EDIT - Sorry for the cell phone pics.
I can't remember where I left off, but the cockpits are done, the cowl mounted guns installed completed with Master Barrels - I love these things.
The biggest achievement has been the tail for the Rufe - it's a 5 part converstion and involves some nasty cuts. The fit was pretty good. Some of my parts had shrunk, but Bob from MDC had replaced a few and I didn't want to bother him for any more.
This isn't a cutout at all - this is where the tail hook usually goes. The Rufe has a fin on the bottom of it's fuselage. MDC provides the fin that is on the bottom of the plug for this hole. The plug was too small for mine - which is weird because it's a set size on the kit, not a miscut by me.
I didn't want to glue a shim to the plug because it would have been end to end like - to - and there wouldn't be much of a gluing surface. So instead I found a sheet of styrene the thickness of the gap, cut a steep triangle and stuck it tip first into the fuslage - this made sure that it was the perfect size in length (thickness of the sheet) and width. The added advantage is that I cut and sanded it flush and it was face to edge for gluing.
Like so
Yields
I'm no Chuk, but you get the idea, which is all that matters
The new vertical stab. The A6M2b kit has a separate piece for the spine of the fuselage, which has the fairing at the base of the stabilizer included. I have no idea why MDC decided to mold the fairing on their tail, as opposed to copying the shape of just the kit stabilizer. The problem this creates is that you have to cut the fairing off the spine and now the spine is two parts - the original part which not only runs to the base of the new fairing, and the fairing itself. Mine didn't fit and left a considerable gap despite being cut at the panel line. Again I have shimmed. I shimmed on the large side and sanded to shape. There was also a casting bubble on the corner of the new fairing, I shored that up with styrene rod (like a nut through a bolt)
The end of the tail. The Rufe has a full height rudder, as opposed to the Zero's rudder which ends just below the horizontal stabs. You have to cut the tail off the kit and replace it with this plug. This part shrunk considerably and I had to mix some 2 part epoxy to build the part out and flush.
All of the components in place and glued. Under the elastic you can see the separate spine and the gap on all three sides of the new fairing at the base of the vertical stab. Note the shimjob. Also note the fitment of the tail plug....
Lots and lots of time spent sanding, fitting and sanding and fitting - just a few strokes here and there managed to get the tail fitting pretty well. I knew I would need putty, but that's expected in any conversion.
The elastic running length wise was originally looped around the tail plug, holding it in place while the Zap cured.
The tails fits very nicely - it just took a fair bit of work to get it here. The tail plug on the other hand.... and this is the GOOD fitting side.
I WANT TO MENTION that the fitment issues are not the fault of MDC, my parts had simply been an early batch and had shrunk. The new parts I received for the wing fit much better (touch wood).
Puttied, epoxied, sanded and sanded and....primered. I'm really happy with how it has come out so far. You can see a few spots that need attention still - I'm already on it!
Overall, I'm really happy with the conversion set and am looking forward to doing the wing.