Another Hasegawa T bolt Bubbletop, my first LSP. November 12, 2022, It is DONE at last!!!!!!!!

[Citadelgrad]

More baby steps.   Shot of the front, unused fuel fitting at the front, and now i ran the air line.  It still needs a “rubber” section, the only thing i can think of is a short section of painted brass tube painted rubber, its far too thin for tape.  
 

 

 

 

now i am waiting for the primer to dry on the brass tube, then a quick coat of rubber, then i can install the drop tank for the las time. 
 

en maybe i can finish this rig and move on to #2?

[Citadelgrad]

Strike while the iron is hot and the garage is cool(er).

 

got the belly tank all plumbed and hung, i still need to add the sway braces, then i can check that final large hurdle off the punch list.  With the 4 sway braces, the belly tank is a 10 piece affair, 11 if you count the tank halves.  
 

heres where we stand, i must say, for all the screw ups on this build, sometimes i really like the way something turns out. 
 

photos…

 

Then, the photo that started this plumbing madness, 

 

and my humble result so far

 

obviously still missing gear doors, guns, pitot, and somehow i lost a main gear rubble brake line, but shes closer than ever to done.  
 

thanks so much for looking in, i really appreciate the support. 
 

Bill

[r0t0rdr1ver]

Wow! Absolutely amazing build! Love the plumbing work, very clever approach.

[JayW]

Bill - a very convincing job on the tank plumbing.  I love it.

[Citadelgrad]

On 9/11/2022 at 2:01 AM, MikeMaben said:

Turned out great Bill 

Thanks so much, Mike, I do appreciate it.  I am really happy with at least this part of her.  

On 9/11/2022 at 3:31 AM, Archer Fine Transfers said:

Glad to see you're back on this.

You and me both.  It's been SO hot locally lately, the garage is almost always 90+, I have repeatedly vowed to install an AC< but this winter I hope to do it.  That will really let me build year round. 

On 9/11/2022 at 9:38 AM, scvrobeson said:

That came out great!  Awesome problem solving on this.

 

 

Matt 

Thanks, Matt.  It had me stumped for longer than I care to admit. The combination of brass tube and stretched sprue for the glass seemed like a no brainer, but introduced so many unnecessary joints that I was just stuck until I decided to take a step back and use the clear rod.  What a simplification, from a 3d puzzle to a painting exercise.   

On 9/11/2022 at 10:14 AM, TAG said:

Bravo, awesome solution, and totally looks the part! It's these little details that make all the difference, good on ya, Bill

Thanks very much, I agree, they are almost always worth the trouble.  

17 hours ago, r0t0rdr1ver said:

Wow! Absolutely amazing build! Love the plumbing work, very clever approach.

Thank you for looking in.  See above, though, it had me stalled for a long time until I figured this out. 

3 hours ago, JayW said:

Bill - a very convincing job on the tank plumbing.  I love it.

Thanks, Jay, coming from the magical miniaturization machine you appear to use, that means a lot to me.  Thanks for following along. 

 

Bill 

[Citadelgrad]

I got two sway braces mounted.   Anyone building this kit, beware.  I missed the instructions telling me to open the mounting holes for these, so i had to cut off the pins, sand them flat, and cross my fingers.  It did give me a bit of up and down flexibility, so the mpads touch the tank, but it doesnt sit flush, only an edge touches. In the end, the fact that the tank, the braces, and the fuselage are all painted, and there is almost no room, i had to just get these close enough and move on.  I settled for parallel and just touching. 
 

thanks for looking,

 

Bill

[Ayovan]

18 hours ago, Citadelgrad said:

I got two sway braces mounted.   Anyone building this kit, beware.  I missed the instructions telling me to open the mounting holes for these, so i had to cut off the pins, sand them flat, and cross my fingers.  It did give me a bit of up and down flexibility, so the mpads touch the tank, but it doesnt sit flush, only an edge touches. In the end, the fact that the tank, the braces, and the fuselage are all painted, and there is almost no room, i had to just get these close enough and move on.  I settled for parallel and just touching. 
 

thanks for looking,

 

Bill

Really nice job on the plumbing Bill. On mine, I had to shorten up the mounting block that goes into the fuselage to get the sway braces to actually touch to tank. I probably removed 1 to 1 1/2 mm and the block ended up just about flush to the fuselage. Don't know that it's righ, but it looks good to me...

 

[Citadelgrad]

1 hour ago, Ayovan said:

Really nice job on the plumbing Bill. On mine, I had to shorten up the mounting block that goes into the fuselage to get the sway braces to actually touch to tank. I probably removed 1 to 1 1/2 mm and the block ended up just about flush to the fuselage. Don't know that it's righ, but it looks good to me...

 

Thanks.   Amazing the details we convince ourselves to sweat about.  
 

Someone posted a photo of the plumbing fixtures on a plane without a mounted tank, and it showed the sway braces really well.  the kit sway bars look nothing like the real deal.  That took away some of my desire to get this “just right. “
 

 

[Ayovan]

51 minutes ago, Citadelgrad said:

Thanks.   Amazing the details we convince ourselves to sweat about.  
 

Someone posted a photo of the plumbing fixtures on a plane without a mounted tank, and it showed the sway braces really well.  the kit sway bars look nothing like the real deal.  That took away some of my desire to get this “just right. “
 

 

 

[Thunnus]

Great to see you back on this one!  The plumbing to the drop tank look fantastic... well worth the extra time and effort, Bill!

[nmayhew]

Nice

 

when I built this kit a while back I looked and I looked and for the life of me couldn’t find definitively where that plumbing went into the fuselage - I even registered on some subscription plans / technical drawings site and couldn’t find it there either (although there was probably too much info there rather than not enough).

 

anyway, I like what you have done with it

[Citadelgrad]

On 9/14/2022 at 3:31 PM, nmayhew said:

Nice

 

when I built this kit a while back I looked and I looked and for the life of me couldn’t find definitively where that plumbing went into the fuselage - I even registered on some subscription plans / technical drawings site and couldn’t find it there either (although there was probably too much info there rather than not enough).

 

anyway, I like what you have done with it

Thank you.   There is not a great deal of readily available information, but I started a thread 

 

This one photo from TAG in particular, shows where the penetrations are.  

Edit to add, here is my interpretation of the same area

Edited September 15, 2022 by Citadelgrad

[Rick K]

digging the tank lines.  very nice work.

 

[MikeMaben]

Gettin' there Bill  

[Citadelgrad]

Painted up the oleos that move the inner gear doors.

 

 

i went with a darker zc for the mechanism and a chrome pen to do the oleo itself. That nasty nub on the mechanism is not a sprue gate, i cleaned it a bit but i might have to remove it, it looks bad blown up. 

 

more later. Not sure how long the chrome needs to set up.