Here be dragons!

[The Wooksta!]

"Bored. Bored. Bored! Bored!"

I've started reshaping the sandwich - mmmmmm, sandwich! - and  look like I'm finally getting somewhere.

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This is it taped in place.  It kind of helped, but not much, so in the end I put some strategic dabs of superglue in place, left it to cure for a few minutes and continued sanding.  It's not just the sides, although that was pretty quick, but the top too, as this slopes somewhat towards the nose.  Took a while, but I seem to be getting there.

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The now reshaped sandwich under a coat of primer.  There's a few etched guidemarks which will help later.

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The canopy.  It's a spare one from the CMR Wyvern TF1 - thankfully, Mark 1 have a set of these available fro the CMR kit if you cock them up  - and it needs some minor work to the base of the windscreen, as it angles upwards towards the front.  Not sure if that makes any sense, but I'm the one building this thing and I know what I mean. 

I'll put some pencil exclusion zones outside it and cut inside at least a mm away.  The back edge is where the rear bulkhead is.  TBH, I'm not looking forward to carving through this thing, so using the drill, the hedge trimmers and some plastic weld may be necessary.

Next: Nice Time with Brian Damage Balowski.

[Gondor]

The picture helps the description, which is always a very difficult thing to do when you can't find the exact technical word to describe exactly what you want it to do.

Great progress regardless 

[buzzbomb]

Just wow.. what work 

[The Wooksta!]

"Sounds like supper's ready."

What I thought was going to be an absolute chore was done quite quickly.

Staying inside the exclusion zone, I chain drilled a line of holes to denote the front edge, then used a ruler to mark out the coaming sides.  Several strokes with the scalpel to deepen them, then I just started carving through the top.  The plastic was quite soft and it didn't take too long, although the part itself came out.  The superglue is that cheap stuff from Poundland and isn't very super.  Still, I needed it removed anyway so it saved me a job.
The coaming sides were a bit too narrow, so I trimmed them back, again using the canopy as a guide.  I also bevelled the insides to give the occupant a shade more room.

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The relevant piece now glued back in.  The front edge is likely to be trimmed forward again once everything is all tidied up.  I'll cut a saw line laterally and install a piece of plastic card as an instrument panel.  It's a trick I got some years back, but rarely use it.

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So back out with the filler, as some of the gaps around that coaming are rather deep.  More sanding on that fuselage... The red wing is for display.  It may get used, although if I'm sticking to the drawing, the trailing edge fences aren't there so their mounting holes will need filling.

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And with the canopy in place.  Starting to look viable, even though there is a great deal of work to do.  I wonder what happened to the tailplanes I used when I made the moulds?

[kitbasher]

More great work, Lee, keep going.

[Rick Lowe]

Still, it's giving me the foreknowledge I'll need when tackling the Nomad Firecrest.

To quote: "Time spent in reconnaissance is never wasted."

  

[The Wooksta!]

"Blimey! That was quick!"

After a bit more sanding, I've given it a couple of coats of filler primer, with another light sanding in between.  It looks like the planking effect has just about disappeared.  Think I'll need a bit more filler around the coaming panel, but I can get a proper primer coat on it tomorrow.  Then I have to start the scribing.

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I really should look at the tail, because other than fill a few air bubbles, it looks fine.  Any flaws should be highlighted by the primer.

There's a few areas under the exhausts that need filler, but I'll worry about that when I put the wing on, because I'll need a lot of filler anyway.

I've checked the box that contained the horrible resin wings I'm using for the tailplanes and they're unusable.  One has a humongous air bubble.  I'd cast another but TsrJoe knacked the mould some twenty plus years back and I chucked it a few years back in a clearcut, so I've been down to a very cold shed to check through the masters box.  I'll used those for now - I have an actual proper Frog one I can steal the tailplanes from later to create new moulds.

[The Wooksta!]

"I laughed and laughed and laughed."

I hadn't given up on this, it's just dropped off the radar somewhat.

I wasn't happy with the wing.  I mean, that Halfords resin is crap and nasty to work with.  So I decided to use the master for it. I'm not likely to redo the mould so it was sitting there doing nowt.  And I looked at the radiators. Too narrow and the closest thing to the ones in the CMR kit are Spiteful ones.  I could start looking for some resin ones, but there's a large stash of Pegasus ones unused and IIRC I'd always intended using them.
I tried fitting them but they appeared too wide, falling over the flap hinge line. So I measured the Novo one and then the CMR and the former had them too deep in chord.  Quick bit of rescribing, some filling and out with the primer.

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I did some work because the Pegasus bits are just lumps of plastic, carving out some semblance of an intake and outlet.  Not brilliant but better than before and underneath where people never look.
Now fitted and with filler.  Happy with that.  Now I just need to reinstate the guns and add some ejection chutes.