Okay, first WIP shots, as promised, of the Tamiya A-1a:
General subassemblies -- note some filler under the nacelles, I can't have used enough cya to join them, there was a hairline gap when I smoothed them off. One sanded, one to go. The wheel bay struts are in place, the exhaust flow cones assembled, smoothed and masked, and the cockpit and panel are done:
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And a closeup on the pit:
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The decals went down better than expected, with plenty of Microsol to pull them over the guages. The lenses were created with Testor Clear Parts Cement, though they don't show in this pic, and probably won't be very visible when the pit is closed up.
Next, some masking over the top of the pit and she can be blown into metallic along with the rest of the internal stuff, then the wings and engines can be assembled.
I'm ordering up the Eduard canopy masks shortly, and will need to source some open white crosses to replace the ones missing from the sheet -- this might be a good opportunity to try masking them.
Cheers, Mike/TB379