SPA Modeler

mostrich wrote:Clean work on the covers, Kent. These can be a PITA, seen a lot of modellers who binned this kit because of them.

Many thanks,

It is one of those infamous engineering decisions. I am sure I have seen it done that way before somewhere, but if not, I will claim it! A little less material removal at the rear of the opening would have been better but it's really close!

Regards,

So,

I set about finishing off the cockpit PE general finagling...before I knew it the cockpit was installed:





I left the seat until later as I will now have to gloss coat, wash, weather and matte coat with the cockpit installed. I decided to test fit the lower wings and dry fit them to a point where the seams were almost invisible and thought, " I don't want to miss that chance, I'll just add a spot of glue to the lower wing joins to hold it." Well, before I knew it, the lower wings were attached and setting up nicely:









Thanks for looking,

This is quite nice to follow!

Thanks Stikpusher,

Not to self....do not proceed with attaching cowling, no matter HOW tempting to check the fit, before you prepare, paint and install the exhausts!

Regards,

She is coming along nicely.

Thanks lads,

Welcome back,

True to my word, I spent the morning working on the exhaust. I found the longitudinal centre of each and marked them with a pin scriber in two places, about central to the micro drill I was using. I then drilled two shallow holes and cleaned out the centre, leaving a roughly similar shape to the exhaust outlets. As I intended to replicate the QB set, I cut the prepared ends of each eaxhaust and glued them to the interior of the cowling. I had marked the upper and lower extremes of the cowling wall. It was then a matter of align, check, re-align until I was happy:



The lower exhaust was done the same way and then the downside to my haste became obvious. After about 30 minutes of attempting to manipulate the piece into place, I gave up and will install them from the outside later:



I worked the MG 17 troughs, both lower and upper to get a better fit for the Master Barrels MG 17 tips. Once I was happy the only thing left to do was attach the cowling:













Pretty happy with that. Thanks for looking.

That pit as well as the exhaust looks great Kent. Good idea on the exhausts by the way. How's the upper wing to lower wing fit?

mostrich wrote:Clean work on the covers, Kent. These can be a PITA, seen a lot of modellers who binned this kit because of them.

Yeah I attempted this kit and that's exactly what I did. Binned it. I screwed up pretty much everything.

Wish I could have seen this build before I started mine. Awesome work!!

mustang1989 wrote:That pit as well as the exhaust looks great Kent. Good idea on the exhausts by the way. How's the upper wing to lower wing fit?

First dry fits show promise. The wing joins aft of the gun opening on both sides looks great, so I will probably start the gluing from there and work my way around. The forward edges right at the wing root will close with force, indicating something is snagging. I have sanded the wing spar and MLG lock uppers and also the rear tabs where the forward edge of the cannon bay butt up against the spar. I think it will be just a bit more fettling. I will post some photos later.....

Regards,

Medicman71 wrote:

mostrich wrote:Clean work on the covers, Kent. These can be a PITA, seen a lot of modellers who binned this kit because of them.

Yeah I attempted this kit and that's exactly what I did. Binned it. I screwed up pretty much everything.

Wish I could have seen this build before I started mine. Awesome work!!

Many thanks,

I think the problem with early Eduard kits is they were engineered with very fine tolerances. Even a lick of paint was enough to throw alignment out. I have noticed a bit more flash on some of the parts on this one, so I wonder if the decision to release a new tool has come out of the original moulds reaching their use by date?

I think the new tool kits will find favour amongst the great unwashed.

Regards,