MAILPLANE ALTERNATIVES HOW TO
MAILPLANE ALTERNATIVES PLUS
MAILPLANE ALTERNATIVES WINDOWS

It does mean that the fairings over the cylinder heads need a small extension adding at the rear, and I've actually shimmed the whole thing. Work on the cowlings has involved cutting the 'steps' off these and the wing nacelles as I could see that the kit's cowlings/nacelles are too long in front of the wing leading edge - it looks right now. Made some ridiculous fuel tanks based on the Aeroplane drawings, and photos for size and placement. I've still to move the starboard rear door to over the wing root fairing.

MAILPLANE ALTERNATIVES HOW TO

Not happy with my clear parts (cut-down kit pieces) - must learn how to restore blemishes and scratches.

MAILPLANE ALTERNATIVES WINDOWS

The fuselage halves are almost done (next post) and the cutting out of the windows and refitting the clear parts was a chore. More progress has been made with this conversion, coming at it from all angles. I will be adding brass rods to support the horizontal tail-plane and fins. I haven't tried dry-fitting the cockpit canopy yet. The plastic is also very thick on the fuselage which is OK for strength but difficult to cut out. This is is because the small part needs a proper cut-in/seat on the inner curved surface of the wing leading edge (plastic too thick) - otherwise is doesn't really settle properly. The trickiest bit are parts 30 31 (vertical leading edge supports) and the small inboard fillet/panel ahead of the u/c. Wing-halves fit is OK too but the clean up around the air intakes is fiddly and I've not yet completed this. on the wings) apart from those on the engine cowlings and nacelles. The fit is OK based on what I have done so far and with dry fitting of the wings and under-surface fuselage/wing panel. The trailing edges are commendably fine too (albeit they could be refined more if you want to). The moldings are very decent overall (the fuselage is lovely), with hardly any injection overshots or blemishes. The kit is actually very nice and could have been built out of the box with very little trouble for a relatively short-run product.

Very nice of you to respond to this post. Came out of restrictive Level 4 to somewhat less arduous Level 3. Since then I've made good progress with marking out the new windows for cutting.

MAILPLANE ALTERNATIVES PLUS

After filling the window apertures with plastic card (and backed with molten kit plastic - sprue plus liquid glue mix) I noticed that the kits appears to supply window inserts as well. There may be a better way but I went down this route. The main meat of the conversion is the reconfiguration of the doors and windows and this starts by filling the port-side doors and all the cabin windows. While this was going on, I diverted off to the fuselage and tail assembly. I also decided to tweek the engine cowlings and show the aircraft with the lower panels drooped as in some photos. Some adjustments need to fit the engine cowlings neatly. The leading edge is pain around the air-intakes (not really the kit, not having benefit of Tamiya/Wingnuts engineering). A bit hit and miss accuracy wise I suppose but to me it looks better. Also, an attempt has been made to reduce the bulbous upper wing engine nacelles by thinning the top surface down and narrowing/tapering the sides. The wings have been a major focus and I decided to cut out and make the slotted flaps, using the kit parts as a basis. Starting to make some real progress with the lovely Valom Albatros but I've tended to be rather haphazard with with project, having originally intended to be slow and methodical and not start things before finishing others.

Mailplane alternatives