Cheetah11 Posted October 26, 2020 Author Share Posted October 26, 2020 Thanks for the heads up Romain Fortunately there are two tanks provided so I will easily fix it. I hope the pylon is correct. Nick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheetah11 Posted October 28, 2020 Author Share Posted October 28, 2020 A little more fixing to do before painting. As I said earlier I want all the fixes out of the way before painting and assembly. I fixed the length of the drop tank tanks to the info Romain provided. I will post it tomorrow after the filler has dried. The gun bays are also designed to be open and the doors will not fit flush with the bays installed. I simply removed them to get the doors flush and added a piece of tubing to later fit the gun barrel. The engine mount and engine are secured with super thin location pegs. I was afraid with my clumsiness I will battle to get them to fit. I replaced them with a piece of brass rod through the engine and 3mm plastic card on the fuselage sides. Now for the biggest fix. The resin AB nozzle is undersized. I think KH realized this and instead of printing a new master, they added a ring to the nozzle to get it flush with the fuselage. This leads to a step which is not present on the real aircraft. Because of the nature of the resin nozzle, it will be almost impossible to enlarge it. There are a few options. 1. Best one to get the Resikit nozzle if the fit is better. 2. Ignore the problem. 3. Size the fuselage to fit the nozzle. Option 3 is the only viable one for me, so here goes. The step if no adjustment is made. Bottom cut by sanding a wedge out of both sides Two small cuts on the side of the fuselage completed the cutting. And the corrected nozzle. Now almost ready for a normal build and painting Cheers Nick thierry laurent, Landrotten Highlander, blackbetty and 17 others 20 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marcel111 Posted October 28, 2020 Share Posted October 28, 2020 Nice save on the nozzle but phew what a miss by Kitty Hawk. Marcel Cheetah11 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jgrease Posted October 29, 2020 Share Posted October 29, 2020 The issue with the nozzle seems to vary by individual kit. Mine was fine while others are like Nick's. Wonder what happened. Cheetah11 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheetah11 Posted October 29, 2020 Author Share Posted October 29, 2020 Thanks for the comments guys. Marcel you mentioned that you had the kit and the Resikit nozzle. Maybe you can give us an idea of the fit. I promised pictures of the corrected tank. As you can see not a big issue but one I wanted to address. The nose and tail was also rounded a bit more in line with photos. The pylon needed to be shortened to now fit the shortened tank. A good thing I did the tank now as I sprayed some Tamiya primer on it after the adjustment and filling. I thinned it with Lacquer thinner and the finish on some parts went dull. The plastic was affected by the thinner! The last time I saw this was in 1974 when I tried to paint my 1/24 Bandai P-51 Mustang silver with a Duco can. I sanded the tank again and primed it with some Acrilic which I had in my paint collection and it was fine after that. If you use Lacquer thinners for paint I suggest a test on some of the unused stores before using on on the model. Well if it is not the one thing it is the other. I looked at the pitot tube and it seemed a bit large compared to the other Mirage models. I took a picture on the Ipad of a Mir 2000C from side on and sized it to the scale if the nose cone. The kit pitot probe seems way too large. A new pitot was turned from brass in the Dremel. I compromised a bit on the center section for a bit more strength. The picture will hopefully explain. I also found this explanation of the slat operation in a Mirage 2000 simulator manual while looking for some 1300 l tanks details. This should explain the position during different phases of flight. Cheers Nick Kagemusha, alain11, Lothar and 5 others 8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alain11 Posted October 30, 2020 Share Posted October 30, 2020 hi Nick I did a dry test fit of the nozzle , I have the same issue , the fuselage is a little bit too big than the resin nozzle . before cutting the fuselage as you did , I think I will go to the reskit set . I don't know if the fit will be better , but I know , that the details are "sharp" ..... in fact , I think that most of the modelers have chosen the second option .... ignore the problem I am stunned that the guys from KH could have made such mistake on the tank . I don't want to question Romain's word ( he is a meticulous modeler ) , I haven't the answer , but nobody , mentioned this issue ( or I missed something ) ....8 mm ??????!!!!!, or 25,6 cm ! what a mistake ..well in any case , good job !!!!!!! Alain BTW : are you still looking for an ASMP missile ........... I got the " Superbase " book today ... nice pictures !!!!! Cheetah11 and Lothar 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Biggles87 Posted November 2, 2020 Share Posted November 2, 2020 Hi, I think the Mirage 2000 is one of the most aesthetically pleasing jets ever built and I am seriously tempted to buy one of these to add to my two 1/48 examples so I'll tag along If I may. John