Fuselage glued up (we've
had some practice assembling it by now...), the windshield has
been trimmed to fit and 2 bracing wires of stretched sprue are
crossed behind the windshield. They're a bit thick but dark grey
paint will tone them down. Most of the super glue holding the
resin nose section on went in through the front end with a stretched
sprue applicator, while held in place with a rubber band from
nose to tail:
These are the unfaired
oleo struts I'll use for NC168N, cut from "doorbell wire"
with sections of insulation left on ( there are straight ones
in the kit, but they're faired):
Just a thin bead of 5-minute
epoxy holds the windshield on; a second application and a quick
wipe with a rag finishes off the joint (it's not glued on yet
here, those bracing wires still need paint. I also black-painted
the inner front edges of those clear side panels):
Windshield and all openings
covered while filling and sanding: The
masking tape strips will guide cutting of the liquid mask compound
later. The center of the wing spar is Testors Flat Rubber (don't
know why they call it that; it's a dark flat brown and I'll be
using Panzer grey again for the tires...):