Thanks Dr. Hugh (Dr Who ?) and Andy, and thanks for the good wishes. Looking forward to having the drip bunged in my arm for 8 or 9 hours, and as soon as I've posted this, I'm off to bed, as I have to be up and on the move early-ish tomorrow. Then home tomorrow evening, and probably sleep for hours, as the stuff makes you drowsy.
Anyway, on with the up-date, and the first stages of trial-fitting for the undercarriage and resin cowlings have been completed, and it's looking encouraging.
The build sequence calls for the main gear legs and diagonal braces to be fitted into the nacelles at this stage, a sure recipe for a mini disaster, when the gear legs will not only get in the way, and be a pain to mask for painting the model, but could also break (like the nose gear leg), due to the rather flimsy mounting pins. Consequently, I wanted to find if it would be possible to mount the gear legs, at least, at a later stage, and the answer was 'Yes'.
Next stage was to work out how to attach the resin cowlings, which are devoid of cooling gills, and actually designed for the Italeri and Revell /Monogram kits, and this is explained and illustrated below.
PIC 1. First, the engine nacelles were assembled, and the joints, somewhat rough in parts, were filed and sanded.
PIC 2. The starboard nacelle had the hatch for the starter trolley plug opened up, the edges reamed, and the hole backed with scrap plastic sheet. The model will eventually sit in a diorama setting, with a 'Trolley Ac' plugged in, and the hinged hatch cover will be added at this time.
PICS 3 and 4. The mounting frames for the main gear were cemented into the nacelles, and the diagonal brace fitted and cemented, after first cutting a couple of millimeters off the cross pin, which locates into a hole in the main leg. This will allow the main legs to be slipped into place later, after detailing and painting, and only a very short length of the diagonal brace protrudes from the wheel bay aperture, which shouldn't be a problem when handling or masking.
PIC 5 Shows one of the rather basic main gear legs, which will be cleaned-up, and have the torsion links thinned and drilled out, before adding brake pipes and hoses, and hinge pins for the diagonal brace.
PIC 6. A trial fit of the resin cowling to the lower nacelle, shows that it fits over the flange, although the 'rib' for the carb intake, on the top section (not shown) prevents fitting to the complete assembly. However, the cowling needs to be further forward, both for the correct appearance and fit over the engine, and also to allow room for the individual cowling flaps, which will have to be fabricated from plastic sheet or thin alloy, and fitted after assembling the engines and cowlings. The 'nose' of the carb intake also occupies the same space, on top of each nacelle / cowling joint.
PIC 7. After trial fitting with the engine mount in place, and some careful measuring, the solution will be to extend the 'flange' on the nacelle, top and bottom, and allowing space for the flaps and intake, by fitting a 'ring' of plastic card around the circumference of the nacelle, as roughly indicated by the white lines and dashes in the photo.
This, together with the engines themselves, will support the resin cowlings, which will slip over the flange extension, and also provide a base where the cowl flaps can be fitted, along with their actuating rods.
The 'trough' for the single exhaust pipe from the kit collector ring (indicated by the white dots) will need to be filled and sanded to match the nacelle contours, with the replacement resin cowlings having the later 'S' pattern individual exhaust stubs enclosed inside the separate fairings.
So that's the plan, and with luck, I should be able to get to work on the modifications to the nacelles, and assemble, paint and fit the engines, on Sunday.