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A clear resin canopy comes with the http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/New_Stuff/AVENGER_STRIKE_FIGHTER.html kit.

It's kinda cool that they cast up the canopies in pretty intricate shapes, but the problem for me is that mine is rather cloudy. I've cleaned it gently in some soapy water to see if it was just release agent and though it became a bit clearer it's still not as clear as the plastic ones that come with normal GW kits.

Is there a way to make it better? I mean the kit has a pretty detailed interior and it's a shame if you can't see any of it (or only very blurry).

If you can't clean the cloudiness off it's cause they mixed the resin parts incorrectly, same thing happens with white resin except it turns kinda clear if you mix it wrong.

You should have them send you a new one, their customer service is great.

Sometimes heat works with clearing up resins. The downside with that is that it can also distort them.

When you say cloudy is it almost like the surface is frosted or actually within the resin itself?
An old aircraft modelling trick for canopies is to give it a gloss varnish, if its just a roughly cast surface, this fills in the "pits" making it look rough/cloudy and helps the shine.

I did this when casting clear resin for water on a display base, horrible and cloudy when the mould was pulled away, couple of thick gloss varnish coats and good as new!
Might be worth giving a go, after all, you can always strip it off!

- Dan

On close inspection it does appear 'frosted'. I will try the gloss varnish method first to see if it helps.

Did you glue it into place yet?

Cyanoacrylate superglue(what you'd use for resin) frosts clear parts.

No, I usually paint it separately and varnish the rest before glueing it in place (taking care only to get glue on painted parts of the canopy).

After applying a few layers of varnish it did clear up a bit (the frostiness mostly disappeared). It's quite hard to get it on really smooth though.

the best thing to apply gloss in this case is an airbrush if you have one, the GW gloss pots are great for airbrushing as long as you give the brush a good clean afterwards.

Clear acrylic floor polish is what people recommend for correcting scuffs in clear plastic, would that help at all for this?