Hi Guys.
Well before I post these pictures let me apologise for the quality. The camera I have is pretty basic and when I eventually mastered the micro setting and came to view the pictures they looked awful. The parts look like they have painted with a tin of dulux and a stick. I can assure you that they dont look quite this bad in the flesh.
So this is my first attempt with PE parts and please remember this is 1/72 scale.
View attachment 43660I initially bought some Airwaves harnesses which are the ones on right(brass coloured) but when I realised they wernt painted decided to get a set of Eduard painted ones. They are on the left as you look. But they came as a grey color and were a lot thinner than the Airwaves ones. I also noticed that on the Martin Baker ejection seat the straps that run down from the headrest go behind a piece of padding on the seat so you cant see them, and that two shoulder straps then hang down infront of that back rest padding. The eduard set did not have these shoulder straps which did come with the airwaves. so in the end I made a piece of padding for the seat from plasti card, ditched the Eduard set and went with the airwaves. Because I do not feel confient enough to paint them without destroying the fine detail on them I left then the brass/brown colour and just coated with matt varnish to take the shine off.
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I then moved onto the cock pit and used the
decals supplied with the kit for the centre consul. Im not a lover of these dacals but if I try and dry paint something this small the consul just looks a total mess so its the better of the two options for me. I used the PE eduard set for the front instrument panel. To fit these you have to file away the panel to make it thinner so that it can take the etched panel and plastic backing panel with the dials painted on. This was such a phaff to fit that I left it out and just stuck the etched panel on to the facia.
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I will leave the ejector seats out until the model is completed so they dont get in the way and damaged.
The wings were then assembled but you have to fit the pylons early in the build. This is because they actually rotate so that when you drop the wings back you can adjust the pylons so that they always face forward. The mechanism used is a plastic circlip that just pushes onto the pylon once it is in position in the wing. They say not to use any glue but I secured the circlip with some epoxy to stop it springing off once the two wing halfs were joined. I just hope the pylons dont interfere with the under wing
decals later.
I have also filled the nose with some small lead shot which is just coated in PVA and stuffed in to set and completed the rear stabaliser assembly which also rotates
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So thats it so far. Not much progress but I always find the cockpits take me ages and things should progress a bit more in the next week. Once again, sorry for the picture quality.
Steve
PS Cant wait to start on my next build. 1/24 scale. At least I will be able to see the parts LOL)
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