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Tuesday, March 31, 2020

Hobbying In Place #6 Building the Airfix Handley Page Victor K2/SR.2

A Tale of How Sanding Leads To Distraction


I have watched grown men pull their own heads off rather than build a kit with intakes. Because I am building for fun, because there may never ever be another judge or contest, because I simply need to build just to keep my frail sanity, because if I get stuck not finishing this, well, you know.

Ahem. I painted the intakes simply by thinning down the gloss white and painting everything very carefully. Very mindful of not letting a big glob of paint build up and drip. Don't tell anyone, but I didn't get all the way back into them. If you shine a pen light back there you might see seams, gray plastic and maybe worse. It's like a nightmare.


The nice people at Airfix made it so all the vaney things get pushed into the intake assembly from one side. This way they can have some detail on them and get painted separately.


Here you can see all the vanes, or whatever they are called. Somebody in the club knows.


Once I pulled the tape off I discovered a few places that still needed a bit of fixing. There was a bit of fuse gappage here, I dipped a section of sprue into the solvent and pushed it into the gap while soft. Once it is dry, Ill shape it.


In this beautifully staged photo I am brushing liquid cement into a seam on the bomb bay doors.


I could only glue the vaney things in from one side, so I reinforced them with chunks of sprue and model cement.


Wing on, liquid cement and clamps. Oh, pinch me!


Another replica rescued from the dust farm. These yoga blocks are way more awesome than I thought.


A little voice in my head suggested I go into one of my stashes and get the 1/144 Millennium Falcon. It's like hearing the voice of the lady of the lake. But just inside my head. And no lake. Or lady.


Some of the larger kit boxes have been chopped down to fit.


The clamps are off. All that work I did on the rear section...wasted. See how the new section sits higher than everything else? I should have really test fitted and ground something away (like my brain) before glueing. Idiot!


Back to the grind. The detail thingie will have to get replaced.


Meanwhile, when I know I'll be doing something else, I set up something that needs to be glued. This way it will be dry when I return. Here you can see I am putting on the starboard lower wing.


Oh, look...some kits from my stash. Shiny sci-fi race car.


Old Aoshima kit.


Section by section I glue and clamp the British bomber. The clamps kept slipping off, so I put double sided tape on the wings to give them some gription.


More of the blasted sanding.


It's like I am walking in the desert when I notice a shimmering oasis. My throat is so dry. The sun feels like a desk lamp that is too close to my head.


At last you drag yourself to the edge of the pool...

That's it for now. Keep building in an uncertain world.

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