Estes Orbital Transport, Kit #K-42, Part 18, Scramjet Assembly Gluing

Yep - I should have glued these scramjets on earlier, but I wanted to get enough white paint into the inside edges. There are a lot of inside areas on the model.

Some paint had to be removed for gluing.
The scramjet assemblies were set in position then slide back about 1/16". The fronts of the housing vanes were marked.

The marks were made 1/16" back so there wouldn't be a chance of scraping too far forward.

The aluminum angle was used to extend the pencil lines to the back, parallel to the body tube.
The angle wasn't set over the tube, it was simply narrower than a steel ruler.






Many small scrape marks were made down the pencil lines with a #11 blade in an X-Acto handle.
The scraping width has to be narrower than the 3/32" thick scramjet housing sides.

Yellow glue was used to tack the housings in place.
This was followed up with Titebond M&TG fillets.

Look inside the housing and you can see where the fillet stops. I couldn't find an easy way to get the glue farther inside.

There are some sanding marks in the fillet areas. These will get some gloss white applied with a Q-tip before the final spray coats go on.