DocRob

Thank you Craig and Walter. Looking at all the details in reflection is a pure joy and let forget the fails a bit more easily. It´s also great to have the finish line in vicinity. Cheers Rob

I continued with the glazing, starting with the windscreen. This is again a clear vacuum formed part, which needed to be cut to fit. There is a tiny sill, where the screen sits recessed into. After fitting it properly, I used transparent adhesive double sided tape of 1 mm width again (best stuff ever for these cases) and with a deep breath pushed the windscreen in. There are two possibilities supplied with the kit for the sealings, one made by rubber (upper) and another, which the manual calls UV print. Never heard of, but luckily found a descriptive video build from Pooh´s on YT, which described it as a kind of decal and this seems to be the case, maybe like the Quinta sets. After removing the protective foil, it looked like this, not very appealing. ...but it worked very well. I dampened the backing paper and after a minute, it came loose from the sheet and was easily applied onto the windscreen. Thanks again to Pooh, because nothing about the how to with this part was mentioned in the manual. I was on a roll and added the bubbly plexy side ducts behind the door´s windows, again with double sided tape and in this case with some rivets. Most of the glazing is done now, except for the vizor screens on the side of the windscreen. Cheers Rob

Thank you Ken, the benefit of the vacuum formed clear parts is, they are absolutely clear, thin and distortion free. The downside, you have to cut and sand them to fit and they scratch very easily. Cheers Rob

Thank you Craig and Alan. It was tedious, but worth it. What I feared most was that one or more rivets would not align, which would have looked ridiculous. The riveting is like the cherry on the cake and looks so old school with modern gluing techniques making these beautiful details obsolete. Cheers Rob

Today, I started the next nailbiter sequence with glazing the rear hatch. This is a tinted vacuum formed part, which needed to be cut to fit and then applied onto it´s framing and "secured" with rivets. Shockingly, there was nearly no visible marking on the vac part: With a strong light and Kabuki tape, I tried to mark the borders as good as possible. Then I cut to shape little by little and effectively a bit too much at the lower end, where the marking still showed some excess. Next, I drilled all the rivet holes with a 0,6 mm drill bit and applied 1mm wide transparent double sided adhesive tape (red tinted cover paper) around the framing, exactly over the line of rivets, covering the pre drilled holes. I took great care, not to touch the tape and leave fingerprints on it, which might later show. On with the clear part, one deep breath, steadying the fingers and go. There is only one attempt and it has to sit correct. Finally I did the riveting job. I used a steel needle to mark the still visible holes on the vac part and drilled them with a 0,6 mm drill bit. The adhesive tape got pulled into the hole by the drill bit a little, which was exactly what I was after, as it will hold the rivets in place without further gluing. On with the magnifier and the sharp tweezers and applying about 40 of the tiny rivet buggers. Now I have to relax my eyes and am happy not to have scratched the clear part. Cheers Rob

Thank you Craig, how often have I watched these videos by Pooh . At the stage shown, I had everything fitting, after thinning the hood a lot, where the air intakes are. I also thinned the hood in the area of the hinges mounts, to raise the entire hood by a millimeter. At this stage, test fitting was relatively simple, but by the time, where the chassis is finally married with the body, there numerous interfering components everywhere and you have to get everything aligned in one go. Like I said, I have a small step between the chassis and the front of the main body part. It´s about a millimeter, but I can´t do anything about it other than lower some internal fairings a bit, which didn´t better the situation significantly. Pooh has these videos in a even more detailed version online, but the final attachment of the hood was either problem free with his build or the cursing and manipulating of parts was off camera (my guess). It looks like a snap fit, which I doubt. The hinges are gone now and I have to live with my attaching method. Cheers Rob

No pain, no gain , Yves but thank you. What I grieve most at the moment, is that there are so many delicate steps concentrated right now, which make the finalization of the Cobra a bit unrelaxed. Many of my issues are possibly caused by my inexperience. I´m a bit out of my comfort zone, which I wasn´t for most parts of the build. However, I´m on the last pages of the manual and one way or another the Cobra will cross the finish line. Cheers Rob

