I've been plugging along on this bad boy. Well, reviews out there on this kit are pretty much dead on, it takes alot of patience. I will point out the areas I had trouble with for those who wish to tackle this turkey.
I closed up the fuselage to discover the panel lines were slightly staggered. Not unfixable, but enough to be annoying when trying to rescribe lost panel lines on the spine. The nose fit was as reported, absolutely comical if you want it closed up. Heres my solution.
1.First I glued the two nose pieces together (top and bottom).
2. You'll find that the lower piece is slightly longer, so I sanded the back face until it's flush.
3. The fuselage nose is unfortunately slightly larger in diameter than the nose piece, which leaves a step. I sanded the front face of the fuselage back until it's the same width as the nose piece. It worked for me. It will look lke this...
4. Don't add any of the gunbay parts. Instead, add some plasticard to the inside of the nosepiece so it has something to sit on. I did it this way.
5. Glue that turkey in place. Mine was far from perfect but it's passable. It will get covered by a big wasp decal anyways, so I got that going for me. I also added a piece of plasticard inside the nose so the Quickboost guns have something to butt up against.
I moved on to the wings. The nacelles actually fit very well but there's a hug gap at the top joint where they meet the wing. On both sides of course. I filled it with superglue and used the accelerator sanding trick. I then rescribed the panel line back in. Again, not perfect but good enough. This was sort of a pain. Next time I'll fill the gap with plasticard. I know this looks horrible now, but it was passable once primered.
I put my silver Sharpie to good use on this one and it needed quite a bit of filler. Sometimes we need one of those kits to hone our skills I suppose. I thing the worst is over...
I eventually got the seamwork to a satisfactory point.
I had a left over Montex Bf109 set in the stash and horked the crosses. The rest will be decals. First I preshaded the lines and general areas that are to be black thusly....
Next I added the white and masked those areas.
Next I got the yellow fired down, which in this subject is the lower wing tips and an oddly placed fuselage band. I added a few drops of red to brighten it up.
Now the fun part. The Eduard instructions call for RLM 74/75 over 76, then a white wash on this subject. I won't be doing the white wash, as it will be depicted as it looks on the box cover art. I started with AK Real Colors RLM 76 early version. Their late version seems too blue to me. I mottled and faded it with the addttion of XF-2 White. As always, these perform flawlessly.
Next I will start on the upper camo.