Roden
1/72 C-123B
This little triangle fills in the wing root area aft of
the wheel well housings. It needs to be thinned down until it is
a near wafer, and has to be trimmed back on the side facing the wheel
housing to get it to fit flush
with the skin and in line
with the rib detail. The style of instructions
is not helpful as there is no suggested order of assembly within each
section of the instructions. The wheel well housings should be
installed first,
using the floor as a guide to alignment. Get them to fit as
flush to the wall as you can because any gaps here will prevent the
proper fit of the floor and overhead bulkhead. Then the triangle
above should be
installed, followed by
fitting the floor and the the overhead bulkhead that fits above and
between the wheel housings. Dry fitting is needed at each step
as the fuselage would not come together freely until the floor
was trimmed a little along the
sides an in the cutouts where the wheel housings fit. A little
filing was done on the top of the overhead bulkhead, and at the
cutouts that fit against the wheel housings.Not much is
needed but if you don't it will result in a difficult fuselage
seam. Next the fuselage frames can be installed, and then the
heater ducting. Everything was glued to one fuselage half during
the fitting process. It was
necessary to remove a little material from the front of the floor
before the cockpit and nose wheel assembly would fit properly.
Just for insurance about 1/32 was removed from the front of the
cockpit assembly to
be sure the nose weight would fit without interference.
The cockpit glareshield had to be trimmed on the front and sides, and
the area of the fuselage under the front of the windscreen was thinned
down
considerably before the fuselage would come together at the top of the
nose.
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