Today was the day I planned to add the glass to the plane, mask the frames, and get everything prepped for painting. But alas, it was not to be. I ran into several problems that I am still working to fix. All of these problems involve the glass on the plane.
When I first looked at the plastic canopy pieces in their separate bag, I thought they looked pretty good. I started with long sliding portion of the canopy because I thought that all I would need to do is add the Eduard masks. The clear plastic if really thin, so when I noticed a rather large sprue attachment point on the canopy bow, I decided to use a razor saw to separate the canopy from the sprue instead of nippers. Sometimes nippers can damage the plastic part, especially on clear plastic which is usually more brittle than the rest of the plastic. A few swipes of the saw removed the canopy and I got ready to clean up the former attachment point. It was then that I noticed that the canopy had cracked at the attachment point. As I was grumbling about brittle clear plastic, I noticed the canopy had a molding seam down the center of the entire casting. Starting with a fine sanding stick and water, I sanded away the seam. I then attacked the area with increasingly finer grits of sanding stick until the canopy was clear again. I then polished the canopy with car wax. Later in the build I will cover the canopy with Future, but that will come later.
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1. Crack at the attachment point.
2. There was a seam down the middle. I have started removing it already.
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1. Seam removal in progress.
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1. Progressively finer grits restored the clarity. Car polish and Future still to come.
The forward windscreen was next to go. The first thing I noticed was the sprue attachment point was on the side glass rather than on a frame. I figured I could sand the mark away and restore the clarity like I had on the top of the canopy. Sadly, the remnants of the attachment goes all the way through the glass, so it will be a permanent part of the canopy. As I prepared the rest of the windscreen, I noticed that the side glass on the side opposite the attachment point was slightly deformed. There was a ripple in the plastic of the right side of the windscreen that was fairly noticeable. If it was in the gray plastic, I would simple fill and sand until it was gone, but can't do that on clear plastic. Hmmm...maybe this plane suffered a bird strike on the glass that caused the ripple, and I am modeling that in my build. I dipped the windscreen in some Future and hoped for the best.
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1. Attachment point goes into the glass on the left side of the windscreen.
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1. The plastic is marred all the way through the glass.
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1. Front glass polished and given a Future bath, then attached to the model.
Dealing with these issues consumed most of my time and patience for the day, so I finished by gluing the front windscreen on to the model and calling it a day.
I hope to get much farther tomorrow, although my house is in the path of the total eclipse tomorrow, and I have sun-watching glasses, so you know where I will be in the afternoon. It is supposed to be raining here tomorrow, so I may have some extra time. Of course, the conspiracy theorists all say the eclipse will be the end of the world, so I may not need to worry about finishing the model. Luckily, I was blessed with a little common sense, so I figure I can continue to work on this model later in the week.
