ipmsusa2 Posted July 7, 2018 Report Share Posted July 7, 2018 Hi all, Moving right along, here's the next installment. As you know, the horizontal is not horizontal but is instead a very mild V shape. I've rotated the image in order to show you that the inboard verticals form a 90 degree angle to the horizontal. This means that the inboard verticals actually lean in toward the aircraft centerline, as do the tip mounted verticals. The easiest way to get all of the verticals installed correctly is to simply cut a 90 degree piece of scrap styrene and use it as a square. With both inboard verticals installed, you can see how they're supposed to look when properly aligned. In this view from the top, the tail assembly in complete. And for the hawkeyes (pun intended) in the crowd, two of the molded static discharge wires are broken. No matter how careful you are, odds are you're gonna break at least one before you're thru. A little later I'll show you my repair method. With all of the verticals installed and viewed from the back, that is one busy tail section. And it gets even busier when the wings are folded! Incidentally, the slots and tabs for the inboard verticals are keyed but the end ones are not. Since logic says that the verticals should be higher above the horizontals than below it, you'll need to be careful to position these correctly. Also, the slots tend to be a little snug, so you may have to ease them a bit for proper fit. Finally, in my case, I had to shorten the inboard vertical tabs so that they would seat correctly. Regardless of how complex the radome support looks, it's actually a piece of cake, utilizing a mere four pieces. This is the port side. And the starboard side. The rough area you see is dried liquid styrene that squeezed out during installation. It'll be cleaned up in due time. I shot some Dupli-Color Gray Primer over the area that would be covered by the installation of the radome support and then attended to any remaining seam flaws that might exist. After that, a final shot of primer and I was ready to install the support. Installation of the support is a little on the tricky side, but in this case patience is a virtue. As you can see, it does fit the way its supposed to. More than likely the four holes in the fuselage top will have to be 'adjusted' a tad with a #11 blade, but don't get too ambitious at one whack. Adjust and try is the watchword here. Looking down, you can see how everything finally fits the way it should. After all the solvent has dried, the support is sturdy enough to pick up the entire model with it. That's saying something when you consider how much lead this model takes to keep the nose down. One more thing: In case you're wondering about that collar that projects above the top of the support, it's supposed to be there. It's a spacer that allows the radome...both real and model...to rotate without binding on the top of the support. And for us, it has one other very useful benefit. Due to the way this kit is designed, not only will the radome rotate (by hand, of course), but it is also removable as long as you don't glue the shaft in. That's a real advantage when it comes to transporting the model and especially when shipping it to a client in another state. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ghodges Posted July 8, 2018 Report Share Posted July 8, 2018 Good progress, and congrats on getting your outer vertical tails on right....I didn't! GIL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Deliduka Posted July 9, 2018 Report Share Posted July 9, 2018 Looking great! And yeah, I almost messed up my tails on the one I did. Well done on all counts! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ipmsusa2 Posted July 9, 2018 Author Report Share Posted July 9, 2018 Thanks, guys. If Kinetic had keyed the end tabs, it would have avoided a lot of misery for some of us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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