1/144 Revell Space Shuttle OV-101 Enterprise

Box on the bench. 

Kit sprues overview. 

Considering all it's short falls and the horror stories I've read and heard, she goes together very very quickly!
This is about 2 hours work from box open to photo taken. 

So that's the build done, next up, filter! 

And I found a fairing to cover the engines and decided to test for it all. 

Lots of filler. 

Yep, definitely needed filling! 

I used Flory Models Sanders and watched his tutorial videos whilst learning.
Its nowhere near Phil's results but it's already better than my best result! 

All filler has been sanded. 

The nose section has now been filled. 

Engines are now all in place, heres a first and final shot showing them before the fairing goes on. 

Fairing in place with the cargo bay doors glued together to form a lift off lid, I will be adding more support but it's good enough for now. 

Test fitting the cargo bay doors, works for me! 

And the other side. 

Prototype siblings. 

Yellowed decals just after being placed into the Bleaching Hanger. 

4 hours later there alot less yellow and good enough for me. 

This is the idea I have.
I'm going to use this support piece taken from a Monster Truck toy and install the spare set of mounting points from the Minicraft Shuttle.
This is my plan to make all 6 Shuttle mountable on both this base, the external fuel tanks and boosters and one day the 747. 

All parts cut off ready for the trial. 

That seemed to go well. 

Enterprise seems to like her new stand!
As I have 6 Shuttles and 2 Buran's to do, this build/storage stand fits the bill just nicely! 

She's now primed white and ready for paint.... 

When priming the Shuttle I also primed and painted the wheels and cargo bay.
Please note, if you dont already know this, OV-101 Enterprise was one of the Prototype Orbiters and her cargo hold was never fitted out with the protection lining that the others were.
Hence the green ribbing.
Revell definitely based their 1/144 Shuttle on the Enterprise. 

The real Enterprise on display at the USS Intrepid Museum New York has had a wooden walkway fitted to preserve as much of the original cargo bay as possible. 

Left wing masked. 

Right wing masked. 

Bottom masked. 

More filler..........
 

Sanding done. 

Rear view of the fairing. 

Look at all that filler! 

No idea why but Scalemates likes to invert some of my photos,. 

And the painting process has begun!
I'm masking the nose first as I was most worried about masking that. 

Another view of the nose masking. 

Left tail section masked. 

Right tail section masked. 

All masked and paint started. 

Black airbrushed. 

The base looks shiny with wet paint. 

All sprayed and hung up to dry she looks like the real Enterprise did on her flight trials. 

Just the tail and cockpit to go. 

Now to figure out the cockpit...... 

She's now on her own legs.
Also this photo was taken testing the new LED lighting system we've just had installed over the last week in our house.
I think it does the job very well! 

I've now put the wheels and doors on, painted the leading edge of the wings grey, painted the black square on the nose and put a nice layer of Klear on.
I also painted the 5 rectangular shapes on the left side of the fuselage and I used the Dragon Shuttle to create a paint mask for the cockpit windows. 

She's now ready for Decals! 

A nose shot! 

Decals on! 

I ended up using only the Minicraft decals as they appear to have 2 complete Shuttle's worth of decals if you use the Enterprise option. 

Oops!
I spotted that Minicraft's decal placement for "Enterprise" is about half inch wrong if your modelling herbas she's sat on the USS Intrepid Museum in New York. 

All that's left now is the thruster dots and the grey nose.