Well, after a week of dealing with the 6 piece main canopy, I finally have it together. What a pain in the ass that was! Used some double sided tape and a couple of slivers of styrofoam to support the rear center piece to get it all started. Added the two cockpit "hatches" in the closed position, then carefully pulled everything up and rolled it over and slid in the solid piece which needed a significant amount of sanding and fitting. But, it is finally done! Attached it to the fuselage and added the forward gun sight to windscreen and glued that on as well. Time to start painting in earnest with just over 2 weeks to go. My only concern is any glue that may have slipped up under the tape. Fingers crossed on that.
It has been awhile since my last post and I have made good progress. I am about done with the panel line stuff. I need to seal the panel line with flat clear then do the final staining and chipping. All in all, the Meng kit is not a bad kit other than the canopy.
Pic 1 - top of fuse and wings painted
Pic 2 - bottom of fuse painted
Pic 3 - props completed and temporarily installed
Pic 4 - weathering card. I found this on eBay and decided to give it a try for weathering up the overall paint job. See Pic 5 for those results.
Pic 5 - weathering of wing with the weathering card. This is a tad difficult to see in the picture, but in real life, it worked out nicely.
Pic 6 - fuselage with paneling lining and some initial dirtying up.
Pic 7 - fuselage panel lining and some light dirtying up.