First off I will not be following the exact order of the instructions. Sometimes it's easier to do things in a certain order, but in some cases I just decide I want to work on one piece before another. I'll try not to jump around too much.
First thing I decided to do was glue the Control horns onto the surfaces. These horns appear to be well made and are much like many of the jet ARF's out there.
I decided to use 4-40 Dubro ball links instead of the stock ones. I don't think the stock ones would be a problem, just personal preference. The Dubro use a larger screw, so the first thing I had to do was drill out the horns to accept them. Still seems to be plenty of beef for them to be a very strong set up.
I then roughed up the surface to give the glue some help. I checked all of the slots in the surface to make sure they were ready. It took a bit of digging with an X-acto, but they weren't too bad. I noticed the spacing was not always the same between the dual slots.
I used Hysol Glue for this step. There is nothing better for gluing glass. It's not cheap, but it's the best.
Once I made sure the horns would all slide in I was ready to glue. A couple needed to be trimmed just a bit to make sure they would drop down all the way into the surface. I used the 4-40 bolts and put a ball link between two first, that way I could make sure the spacing was right as the glue dried. Also it's a good idea to align the two surface to make sure you have the same offset and hit the hinge line properly. The instructions show putting tape on the surface, but I found that I could do better without. I kind of like the bead of glue that forms when I stick them into the slots. Just take your time, and make sure you have some paper towels and alcohol handy in case you get glue on the nice paint job. Here's a photo of the horns glued in and set aside to cure.
Once they dried, I removed all of the ball links and decided to paint the horns. Testors Japan Navy Sky Gray is a good match, at least in areas without the green over spray. I'll match the paint perfectly later and take care of that over spray during the detailing process.
