DoogsATX

My bench WIP shots are all taken with my Nexus 6P. When I shift over to the light table, I use a Nikon D610 with a Nikkor 60mm macro lens.

Sink marks - if you look very carefully you can see them here - before glue even touched the fuselage/wings

Yeah I don't see any way to sand the rest of the wing down to their level without significantly screwing things up. Instead I'm going to be using putty to fill them in. NOT looking forward to it, but what can you do?

Joining the fuselage = a super-fun seam to deal with! There's really no way around it, with the thickness of the plastic and the shape of the fuselage. First pass of Mr. Dissolved Putty and Mr Surfacer 500 didn't quite get the job done (showed up under primer): So time to bust out the 3M red stuff. LOTS of sanding with LOTS of different grades of sandpaper later: Moving around top. Masking the exhausts is tedious, but has to be done. Primer down! Mr. Surfacer 1500: Looking in the harsh light of morning, though, I found something rather deflating. Sink lines running the entire perimeter of the wings. BOO. Not something I'm particularly keen to deal with after the elbow grease of the underside join.

Been a frustrating couple of days - futzing with the -117 and making progress but not feeling like it. Fortunately I think I'm starting to pull out of the suck zone. Got the exhausts painted up - MRP Burnt Iron for the exhaust vent/baffle, then Alclad Magnesium and MRP Duraluminum for the exposed metal. Got the cockpit and FLIR and DLIR installed. The highlight here was that Trumpeter forgot to put a back wall on the FLIR bay, so you can totally look through and see the back of the IP. I did a quick spray of some styrene sheet to block it off. And...got the fuselage closed last night. The fit is good considering the size and thickness of the parts involved, but got a bit cramped up front. I think the cockpit and nose bay were getting in each other's way a bit. Still - got it all closed. And now I'm going to need to play games with putty to overcome the join lines.

So those are lights! Was wondering what they were. Good call. I might even see about stuffing some Bondic in from the back. Work continued last night. Knocking down the heavy airframe RAM without knocking it out completely: This is one place where the single-piece airframe works against the kit - maneuvering requires some interesting logistics! Also, did a quick test-fitting of the nose gear last night. Still not sure if I'll use the metal or plastic gear (strength vs. detail...), but happy to report that it is extremely possible to install it after the fact, and that fit is phenomenally secure. Trumpeter does a lot of silly things, but they generally seem to nail gear strut location, at least in 1/32.

Excellent! One less detail to hassle with! Any insight on whether the thing needs ballast? Given how far back the main struts seem to be, perhaps not...but then again if I have to install the nose gear, I may as well do the mains at the same time and be able to set it down on its legs. If so...I can always test before I close everything.

Those switches are some wire that I added. PITA to do it, but the side console detail really needed some life. For the canopy, I'm going open. I wanted to do closed, but it bunches in on the port side. I *could* brace it with something, but eh, I'm already this far along.

I've got this close-up that shows some faint riveting - and I went VERY light with the wheel. Worse comes to it I can fill them in easily with some Mr Surfacer. Wasn't sure how common or not it was (need to go back through references), but figured I may as well go ahead and do it since it's a lot easier to fill the rivets later than it is to add them after the plates are glued in!

So my plan to use acetate for the MFDs didn't work. I really wanted to find something identical to the acetate Aires, Eduard etc throw in. Thin but stiff. But the stuff I found was very floppy, and when glued in place, curved on me. Fortunately, PVA can be removed without too much issue. Since I need to keep moving, FICE is in full effect, and I ended up using Bondic for the displays. Not terribly pleased with it, but...need to keep moving. Cockpit sills and coaming painted up - reference pics show that the coaming seems to have more weathering than the rest of the cockpit combined, so that'll be coming up here soon. I was also looking at the Eduard exterior PE set and decided I wasn't happy with the intake applique panels. The raised rivet detail just doesn't work for me. So...I scanned them in: And used Illustrator + my Silhouette cutter to make some replacements out of .005 styrene sheet. Rivet lines were marked and riveted. And the panels glued in place: Plan tonight is to weather the coaming and start getting that squared away, get final paint down on the FLIR and DLIR mesh so I can drop the insides in place, and get to some of the fuselage stuff I've been putting off. Also - anybody happen to know if 1) the gear struts can be installed after the fact? They look like they can be. And 2) if this sucker needs any ballast to keep it from tail-sitting. NOTE that I'm leaving the middle engine sections out. Though they're mostly in-line with the gear bays so probably wouldn't impact weight distribution in any significant way.

I'm definitely not going with a DS 117 - going to stick with later in their service life so I can play with all the interesting surface wear.

honestly I haven't even gotten that far yet - it's going to be black so I'll dig into markings when I get closer to paint

Just some AMMO Medium Gray PLW to give the illusion of separate panels - nothing fancy.

Progress continues to be made! FLIR and DLIR sensors. Have to say, I really love the depth that Trumpeter put into the clear parts, especially the FLIR. Some wiring on the bulkhead to liven things up a bit. Work on the canopy frame. I totally stole Brian's excellent tungsten cone idea, and man was that some fiddly work with the mounts. Scratchbuilding is definitely not my thing. The cockpit sill. This shows as a very light gray in reference photos - markedly lighter than the dark gull gray interior. I used some MRP Light Gray (for Slovak MiG-29s or something) mixed with some USN Insignia White. Phone camera had a fit with levels trying to capture it, but it's a very light gray (some darker portions are masked off). Finally, cockpit work. Trumpeter's gauge decals are a bit too bold for my taste, but I'm trying to move quickly and am just going to deal. If I were doing it again I'd use Airscale stuff for sure. Airscale stencils are also being employed to break up the side consoles a bit.

That's primer! And in many cases (intake lips, FLIR, cockpit...) they're going to have to be painted up before the rest of the airframe.