This next build step starts with the assembly of the neck joint of the Battroid. It actually breaks into 3 parts and is connected together by metal shafts. The two shafts needed to build it are a 10mm 1.5 diameter shaft and a 13mm 1.5 diameter shaft. Once again I use my trusty ruler to check if I have the correct shaft by measuring the length and its diameter. Oh and before I forget, part III of this build can be found here.
Here is the completed neck joint with the two shafts inserted in already.
At this time I also decided to focus on building the tail wings, so I taped it up with Tamiya Masking Tape in order to paint the red parts on this.
The front fuselage is the next step to be built in the manual after the legs. So with that I decided to start painting the cockpit, specifically by adding TOA plastic primer to the pilot's chair and the dashboard.
A couple of hours later the tail wings are painted with the red stripe and after that dried the tape has been removed
To color the pilot seat I sprayed on some misty grey, then a matte coat to give the part a rough surface. Using some cheap water based acrylics I painted on the seat part with some raw sienna. This is the first coat, then I applied a second coat to cover up the gaps. Actually had some overruns of paint...blehhh, old age and my shaky fingers.... hehehe
At this point, while waiting for the paint to dry I decided to skip over to building the chest part. The manual actually calls for you to assemble the diecast parts together already with this chest part. But if you assembled this part first you will experience some difficulty later in inserting it into the chest piece. In the end I had to disassemble this part in order to fit it into the chest piece. The shafts used for this part are 11 mm in length and 2mm in diameter.
While trying to fix the part into the metal chest plate I broke the hinge as I used a pair of pliers to attempt to squeeze the shaft in. The other side went in without a hitch but the right side just didn't want to go in. Upon checking I found out that the hole was a bit small for the 11mm 1.5 diameter shaft.
Luckily I have my hobby router and the hobby grinding bits that I used for my failed SF-3A Lancer II build
This is the hobby router with the grinding bit installed. After grinding the hole to make it larger, I test fitted it a bit to see if the shaft would fit in first.
Here's the part assembled already. That broken hinge really looks ugly.
Next part of the build was to assemble the hip joints for the legs
A rubber polycap like part fits into the block that will connect to the leg part.
Here's the polycap like part fully fit in the hole
The block parts connect to the hip joint via flat head screws
Forgot to take a picture of the masking of the chest part, but here is the finished chest part with flat black painted already onto the intakes
Going back to the nose fuselage assembly, at this point I applied the decals to the cockpit dashboard part
The front landing gear is then attached to this plastic block part. It is recommended to glue the part in. I'd recommend not gluing the part in first as its better to test fit it first to see if the landing gear will properly fold into its landing gear bay and the doors fully close.
Here the cockpit is being put together. Instrument panel is connected to the cockpit as well as the seat. The pilot seat is actually glued into place
Landing gear is connected to its wheel well. This is the point where I'd recommend testing whether the landing gear properly fits into the wheel well.
Cockpit installed into its place in the front fuselage
Another shot of that at a different angle.
Next step would be to install the front tires of the landing gear. Here are the rubber tires on its runners.
Rubber tires on the front landing gear.
Here's the assembly of the nose of the plane. This is the part that the hip joint is latched on to. The black marking on the nose of the plane can actually be made by just means of decals. Something I should have used rather than by having to paint it on which was what I did.
The two halves of the nose of the plane are connected together by means of a flat head screw and a round head screw.
Next is to connect the hinge cover that covers the recess where the hip joint gets latched on to.
The flat screw head I actually got to fasten the two halves of the front part of the nose was deformed. For the hinge cover, no glue is required. In this part of the assembly a block part labeled part A05 is also installed in this step.
The tip of the nose of the plane then gets inserted on. I actually glued this part on because the tip seems to fall off easily. There was a slight mistake in my painting of the black parts of the nose fuselage, rather than scrape it off I decided to just paint it over with flat white paint. Which wasn't exactly a good idea on my part. Next time I'll just use the decals rather than paint on the black parts of the fuselage.
Part V of this build can be found here.
