In Progress » YT-1380f Corellian Light Freighter » Hull Lamination Complete

Yesterday I began laminating the outside of the bondo with styrene sheet. I also forgot to mention WHY I did the balls/bondo thing and didn’t just add the styrene over the ribs. Simply enough I’m clumsy and heavy-handed and would had crushed the shell without the underneath support. Plus it gives something solid in which to mount things. Mostly my accidental destructiveness though. Once the .020″ styrene wedges were epoxied into place I trimmed the edges took my sander to it all to blend it all together. Then I cut out the groove for the cabin tube and glued that into place and added a little styrene on the right-hand side to blend that in.

Cutting the slot wasn’t as easy as I thought it’d be due to the balls. They acted as bearings with my various cutting tools and the blades just rolled over them. So I ended up slicing, snapping and breaking the slot out a little at a time. And whatever balls fell out were saved for future use. Why throw them out? Markings were added to other cuts I’ll need to make like for the escape pod notch and the engine area. After doing my next cuts I’ll apply some putty to fill in any gaps between the laminated sheets and add some styrene strip to the edges to close off that unsightly mess.