Okay... where was I???
FINALLY ventured back into the modeling room after an unexpected hiatus. It's been five months since I've touched this build so I have to reacquaint myself with the status of this model.
To summarize... the Aires resin cockpit is pretty much complete and the fit issues have been addressed. I think it can be inserted into the fuselage from the bottom after the fuse halves are glued together.
I've also completed the sculpt of the gun cowling to reduce the exaggerated bulges on the kit part. The main task in front of me is to finish the engine plug assembly, which will require the addition of lots of wiring/piping to make it look realistic. I'm just not ready for that yet.
To ease myself back into the rhythm of modeling, I've decided to do some riveting. The horizontal stabs are the smallest parts (besides the gun cowling) that requires riveting so I thought this would be a good place to start.
Using detailed line drawings of the Fw190D-9 (Kagero Top Drawings No. 3), a clear plastic ruler and a soft leaded pencil (4B), I draw the rivet lines on the horizontal stabilizers.
After the lines have been drawn on one side, I use a rivet tool (RB Productions Rivet-R, 1.00mm) to put rows of holes along the drawn lines.
The guide lines are removed using a paper towel damped with iso alcohol to inspect the lines. Due to the lay-off, my touch with the rivet tool was very bad at first. You can see some really wayward lines on the stabilizer in the back of the pic. :headslap:
The same rivet pattern for both sides of the stabilizer so I simply flip them over and repeat the process.
The riveting process pushes up the plastic around each hole. Depending on the effect you want, you can either leave it this way or sand it down. I want to a subtle effect so I've elected to lightly sand the riveted areas to get rid of the raised plastic and just leave the holes.
Stabs are "done". I'm going to look at that one side where the rivet lines are really crooked. I may have to do some repairs.
Not sure my mojo is complete back but I'm going to give it a shot. Moderator... can you please move this to the Start to Finish board?