After assembling the landing gears, I left the plane to rest.

The day after, I assembled more or less everything else. The closed canopy was removed, and parts of the paint was touched up. The front glass was glued and the pilot put in place.

Lastly the glass on the bottom of the wing was glued and also the drop tank.

Except for some weathering, there’s only one thing left to do. The glass pieces on the wing tips needs to be glued in place, but first I need to sort their colours.
After checking the net it seems like the left is red and the right green.

This is just a quick update on the decals.
Where is it easiest to hide something black? On something black!
I thought the black area on the nose looked a bit strange, and on closer examination, I realized that it was the missing part of the skull decal.
After using Microset on the decal, letting it soak, I could move the missing piece in place.
There was just a little bit missing that I sorted with a little black paint later.

Happy for having that problem solved.

I’ve been doing the decals one side at a time, more or less.

And the other side!

Here it is with all the other decalled parts.
I’m not sure what have happened with the skull decal. Part of it is missing and I can’t seem to figure out where it has gone. I even tried lifting the decal a bit so see if it had folded under, but no, not what I could determine.
The only missing decals are those for the lights under the wing. I’ll sort them once all those dried properly.
I’ll also try to sort the missing decal part, by painting by hand.

Soon time for clear cote and final assembly and then some weathering.

I’ve started adding the decals and the underside is done!

I had a little problem with the invasion stripes. I need to touch up with a bit of colour later.
I’m still happy with how it looks. Now I’ll let these decals dry a while, before adding more decals.

After masking I painted the nose yellow.

Then I did some more masking and painted black.

Part of the masking tape was removed.

Then I masked again and painted olive drab.

So how did it turn out with the masking tape removed? I say it turned out bloody nice! 🙂

Now on to the next steps that probably will be clear coting and then decals.

Propeller, bombs and spinner got clear coted.

I started adding different shades of bright metal to different covers.

I think I’ll keep it there, and start painting the nose next.

I sanded the problem areas carefully with fine grade sanding sticks and lastly some polishing.

Then it all got a new cote of aluminium.

Freshly painted, but it still looks like I need another cote of paint.

I finished the pilot and added the mask.

Now I just need to finish the plane so I can put him in place! 🙂