Hi Carl (@clipper): Wow, I really thought the Airfix had the windows in a strip. So you will have the same problem as I did. Greg Kittinger (@gkittinger) recommended using Krystal Klear to replace the windows. I had actually considered using Krystal Klear, but decided early in the build to use the plastic windows. If I were to do these 3 again, I suspect I would probably go with the Krystal Klear. I think I may build a Ventura to go with the 3 Hudsons to show the family resemblance.

Very good progress on all, George @gblair
Although equal, they will look clearly different once you finished them.

It was time to move forward and put the nose on the plane. I went back to my lead plane of the three, the Revell model, and started working on the nose section. You may recall that the Revell instructions indicated that a 1mm strip would be added to the top of the nose section, just forward of the pilot's windscreen. The instructions also indicated that 1mm would need to be removed from the chart table that fills the nose. I wanted to approach all of these steps with caution because a misstep will be hard to fix. Not taking anything for granted, I wanted to test fit everything before I committed to glue. Oh boy, will all of this be fun. Just kidding. The nose section consists of two large glass parts, divided horizontally rather than vertically. These will be glue to the existing fuselage section. The tip of the nose compartment is a glass piece that will be glued to the other two glass pieces. First challenge is that the glass pieces are very thin with no locating pins, flanges, or anything else. I taped the glass pieces together and then measured the width of the glass nose pieces with the width of the fuselage and discovered that they match perfectly in size with the 1mm plastic piece added. I also wanted to check the canopy width, since it is also dependent on the width of the forward fuselage. I tapered the 1mm strip slightly toward the rear and glued it in place. I then lightly glued the two glass pieces together using Tamiya liquid cement. After letting it dry for a while, I checked the fit of the chart table and discovered that it fit OK without removing any material. In fact, is is just a little small, so I may find some very small strip to reinforce the joint of the glass pieces and provide a ledge for the table to sit on. I hope to get the nose glued securely and then add some Future to the interior or the glass. Perhaps this will help with the ripples in the glass. I don't want to dip the glass in Future since I still need to fill and sand the joints between the fuselage and the glass and between the two glass pieces of the nose. This whole process is very fiddly, and the bad news is that I will have to do it 2 more times. I hope to get the nose completed tomorrow, but I am trying to move slowly on this first example. More tomorrow. Cheers everyone.

7 attached images. Click to enlarge.

Hi Carl (@clipper): The nose compartment is really interesting in these kits. The two clear parts are divided horizontally so that the join-line doesn't run through the windows on the top and bottom of the compartment. The join runs between the small windows on the side of the compartment, but there is very little room for the filler and sanding that will be needed to make it look OK. It will also need filler and sanding to join the nose compartment to the fuselage. I'm not looking forward to the process. I haven't test-fitted the nose cap yet, so I hope it fits. It is also made of very thin plastic.

3D printing is fun, but it has a real learning curve, and designing the parts has its own learning curve. I am designing stuff that consists of very simple shapes. The camera consists of just a flat plate and a tube. I probably could have scratchbuilt it in less time than it took to design and print it, but I like the idea of being able to create identical pieces. It will also print very fine detail. The walls of the camera tube are only .2mm thick. There is no way I could build one that thin. Have you started your thread yet? I am looking forward to following along. Cheers.

Thanks, Spiros (@fiveten). I like the idea of attacking the Revell kit first, which then helps and speeds up the other two.

Hi John (@johnb): I still plan to check the fit on the other kits before I glue. I'm not assuming they will all fit the same.

Some good progress, George @gblair
The strengthening of the landing gear looks more than sufficient this way.