"End Of An Era" XH131 WIP #4

There has been some more progress this week. My target is to finish XH131 this weekend so I can then continue with the figure, ground equipment and the base which needs painting.

The first two photos below were taken during the application of the decals. The kit sheet was used for this along with the numbers from the kit used for XH134. The white XH135 number had to be modified into XH131 but cutting the "5" from the end of one set of decals. Then I had to cut out the number "1" from the middle of the other set of decals and place that at the end to create the new number sets.

The next photo is the model once the undercarriage, bay doors and flaps were glued into position. On this model, I used some fishing shot in the unused front camera bay for extra weight instead of the single lump of white metal. This seemed to work better this time around.

The next stage is to give the model a couple of coats of matt clear before the final weathering and assembly of the model. So a few more hours of work is needed before completion of XH131.

Just to get an idea of how the three aircraft will be displayed, here are some quick photos of how they will look on the base that is going to be used for them. The base still needs to be painted and detailed, and the vehicles are nearly finished to. I just have to make the two remaining ladders for the aircraft, paint a few more figure and add the POV covers on XH131 and XH135.