David, Sorry to misslead you as to my sensitivity. The beauty of the forums is that it has many experienced modelers like yourself and their willingness to help. Unfortunatly the situation with his plane is after the fact. So without appearing to assume on my part that the guy is totally inept, I did not feel that offering simple, common sense solutions were in order. There are two choices. Clean it up as best he can and work the hinges to break them in, or cut them out and start over, that is where pinned hinges come in. Yes, I do believe that was helpfull. Joe