After the last step you can see why it makes more sense to assemble the tower from the top down, not the bottom up. The tension fit and bend of the inverted Vs would make the tower gluing impossible to do with the legs bowing out at the top.
After everything has dried, add a small bit of glue at the joints.
Look close at the remaining dimple where the last motor nozzle will be glued. The paint was scraped off with the tip of a hobby knife.
All three escape motor nozzles are glued in place.
Here's the finished capsule and tower assembly, minus decals and a dull coat.
The white decals will need some MicroScale Decal Solvent to get the decal into the corrugations in the capsule.
I like your tip of spaying gloss black rather than dull to make the decals blend in better. I'll remember that and try that the next time I build one of these.
ReplyDeleteHi Eddie,
DeleteI've learned the hard way that a decal won't stick to a dull flat finish. They call it "silvering" where the clear edges lift.
It's pretty easy to apply a dull coat afterwards, just don't go too thick with it. Be sure the clear coat is UV resistant. Krylon 1305 Gloss UV resistant or Krylon 1309 Flat UV resistant.
What has worked best for me is to use gloss paint, then decal, then put a clear gloss coat on top of that. It makes the decal part of the gloss paint finish blending in better then put on the dual coat finish as last.
ReplyDeleteHi Unknown,
ReplyDeleteDo what works best for you - Be careful with heavy acrylic clear coats. They can get sticky and dirty on a humid day!