Dandiego

Thanks RC. Now comes the tedious part, getting both wings with a symmetrical anhedral. Some filing and shaving of the wing roots will be needed before glue and clamps. Dan

Big milestone, Port wing has been attached to the fuselage. I have done 90% of the scribing on the wings, fuselage and engine pods. The pegs have been installed and the wing epoxied to the fuselage. a few clamps hold everything in place. Join line will need some work but nothing too crazy. Second wing should be attached in a day or so. I will probably prime and paint the inboard engine pods before attaching to the wing. Should be easier that way. Next project to be worked on will be printing and installing all of the cockpit components. But first I need to design them. Dan

Working on getting the wings attached. I have printed out some hollow pegs that will accept a small nail to increase strength. Here you can see the peg with the nail inserted, pounded in. Here they are inserted into the wing. And a first fit test. Not too bad but some final adjustments will need to be done. There are 2 gaps that will need plastic shims to fill in holes. Dan

Here is the weapons pod, primed and with panel lines. And some scribed in panel lines on the wing. Dan

Here is the new weapons pod next to the original. The new one has the red putty. The contours of the two different components are more pronounced on the new one. Yes, bare feet again. Its hot and I am retired. Dan

Well said RC. Hubert, I have followed the same path when looking at stl files. Many possible purchases have been derailed by obvious shape errors. I have a few downloaded additional projects when time permits. An F-94 and an EA-6B. The Prowler would be a Mashup between some stl files and the Trumpeter Intruder. Dan

Hubert, the pods definitely have a "beer belly". And, I think, the pods, as designed, do reflect that. I will be going with the pods as designed as I am pretty far along and wouldn't know how to redesign them anyways. Here are the forward pods joined together with the intake spikes in place. One thing that I will be redoing is the 2 component pod. I don't think I got the shape right. I have designed a new one in Fusion and it is much more to my liking. The first print of the new part is printing now. Dan

Inland San Diego does get warm, contrary to popular belief. July, August and September are the warmest with daytime highs in the low 90's. We really don't complain until it hits 100. And even then the beach is only 15 minutes away. Shorts and bare feet are the uniform of the day. Dan " the beach" Diego

Finished 2 component pod, well almost. There will be 2 fins at the back end of the upper pod. Dan

Printed out the two Component Pod. 18 inches so far. The extreme aft end did not print properly. I will reprint tomorrow. Dan

Work is moving slowly. But some progress is being made. I realized that I needed something to hold the model up off of the workbench so I made a cradle out of wood. Hard to see here but a huge step in the Hustler construction. This is a dry fit of the port side. Tape, clothes pins and paint containers all help to get a view of major components. Here is the first of 4 parts of the two component pod. And some paint on the intakes. Dan

Not progress lately. Got distracted by other projects and I have decided on a full repaint. Don't like the digital camo. But it is still on the bench, so that's kinda encouraging. Dan

While working/looking at the engine pods and how the jet exhaust come together I have found an error that I will be addressing. This first hit me when I placed the exhaust onto the outboard jet pod. The end of the exhaust should end roughly equal to the trailing edge of the wing. But as designed the exhaust goes way past the trailing edge. So I will be cutting the jet nacelle back to the pencil line. And after further review the inboard nacelle will need some shortening as well. Shouldn't be too difficult. Stay tuned. Dan

Here are the exhaust components. All in all they look very nice. A quick test fit showed that I need to adjust the percentages up just a little. All the components were a little small when fit into the engine nacelles. Printing 4 sets as I type. Dan

Gotta be resin!

I want to add as much detail as possible so I went looking for some J-79 engine exhausts. Found them I did. The files cost $10, once I have printed out the first 4 they will be about $3 each. After that about 50 cents each for the resin. I think they look quite nice. The files are in 1:72nd scale. i have increased them by 225 % to get them up to 1:32nd. The first one is printing now. Dan

First inboard engine. Dan

Matt, I gotta say I was a little surprised by how well they fit. Think about it, Robert designed the original kit in 1:144th scale and half a world away Chad designs a detail piece for his 1:48th Hustler. I come along and scale everything up to 1:32 and the parts fit like a glove. Amaze, amaze, amaze. Dan

Rainer, I wouldn't say that I love it. But it is quite satisfying to bring some raw parts to the painting stage. Still a long way to go. Designing and printing the cockpit panels will be fun. Designing and printing the landing gear will be challenging. Dan

Ok, working on the intake interiors. The first picture is of the original hollowed out engine pod along with Chads interior parts. There was not a perfect fit, but nothing a little grinding couldn't solve. And here they are on the wing. Definitely some cleanup work to be done but it looks great. Dan

Here are the front end of the outboard engine pods. I have hollowed out the interior and removed the inlet cone. My friend Chad has designed some seamless intakes for his 1:48th Hustler. He has sent them to me, they look nice and I will be adding them to the engine pods. I expect some cutting and sanding will be in order to get the original engine pods to smoothly mate up with Chads improved intakes. Stay tuned. Dan

Wings are mostly done. I have added sheet plastic wing fairings. The fairings on the original files were not right. They were too low, too thin and too short front to back. Other than that they were perfect. Dan

The wing is all butt joints. Epoxy and clamps do all of the work. Aluminum skinning seems like black magic to me. So just a traditional bare metal spray will have to do. Dan

Here is the Starboard wing. I have numbered the sections so that you can see how it all came together. And a dry fit to the fuselage. Dan

Actually I need to get back to the Thunderflash. I am planning to use the Flash to dial in my metal finish skills before painting the Hustler. Dan