Cheetah11, Lothar and Derek B 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheetah11 Posted November 2, 2020 Author Share Posted November 2, 2020 (edited) Biggles you are most welcome to tag along. Thanks for all the interest guys. I have not done much more over the weekend. The project should pick up the pace once the cockpit is done. I have not started the cockpit for the lack of references behind the ejection seat. I will try and do some detailing on the cockpit. I know Ettienne is doing a Mir 2000-5 cockpit but there are some differences from the Mir 2000C that I intend to do. Speaking of the ejection seat, I have decided to to with the kit seat. I still have an old Paragon resin seat for a F/A-18 which I considered using but although many aircraft use the Mk10 seat, there are detail differences in the harness and headrest shape. In the mean time I used small discs to fill the flare dispensers in the rear fuselage. They are not present for the time period I am modeling. I also made the inspection light above the left intake. I used a piece of chrome tape and a plastic card box which was fitted behind the glass. Duting final painting I will use a cut mask to do the shape of the glass accurately. When I shortened the tank and pylon I was not quite sure if they need to move forward or rearwards on the model after the adjustments. Fortunately they were good but I noticed something else. I used a photo of a Greek M 2000-5 and sized the image on the computer screen. Everything checked out but I noticed the radome was about 10mm shorter (320mm on the actual aircraft) Looking at images it appears the Greek and Taiwanese dash5 aircraft have the shorter radome. Can anyone shed any light on this or confirm it. I am doing a M2000C so it will not affect my model but it will be nice to know. Cheers Nick Edited November 2, 2020 by Cheetah11 Biggles87, Greg W, Gazzas and 2 others 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheetah11 Posted November 2, 2020 Author Share Posted November 2, 2020 With regards to the nose of the M2000-5 I see there is a correction resin replacement. Thank goodness I am doing a 2000C. Nick Landrotten Highlander, Marcel111, kuya and 3 others 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROM Posted November 5, 2020 Share Posted November 5, 2020 Hi single seaters have the same lenght. But KH model is 6mm too long in the front area, approximatelly near the canopy or windshield area. So hard to correct. In fact, kh based their both twin and single seaters models on the scan of a Mirage 2000B twin seater which is longer than single seater. As for the KAsl nose, not convinced it is worthy... cheers Romain Cheetah11 and Derek B 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheetah11 Posted November 6, 2020 Author Share Posted November 6, 2020 (edited) Thanks for the heads up Romain 10 hours ago, ROM said: Hi single seaters have the same lenght. But KH model is 6mm too long in the front area, approximatelly near the canopy or windshield area. So hard to correct. In fact, kh based their both twin and single seaters models on the scan of a Mirage 2000B twin seater which is longer than single seater. As for the KAsl nose, not convinced it is worthy... cheers Romain This seems to be the most viable cut but it changes the geometry of the cockpit and IP position. I will still decide if it is worth it. Thankfully the rest of the fuselage seems to be in proportion. I had a look at the 1/48 kits I have and Esci and Heller got it right all those years ago, so no excuse. Nick Edited November 6, 2020 by Cheetah11 blackbetty, Lothar, Greg W and 4 others 6 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alain11 Posted November 6, 2020 Share Posted November 6, 2020 hi Nick what ???? another cut ???!!! . This one seems to be .. tricky ( I know , cuts , always scare me ) I guess you know the advise : think twice , cut once .... Alain Derek B and Cheetah11 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheetah11 Posted November 6, 2020 Author Share Posted November 6, 2020 1 hour ago, alain11 said: hi Nick what ???? another cut ???!!! . This one seems to be .. tricky ( I know , cuts , always scare me ) I guess you know the advise : think twice , cut once .... Alain Done and dusted or should I say cut and pasted Alain. Thanks to Romain for picking this and the tank discrepancy up. It looks much better and the hud is now correct relative to the canopy frame. Now that it is seen it cannot be made unseen unfortunately. The question now is how is the cockpit affected as the IP will move 6mm back as well. I will see over the weekend what needs to be done. It now looks like this. Cheers Nick Kagemusha, LSP_Kevin, Fanes and 12 others 15 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jenshb Posted November 6, 2020 Share Posted November 6, 2020 Interesting observation there Nick. How will you solve the problem of making the windshield match? 6 mm is a lot to chop. Cheetah11 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROM Posted November 6, 2020 Share Posted November 6, 2020 Wow! you did it! Curious now to see how the windshield fits now. Thanks for sharing your good work! Very inspiring Romain Cheetah11 and Derek B 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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