This post is also available in:

Today I am continuing with project Cruella—a little extra session I had not planned, but why not?

From this point onward, unless stated otherwise or obvious from the context, all abbreviations use the Latin alphabet.

So today, again, after the family had dinner and Elena and Nadya shared an orange, I started clearing the kitchen table at 20:40 without any particular hurry. Around 20:50 I sat down to build.

I am continuing with the steps in order:

An easy and enjoyable assembly, with a small surprise. More on that below…

I was a little surprised here—the periscope “covers” are labelled as parts T2 through T7. Why the surprise? Parts on sprue T are generally clear and represent glass—in other words, I was being told to glue glass “covers” over glass periscopes. I could not quite believe it. I thought it was a typo and looked for the appropriate parts on the other sprues, but no—they really are clear! Gluing them on, though time-consuming, turned out to be quite easy.

I decided to try fitting the assembly from step 9 to the hull and… realised I had forgotten to glue on part E36 in that step. No big deal—I found sprue E and… well, that little part turned out to be absolutely tiny. Anyway, I carefully cut it off, applied two little drops of cement, picked it up carefully with tweezers and… off it flew. I searched and searched, and just as I gave up—ha! There it was on the table. Amused, I applied two fresh drops of cement, picked it up even more carefully with the tweezers and… it flew away again. I searched and searched… Preslav came for a drink of water, so I enlisted him too. Nadya arrived and joined in, but alas! The Carpet Monster’s first victim on this model. Hopefully the last, too…

Assembling the upper cover of the troop compartment was not difficult either, except that the holes in parts A5 would not line up with the locating pins on parts A7. I had to do a little work with the knife, but now they fit perfectly!

I will use part E34, but decided to glue it on only after priming and painting to make things easier.

Here I ran into a hatch arrangement I really dislike, especially those ridiculous little parts B5. It turned out the problem was elsewhere—in part E14. Its attachment to the sprue makes cutting it off awkward, and I almost split it in two with the cutters… Fortunately, the damage was not beyond repair. A little cement and some time to set put everything right. Parts B5 themselves turned out to be surprisingly easy.

I approached part E3, which is even smaller than E36, with extra care, but it went on at the first attempt. The remaining parts are quite large, there is no confusion about where to glue them, they fit beautifully, and I had no problems.

I have not glued on parts W4—photo-etched parts—because I want to paint the plastic underneath first. I also left off part E10, because I have not yet decided whether to use it or go for a very realistic aftermarket antenna…

So, after about an hour and 15 minutes of work, this is where I got to:

The model is still only partly assembled—held together with a little tape and the fit of the parts—but I may well start with the airbrush on Saturday!