Now, go on to this part two. The outer surface of the engine mount was covered with a GRP look decal.  It is not very noticeable even in photos of the real Tomcat.  However, it is really GRP and not black.  Also the new engine discharge pipes were made and inserted into the kit pipes so as to cover the two ugly seams on both left and right positions.  The new pipes were made by a styrene sheet, with lines cut, painted, and then rolled to a circular shape.  There is still one seam, which I put it on the top position.

The landing gears were all enhanced with the pipes (photo etched parts) supplied with the Eduard set.  They really looked good.

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The most ugly part would no doubt be the intake duct.  There was no way that I could live with it, but to scratch my own.  My method is like, or actually is, making a sheet steel conversion duct for air conditioning system.  On one side is rectangular, the front, and on the other side at the compressor fan, is circular. I am very sorry that I forgot the dimensions, but it is easy to work it out.  What you have to do is to make a fan shape sheet. My sketch gives you the idea to do the dimensions and the fan shaped sheet.  It is like dividing the ducting into very narrow segments.  For each 5 mm segment on the compressor fan side, there is a transformation to 5 x F mm on the intake side.  Adding all the narrow segments together side by side, you will have a fan shaped sheet.  Rolling this sheet you will have the duct.

Do a paper one first, try if it fits the fan and the intake.  Then make one with 0.25 mm thick WHITE plastic sheet. Roll it up, and attached it onto the compressor fan by CA glue. Add some thin sheets onto the Tamiya duct as support on the compressor fan side. Put the duct onto the Tamiya duct, press on the intake side until it forms a rectangular shape (the bottom, the left and right).  Apply CA glue from the back around the intake so as to fix the new duct onto the Tamiya duct, keep pressure for five or eight minutes until it is really fixed and the rectangular duct is formed.  Then add a 2 mm strip onto the top of the new duct, press on until it forms the top of the rectangular duct.  That is it. Apply putty on the matting surfaces, and make these good.  When it is sanded smooth, put tissue paper into the duct to seal the compressor fan.  Spray white and you know all the work is worth it.

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The last would be the canopy frame.  Again it was a mix of the kit parts, Teknics set and scratch build. I found that the frame made from the Teknics parts for the rear part of the canopy frame was not possible to be put onto the Tamiya frame.  Maybe it was just me.  As it is on the bottom part, I gave up using it.

I hope you like my Tomcat.  I have the full size progress photos store in another web page. If you are interested, please have a look at here (feel free to download too) :

http://picasaweb.google.com.tw/elainedouglas320/132F14B

Douglas

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