I´m sorry to hear about your experiences, Craig. I thought about 2K clear coats for my car projects as well, but then tried the Zero Paints clear lacquer and was absolutely satisfied. It sprays very well, thinned with leveling thinner, but needs to be sanded and polished afterwards, which is a relatively simple task. Another benefit is the relatively fast drying time, which helps to prevent from dust particles sticking in the fresh coat. The shine on the Cobra is perfect to my eye and so this will be my new go to clear coat for car projects. Cheers Rob

I finished the front section today, what a relief. I feared this step and I was right, as it was extremely difficult. The result wasn´t perfect, but it had to be done with the first attempt. The lower (fog?) lights received a flat acetate cover. My sheet was scratched (my fault) and I tried half successful to polish the scratches out. I glued the three angled PE parts into the light housing with ca and then applied double sided clear adhesive tape onto the fronts. Then I drilled the 0,6 mm holes for the rivets and applied the clear cover onto the adhesive tape. Last were the rivets. Sounds easy, but isn´t. First prob is working with the acetate, sanding it to contour leads to a massive build up of burr, which need to be removed with a sharp blade. Drilling is equally difficult for the same reason. Never use a PCB drill for thin acetate sheet, the burr is enormous, better use a classic HSS drill with appropriate angles. Alignment of holes in PE and acetate is also an issue. Next were the plexy covers for the headlights, again vac parts, which need to be cut to fit. You have to be very precise, as there is only a tiny edge to glue the clear part onto the body. Before I did this, I marked the holes for the rivets with a needle and drilled off the model. I used Revell Contacta Clear for gluing as it doesn´t fog the acetate. I suspect, it´s a kind of PVA glue, thinned with water. From the distance the front looks ok and I´m happy to got it done. Cheers Rob

I think you are right, a pristine Cobra with flat tyres would look a bit odd. Cheers Rob

Thank you Tim, it just doesn´t feel good not to be able to finish as planned. Nonetheless, there will be a place reserved in my shelf for the finished Cobra. The kit is indeed very heavy, but I haven´t weighed it. My guess is about three kilos. MFH provides spacers, to screw under the chassis to prevent the suspension to take the full weight. Cheers Rob

Thank you Mark, there are still many aspects, I like about the Cobra build. It´s a fail to my eye, but not wasted. I never saw the mentioned lock pins used for the Cobra Coupe´s, I guess, it´s because the complete front opens angling to the front. There are the front hinges and then some sort of metal latch to keep it close at the sides. Cheers Rob

Hehe, 99% would be a great exaggeration, Kevin, but thanks for your supportive words. I will close the build as it is as soon as possible now, but I´m strongly motivated to do better with the next one. I have some more MFH test mules in my stash . It´s not the end of the world, it´s more about lessons learned. I may have taken on too much with the Cobra and my the next project will be a bit simpler, possibly a Formula 1 car. As I usually loose interest into a project, once finished, the frustration may vaporize later on, but the experiences and skills remain. Cheers Rob

Thank you Craig, the fit issue was not connected with the relief areas, which worked well and the intake funnels were not a problem anymore. There were different areas of the large cooler housing, which needed to be manipulated and possibly the prime culprit, I have a step of about one millimeter between the chassis and the front of the body, but there was no way to change that anymore. I will not spent more time to find a better solution, because I already did that highly concentrated for hours. Cutting away the hinges was the final measurement to my eye. I read on another forum, where somebody said, the bonnet to body fit is possibly problematic, so maybe I´m not alone. Cheers Rob

Thank you for your warm words, Yves. The bonnet will remain openable with two rivets need to be pulled out for removing the bonnet. At least, that´s the plan. I still like the Cobra, but I couldn´t fulfill one of my main goals, even when I had foreseen this to be a gamechanger right from the start. I always build models to learn something with every build. I learned among many other things, to show some dignity to a truly demanding build and prepare even better than normal. It will definitely not be my last MFH build, I tasted blood and hope this fail makes me stronger with other builds. Cheers Rob