The Little World

And I didn’t even know it until now…

Look at Part One for the parts layout picture. Note that only one elevator panel is shown on the shot. I did not pick this up until I came to assemble the horizontal stabiliser. Airfix had dudded me again.

But I don’t dud easy. I remembered what John O’Reilly had shown us about using Lego blocks as easy casting boxes. So I boxed up the one elevator in the kit and poured a silicon mould about it. It was left to sit for 24 hours and then I looked out the polyester resin to fill it.

Dudded again. My bottle of Barnes Easy Cast had settled and solidified so as to be unmixable. Into the bin. Onto the computer and the Spotlight website. Down to the Melville store on Christmas Eve morning at 8:00 before the crowd. $ 15 yielded two 100ml bottles of clear epoxy resin meant for casting jewellery.

Mix up and pour into the mould – the clear aspect is a help in that you can detect bubbles. Set overnight for 24 warm hours.

Popped out of the mould after Christmas lunch. A tad rubbery but perfect reproduction of the rivets pattern and overall size. Glued in with Zap cyanoacrylate and it looks as though it will be perfect after the paint goes on.

Annoying, but a perfect illustration of the principle of never giving up the ship. Don’t dud easy.