A blessing and a curse Glenn as I see all the stuff that's missing or wrong in the kit and have to reconcile with myself not to add or modify it!
That said, I am continuing with the philosophy of minimal change, right or wrong. The Hasegawa cockpit is actually a real beaut by itself so here are some shots of how it came together.
The only thing that I didn't like was the seat which, though it had all the necessary features, was moulded with very thick sidewalls. This seems to be a common issue with almost every Hurricane and Spitfire kit that I have build. Fortunately the solution is simple; just file down the sides until they are thin. Here you see the seat with the right sidewall starting to be thinned down. The left one remains untouched. The only other thing to do is to drill out the slot in the back rest.
From this point, things went really fast and I didn't stop to take pics. Hope you can forgive me! The IP decal was used and looks pretty convincing. I have yet to add the seatbelts and will end up stealing a set from my future Mosquito build.
The cockpit walls have been finished per the kit instructions and I've made no attempt to make modifications. There could be lots of tubing and wiring to add but I won't do that. Besides, I'm still not sure at this point whether 5389 was fitted with a modified RCAF R/T controller. Some cockpit pics I have show them and others don't and we aren't at the point yet where our cockpit is being fitted with these details on the actual aircraft.
That's it for today and perhaps for a short bit as I've committed to getting more done on my Wellington so that I can get the fuselage put together. Thanks again for tuning in.