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Williams Bros 1/72 C-46 Builld Series, Part 8


ipmsusa2

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Here's the latest for your viewing pleasure:

 

The kit exhaust pipes left a little to be desired, along with the fact that I would have had to drill them out. So...I planned to replace them with brass tubing. For starters, I drilled out the mounting hole with a 1/16" bit in a pin vise. Note that I angled the bit in order to allow the tubing to fit into the kit's recessed groove.

 

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Each of the exhaust pipes was a .30" long piece of 1/16" (or .625") diameter brass tubing. Since no tubing cutter I had on hand would handle tubing that small, I simply scored the tubing with a #11 blade, then snapped the piece using a pair of pliers. In order to avoid having to clean up the cut end, I cut each piece from the finished end of the tubing. Needing four stacks, that approach required two pieces of tubing. Fortunately, tubing that small comes packaged four pieces on a single card. Incidentally, instead of CA for installation, I used Gator's Grip, giving me time for minute adjustments.

 

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With the exhaust stacks in place, the cowls were mounted on the wing. Why now instead of later? Because I anticipate problems aligning the wing and the cowls will help get things right. Beyond that, it's easier to get the cowls properly aligned now. Keep in mind that the center section is dead horizontal with the dihedral not starting until you're outboard of the engines. Finally, and probably most important, because of gaps, seams and contour corrections that I would have to deal with, those problems would be a lot easier to handle if the fuselage wasn't in the way,

 

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This top view of the cowls after they've been installed. You can see some of the problems I'll have to tackle.

 

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With the cowl properly installed, this gap has to be dealt with. There's a slightly smaller, but similar, one on the other cowl. For reasons no one understands, Williams Bros left this flaw in their mold, along with those oddball gaps on the sides of the wing/engine housings. All of this has to be corrected before joining the wing and fuselage. Incidentally, the cowls don't mount to the wing without doing some adjustment to the inside of the cowls. I can't tell you exactly how to do it because it's probably slightly different on each kit. Just keep a knife nearby and do a lot of test fitting.

 

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Because of the size of the cowl/wing gap, I glued a piece of .15" x .20" Evergreen strip over the gap, then brushed over it with Same Stuff until it melted down. When dry, I could sand everything smooth. Some areas required small applications of Squadron White Putty, while others would be taken care of with Dupli-Color Sandable Filler & Primer. Of course, various grades of sandpaper and sanding sticks were used as well.

 

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