ON TO THE BOMB BAY!
When I finished the interior of the bomb bay years ago, I always wondered how the delicate task of marrying the bomb bay interior and the door hinge openings to the bomb bay door legs would go.
Well, come along if you were wondering also.
Here is how I left the bomb bay structure, give or take a few bent wires along the way, and some damage in handling. About a third of the way in from the sidewalls are dark gray cylinders that represent the actuation motor connections for the ballscrews to the bomb bay doors.
I knew this gap between the fuselage and the bottom of the forward bomb bay bulkhead would have to be filled.
Here you can say HG's initial filling effort.
Now let's move to the port and starboard sides of the bomb bay opening.
One of the structural defects in the fuselage in this area is how long the notches to each side of the door openings are. There are six of them and they are meant to hold door legs. However on the real thing they are not nearly this long or thick. And, of course, they have openings for the legs. As HG says,
Quoted Text
So, the biggest accuracy correction is opening up the bottom where the legs of the bomb bay doors are supposed to fit into the fuselage, and rotate from the horizontal to vertical while the doors are being opened and closed.
Compare the drawing
And this photo of some crazy guy bailing out through the bomb bay in a "warbird."
to what the model looks like
Here you can see some of the surgery needed to make it look more accurate.
And here compare the corrected top (note the rivet line near the pointer)
with the bottom, though the differences are perhaps subtle, at least they were to me at first glance.
But, as I told HG, "I trust your judgment on this."
Ultimately, this is the look we are looking for.
The next post is coming up shortly and will be on the doors themselves.
