Thanks Spiros (@fiveten) and George (@gblair). It's always a bit of guesswork deciding when enough is enough and time to move on to the next step. The desire is to make an exact replica, but the reality is much less ambitious, if not occasionally frustrating! 🙂

I'm working on the cockpit now. It turns out that the Hobby Boss cockpit tub is shallower than the Aires tub. Additionally, the Aires combing includes the instrument panel. Both the instrument panel and combing from Aires are superior to the HB parts, so I have had to do do some modifications to get it to fit.

I also wanted to spruce up the side consoles some on the HB tub, so that involved adding a bunch of very tiny little scraps of plastic to simulate knobs, switches, etc. About half of the parts I made sprang off into the unknown as I tried to place them, requiring me to make several attempts on some of them. Once this is painted, it should look busy enough. I do still want to add more details but I think some of that will be added after I get more parts assembled.

The intake trunk is two pieces so I glued these together and smoothed the seams at the front end. Then I flowed white paint into the cavity and let it dry. I was after a smooth interior finish. It took a few coats of Vallejo white, but I think I got it. I have a picture showing the aft end of the trunk and you can see the engine fans. The kit does not provide this. Furthermore, the aft end of the trunk is directly under the aft end of the cockpit tub. I looked around in the jet kits I have in my stash and found a fan which fits well enough to use. It's the wrong scale, but it looks similar to what's in the photo I have.

Not wanting to lose that part from the donor kit, I made a casting of it using thermoplastic for the mold and UV curing resin for the part. It turned out well enough. I am going to have to grind away a bit of the back of the cockpit tub so I can mount the fan up to the trunk, but It should work.

Some really great additional work done, Carl @clipper
I really like your approach to getting a more detailed fan without losing the original donor one.

Fantastic job so far, my friend @clipper! That cockpit is just right! My hat's off to you for your technique duplicating the fan.
Looking forward to your next steps!

Slowly working my way through cockpit detailing. The plan here is to maximize the "busy ness" of this area. I started by adding small bits to the cockpit tub and side walls. The instrument panel is the Aires detail (PE and film). Parts are being detail painted and will be given a wash and some dry brushing. To keep the nose down after assembly, I am using a tungsten weight and some lead sheet epoxied into place. Not visible in these photos is the fan glued to the aft end of the intake trunk. This will be visible from the nose.

Thanks John (@johnb). I think it may be a bit too much. Hopefully the nose gear will take the strain.

All the work on the interior looks great, Carl (@clipper). I like the oxygen hose. Something most people leave out, but very important in real life.

Thanks Spiros (@fiveten), George (@gblair) , and John (@j-healy). So far this build has been going fairly smoothly and I am doing more cockpit work than I've done on previous jet builds. So it's looking pretty cool to me at this point. The Fury is a very attractive fighter and I've wanted to build one for a long time. I know that Caracal Decals was discussing FJ-4 decals, but they have not become available yet. I've decided to paint my markings using masks created on a vinyl cutter. As that is still a bit of time in the future, I have not worked on them yet.

Cockpit is nearly complete. Enough so that I can assemble the fuselage. There are a few small details on the combing I want to eventually address, including the sighting glass for the gunsight. And the rear turtledeck has missing details that will need to be added.

Because of the requirements of this particular cockpit build, I am going to have to deal with keeping the protruding details protected as I work on the fuselage seams and later construction, but I think I can work with that.

The cockpit came out pleasing to me, even if it is not entirely accurate. I can see plenty that could be better, but I am trying to develop a philosophy to model building that allows me to feel good about what I do, even if it falls short of the ideal that is envisioned. So I am not going to let myself get disappointed if it doesn't meet the expectations I had when I started.

I also want to say, that this in no way reflects on the efforts of other modelers and the variety of skill and experience levels they will have. I am not trying to say I am not good enough nor by inference, any who are less experienced are not good enough. This is a hobby of sharing and enjoyment that we all get to share with one another and I want to encourage everyone's journey on this be as complete as they desire it to be.

I apologize in advance for the quality of these photos. Taking good photos of my work is something I need to improve upon.