SPA Modeler

Hasegawa not only molds brake lines onto the landing gear legs, they provide a separate piece for the brake line half loop at the scissors link. But curiously, it stops short of the wheel. Based on my references, the brake line goes all the way to rear wheel cover and Hasegawa, if they are gonna go through the trouble of representing the brake line, should've completed the connection.

Using lead wire and short sections of brass tubing, I've extended the brake line in a much simplified fashion. But at least it's not just hanging out there, open-ended. I've also created a strap using foil tape to cover the joint between the two brake lines.

Incredible work! I don’t think I could do that in 1/48 scale. Maybe in 1/32 scale if I feel like paying attention to detail. Wow....

Good morning! That’s some really outstanding work on the landing gear! I’m afraid I don’t have an answer to your question posed earlier. You already have the best references, and this may simply be a small mystery.... I’ll continue to look for period photos, though! All the best! I was trying to think of any Japanese modelers I know to ask, but most are sci-fi builders. Hmm.

This is the closest I've gotten to in terms of documentation of the starboard side access panel. These are just drawings so there is not much confirmation there. But... the bottom two drawings, which are from the Bunrin Do publication, depict the starboard side of what appears to be a N1K2-J (middle) and a N1K2-Ja (bottom), as identified by the different sized tails. The hatch in question is shown in both drawings.

Nice! The chap in the second pic is looking right into the hatch in question!

The second photo is from the Air Force site. I think. I’ll find the link just in case you need any of their photos.

https://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/Visit ... ai-george/

Instead of a metallic finish, I elected to paint my landing gear legs a light grey. I don't know why... I just like the look better than what I was getting with a dull aluminum finish.


The wheels were painted in a mixture of black and brown and then the contact areas were lightened with a sandy color. I'll weather these more with pastels.


Here's what the gear looks like after the details have been painted and given a dark wash.




I filled the joints of the wing inserts with black rubberized CA glue. I like this as a filler because it is easy to see and it sands a little easier than regular CA glue. You can see where the filler gets really close to some of the raised details. I'll have be very careful when sanding not to lose this detail.



I'm pretty frugal and like to re-use my sandpaper. I keep the pieces in a small cup. But when dealing with CA glue that's close to details that you want to avoid, it's essential to use fresh pieces of sandpaper. The bite of fresh sandpaper is needed to cut down the ridge of CA glue without wearing down the surrounding surface. Plus it is stiff enough to be able to be made into a narrow sanding tool when folded. After the CA glue is sanded down, I treat the joints with Mr Surfacer 1000, sand that down and then give it a spray of primer to check my work.



It looks ok from this perspective but from certain angles you can see where putty has not been blended in perfectly. There are also some slight elevation differences between the insert and surrounding wing areas as well a few slightly jagged panel lines.


I have the time and inclination to fix these issues so one more round of Mr Surfacer 1000 to see if we can make those imperfections go away.

John! Beautiful work. The panel line fills are extraordinary! It’s all about refinement!

Thanks Bruce!

The insert panel joints were further refined using the D400 sander. I changed the sanding paper to 600 grit. I'm not going to apply another primer coat at this stage since there is still riveting to do and I don't want to build up too many paint layers.


I decided to take a look at the engine to decide what kind of work I'll be doing here. It's a fairly complete representation except the cylinder banks are hollow on the rearward facing side.


The exhaust ends are not exactly "hollow" but recessed as dimples.


I used the D300 router to deepen the recesses a little bit.


I spied a cutting head that came with the D300 and thought it might be useful to deepen the exhaust openings. I tested it out on a piece of plastic and decided not to risk damaging the exhausts. This tool isn't really made for the side-to-side motion necessary to hollow out elliptical openings.


Doesn't look much better but the exhaust openings ARE deeper. Tipped with black paint, they should look the part.


Here are the unmodified engine components stuck together using Blue Tack. The stubs on the wiring harness are very small but I think I can use a micro drill bit to hollow out them out to accept wires.