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Engine pylons -

The first thing I did was to make sure that the edges of the parts were as flat as possible. The engine pylons had noticeable shallow areas in the center area at the point where they are to join the engineering hull. First step was to lightly file the affected area of the pylons. In the case of port pylon, that was enough to fix the problem. For the starboard pylon it was necessary to then apply putty to build up the shallow area.

The photo below shows the pylons after this work.



A close-up of the starboard pylon:



..and with a steel scale to show the correct flatness:



-Jeff

Assembly question:

Okay, here's a question that I have for folks.

Where the engine pylons are to be joined to the engineering hull, there is some forward-back play in where the pylons can be attached. There's about an eighth inch movement.

First photo - pylon in the rearmost position:



Second photo - pylon in the forwardmost position:



So....any advice as to where the pylons should be positioned?

-Jeff

Time for a progress update......

I have joined the two engineering hull halves together. However, in stead of using various combinations of CA, I chose to use a two-part epoxy. I made this decision based on my use of epoxy as an adhesive for some of my other model work (e.g. r/c submarines).

After mixing the epoxy I first brushed some on all the surfaces that would 'touch' when joined....essentially anywhere that 'bone' touched the inside and edges of the two hull halves. The 'bone' itself was also given a coating of epoxy. At this point the three parts were put together and then taped to hold while curing.

Next, I took the remaining epoxy and added a filler (e.g. micro-ballons) to get a peanut-butter like consistency. This was them troweled into the various open cracks along the join lines. This can be seen as the red material at the joint.

Once fully cured, a first application of putty was applied. The photos seen here show the hull at this state.

Here's an overall shot of the joined hull:



...and a couple of close-ups:







Next up: initial sanding and a primer coat to make any 'defects' visible.

-Jeff