We had a club build weekend and I made a start on the kits.
I mase a rookie mistake right at the start when I cut the fuselage pieces from the sprue. I cut the first ones off and then realised I'd cut the internal frames off the central fuselage. I got the next two right and I will match one of these up with the botched halves so I can glue the frames back in place.
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1. Always check before you cut!
The three builds will be:
The first two cockpits are in the early #3 Hairanshoku (Ash Indigo) and the third is the later #29 Ki Midori Iro (Yellow Green) used from mid-1943.
Both the Koh and Hei were armed with the 20mm canon in the lower fuselage while the Otsu was armed with a 37mm, manually loaded, tank canon. only 20 or sow of these were built before being supplanted by the Hei, with an automatic 37mm canon in the nose and the 20mm canon restored. This Hei will be the early short noosed version, the ultimate Hei having a longer, pointed nose that fully enclosed the canon.
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1. 20mm gun removed ready for a 37mm canon
So, I deleted the 20mm canon breech in the Otsu cockpit and will look through the spares bin for a suitable, larger replacement. This one will require mods to the lower fuselage to cover the larger breech - for which I have found a photo reference.
I still need to add dial decals, seatbelts and weather the cockpits.
