deal with the landing gear doors.
To mount it I went with the simple option of a 12mm diameter clear acrylic rod mounted to a nice block of wood with a routed edge. I’ll give it a coat of varnish later. I drilled the 12mm hole in the hull at an angle so the Tigershark mounts in a “banking” position.
Once I was happy with everything I gave it a coat of primer. For this I tried airbrushing on some newly acquired Alclad II Grey Primer. I have to say this is seriously nice primer, easily comparable to our good old favourite Tamiya Grey Surface Primer! While the health warnings on the bottle are pretty unpleasant, I’m pretty sure the Tamiya cans say the same thing, except since it’s in Japanese I can’t read it. Applying the primer through the airbrush is far more economical than the expensive Tamiya cans (especially now that my local hobby store only stocks the small cans of primer for a ludicrous price). I’m really pleased with the Alclad II primer and will certainly continue to use it in the future.
For now the Tigershark will be placed in the cabinet in all it’s primed grey glory. That’s good enough for now – I’ll worry about adding colour later on 
