A few pics to show some of the work involved to eliminate, as best as possible, the joints in the intakes, gun hatch and radome, as well as fitting the resin jet pipe, and the rear fuselage / fin assembly.
PICS 1 to 3. The intakes being attacked with a jeweler's file, and after initial sanding, the gaps filled with 'Milliput', blended up to the area of the boundary layer separation. When fully cured, further sanding and polishing will be done.
PIC 4. The joint between fuselage and radome has been sanded, and awaits polishing.
PICS 5 and 6. The gun hatch cover was a very poor fit, sinking into the aperture, and with a gap all around the edges. A piece of thin plastic strip was used a a shim and then the hatch cemented in place, filled, and roughly sanded. Again, final sanding and polishing has yet to be done.
PICS 7 to 10. The kit jet pipe was cut off earlier, and this is what it looked like, along with the kit part for the after-burner nozzle. The resin and P.E. parts are a huge improvement., shown here before, and after assembly and painting.
PIC 11. The truncated kit pipe had a rebate set in to the lower half, and a disc of plastic card added, to provide a better mating surface for the resin part. Once the plastic disc had set, the rough edges were sanded flush, before attaching the resin pipe.
PIC 12. The resin jet pipe in place. This was designed for use with the Hasegawa kit, hence the mods to the Revell kit parts, and doesn't quite align properly within the rear fuselage, but once the after-burner can is fitted (after the model has been painted) this won't be noticeable.
PIC 13. The rear fuselage assembly was fitted, after counter-sinking holes on each side for the position lights, which will be painted and glazed after painting the model. As can be seen, the joint is once again quite rough, and a lot of work was needed to correct this, and thin-out the wing root fillet.
PIC 14. The joint has been atacked with the file again, then filled with 'superglue' and sanded, and awaits polishing. It's actually a lot smoother than it looks here and, when the paint is applied, I'm hoping that the variation in metal shades at the joint line will help to conceal any remaining rough areas. Once the model is polished with aluminium finger-print powder, before painting, any imperfections will be immediately obvious !
PIC 15. How it looks to date.
PIC 16. Next step is to correct the nose profile, which should be a continuous taper, in order to match the brass pitot tube.
Thanks again for your interest, and I'll post more soon.