New Way Mars Snooper II, Build, Part 12, Fin Gluing & Landing Struts

The three principal fins are glued onto the shroud line and up onto the body tube.

The laser cut fit of the root edge was very good.

The three dowels have already been shot with filler/primer and sanded smooth.

The dowels are marked for the small centering rings at 1/8" and 1 1/2" from the low end.

A small ring of glue was set around the dowel at the 1 1/2" mark. A ring was slid down into the glue ring.

I used the end of my straightedge to check the spacing and square up the ring. This straightedge start right at the start of the 1" mark - no extra length on the ends of the ruler.

The second ring was set at the 1/8" mark.

A strip of masking tape, 3/8" wide by 2" long is wrapped around the other end of the dowel.

The instructions say to try the fit of the short launch lug and cut off 1/16" at a time until you get a good fit. I had to cut off almost 1/2" of tape for a friction fit of the lug.

A ring of glue was set onto the masking tape towards the low end. This allows the glue to be spread out when the lug is slid on.

The lug length was a little shorter than the 3/8" wide masking tape strip. The overhanging tape was cut off, even with the end of the lug.