crazypoet Posted July 19 Author Posted July 19 @DocRob I did a bit of digging around. I found one maker who *did* 1/32 scale hose and line fittings, but they are sadly no longer in production. Based on this one find, I’m betting there are others. for this particular line I’d need .4mm (plain) and .6mm (flex) fittings. Some of the internal feed lines would work in .8mm, but that would be way too large for this. I’m using .3mm wire and .5mm braided line stretched over the .3mm wire, and that seems to be working size-wise. Absent actual scale fittings, I’ll be painting those in, with maybe some drops of CA that I can sand/file to shape that said, you certainly got me thinking, and I’ll see if I can dig up some of the fittings in all sizes before I start gluing things down 🙏🙏🙏 I appreciate the feedback - that’s part of what I love about this place 🙏💯🙏 1
crazypoet Posted 7 hours ago Author Posted 7 hours ago A quick update on this as I’ve been sort of obsessing over the landing gear and associated plumbing, I’ve found some interesting “headaches” with both the kit plastic and aftermarket metal gear struts. these are things that could have been easily fixed - especially in the aftermarket struts, but such is life 🤣 I’m actually a bit surprised that Eduard didn’t include some of these fixes in their otherwise excellent exterior detail set 🤷♂️ ordinarily I’d take these in stride as just the pitfalls of working with the kit as it is. But I’m also trying to be respectful of the subject and make it as “right” as my skills allow so, first and most “obvious” are the oleo scissors. The detail on the edges is fine, but they completely screwed up the most visible faces. every version of these I’ve seen in both original and restored examples show that the scissors were made as light and thin as possible, thinned down and drilled to make them both light and strong. This would be a very simple fix in resin (or if I had the mad CAD skillz and 3D printer access of some of our esteemed colleagues here). As it sits, I’m left to figure out if my own skills with a dremel, micro chisels, and drills are up to the challenge, especially as both external faces of both scissors need to be identical as they’re really quite visible. I’ll give this a shot on a spare set I have lying around, and post my success or failure for all to see 😂😎🤦♂️ next are what appear to be hub braces that help to align and strengthen the connection between the gear strut and the fixed inner hub. Again, these are quite visible in both original and restored examples. These I can scratch out of a bit of evergreen, but it irks me a bit that none of the aftermarket folk though to fix this last, the relative spacing of the gear cover connections, oleo scissors, and uplock lug are waayy off. Visually, this is fine - unless one is trying to properly route the brake lines 😂🤷♂️🤦♂️ as it is, both Trumpeter and the aftermarket metal gear struts made this space so tight (about two scale inches too short) that it’s a bit challenging to properly route the hydraulic line for the brakes and have it fit properly. oh well, part of this hobby is overcoming exactly these kinds of challenges 🤣 I did figure out a different approach to the brake lines themselves that will allow me to build and use period-proper hose clamps, that I’ll scratch from thin brass and some .5mm OD tubing I found in my stash. so. That’s my rant for the day - photos of progress to follow as I figure out what I can/cannot fix, and get these things done so I can move on.
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