TIE Brute

Started on the Bandai kit. The cockpit interior and outer shell fit into the conversion kit ball. I cut the ends of the arms to fit onto the wings to make a more positive connection and cut down the pillars on the arms to fit into the new shell. 

The Bandai wings need the detail on the inside centre boss shaved off. Also used the Green Strawberry masks for the panels - sadly they don't fit (too small) and will need strips of masking tape around the edges. 

The cut-off arms glued to the wings. 

The holes in the conversion parts which connect to the wings had a circular profile - I filed them to fit the shape of the stubs from the bandai kit. 

Test fit onto the wing panels. 

I replaced the barrels on the conversion kit guns (which were slightly warped) with brass tube. 

Bandai interior built and painted. I'm using a Fine Molds pilot I pulled out of an old kit (to save painting). 

Bandai fuselage built and ready to go into the conversion kit. 

The 3D printed resin ball comes in 2 pieces, which had spread apart a bit. I dipped them in hot water and pushed them into a conical glass to push them back into the right shape. Took a couple of goes and wasn't quite perfect (but better than when I started!) 

I also added some wire pins to make a more secure joint. 

Main ball being glued together with Bandai fuselage inside, all glued with 5 minute epoxy. 

Front ring inserted, with a stand-in Bandai cockpit glass inserted. Also added the top hatch and the detail piece between the hatch and front ring. 

Top view of top hatch. It arrived with some chips in the thin frame around the glass which were repaired using Aves. I also didn't like the fit of the transparent resin glass piece, which sat too deep, so I cut out the individual sections and inserted them to the depth I wanted. Some filler was still needed on the join between the halves of the ball. 

The rear section also has a clear window insert, which also didn't fit well - it stood proud of the frame. I glued some bits of scrap styrene between the parts to get it sitting at the level I wanted. Also it shouldn't be a window so I've painted it dark grey and masked it. 

The gun turret has had it's glass inserted - painted silver behind and transparent red on the front. This piece also came with a damaged section around the bottom gun insert. I've started repairing that with Aves as well. 

There was a bit of a step when offering up the rear section to the ball so I glued some styrene strip around the flat section to build it up 

Here the added strip has been sanded to match the rest of the ball and the rear section glued on. 

All the main fuselage pieces put together and primed. Still a bit of filling and sanding needed. 

Wings glued on (luckily the fuselage isn't glued yet as I noticed the gun ball is upside-down). 

I like to put my Star Wars kits on Fine Molds type bases. I still had an unused TIE Fighter base but the larger ball on the Brute won't fit - I had to extend the upper arms with 1.5 mm styrene sheet 

The base glued together, with some added stiffening supports for the longer arms 

I wanted to add some red reflectors in the engine exhausts, so I glued some 2 mm reflectors on the ends of some 2 mm rod. I've drilled out the exhausts on the kit and these will be glued in when the paint is done