Ps-After all this planning and plotting there is one place that I can't get a clamp to work. I'm amazed how the designers and manufacturers of the kit figured all of this out! I would have liked to have watched how all of this and other models get to the mold stage. LOL! Another note here is that the cargo bay doors are part of the alignment and rigidity of all these steps and fit should be checked each time you glue. and maybe the next guy who trys it will at least see my attempt.
I think I'm about ready for the last glue run on the fuselage assembly which involves the left side of the cargo bay and from the top of the windshield forward. Since there's quite a weird twist in all of this I've been proceeding slowly and allowing each glue joint to set overnight. I hate to keep dragging out this assembly of the fuselage halves but it really is dragging out time wise. Lotta words, small report, that's it for tonight! Also I think the Challenger was the only Shuttle to carry the ESA Space lab, at least in that configuration which I plan to show. I was going to do Atlantis but after seeing the NASA picture of the Challenger returning I should do it justice and honor the lost crew. The kit comes with decals for several Shuttles and the Challenger always invokes bad memories for me after watching that disaster live. Slow and sure as in the tortise and the hare, I'll get there eventually! I am getting more enthused! This thing doesn't leak oil and corrode, It arrives in a fireball at many Mach which really impresses this guy! We'll see how my re-entry weathering goes but the plan is to at least replicate some of the experience of the return! Now l'm fiddling with the cockpit detail now that I see it could be viewed by removing the cockpit roof. I'm excited with the Challenger NASA shot and may vary from my clean model build. This will fill the gaps and tie all of this together at least I hope! That's the plan but always changing.
Model of 1981 space shuttle enterprise wooden base windows#
Rather than putty around the windows the plan now is to replicate the black window frames with black tape. I was a bit skeptical at the start that this would go together and look like something. The cargo bay really stabilized the assembly after glueing and clamping everything together. I don't think this is going to be a show winner but maybe I can coax a nice display model out of this for the Museum.Īs the pieces go together the floppiness of the fuselage is getting better. This still looks to be a fun kit if I can finess the fuselage halves together and still look acceptable. We'll face that problem after the align/glue/fit problem. lol.Īnother problem is many of the seams have tile detail preventing fill and sand. Still many fit issues on a design like this. After the cockpit has dried I can pry apart the back seams and force glue in the seams, aligning as I go. Back of that glue seams will not show as they are in the cargo bay and the wing assembly hides the bottom seam. After considering the problem I think my plan of attack is to glue together the front cockpit area first. You will never glue this together in one run. Two 20'' floppy fuselage halves with a few twists, turns and warpage used up almost ever clamp I own before even considering cement. Next to the initial fitting of the fuselage halves.
Actually for the available view this is probably overkill but it did entertain me for awhile.
I went through the decal box and found some various technical looking but not exactly accurate decals for the side panels and did build a pair of control sticks and their mounts to add to the meager reality. The whole kit is era crude but it's what was available at the time and one shouldn't spend too much time making one part exceptional only to shame the other part of the build. Four seats and a dash decal just didn't seem to be enough. It did have dash decals probably to make the builder happy but the cockpit detail is sorely lacking. The cockpit looks to be hard to see in but I suppose if you were curious and had a flashlight you could kinda see the basic layout.
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