B-1B Lancer - SAC Euro One - #86-0109 "Spectre" from Ellsworth AFB

This one is going to be big even in 144th scale! 

Cockpit out of the box.. 

...with the only exception being imitation of the seat belts cut from Tamiya masking tape. 

A bit of a progress today, I attached nose and tail sections - it's getting even bigger 🙂. Started to sand the seams, the fit is pretty good but there are some places that will need a bit more love and attention... 

... like this section under cockpit, where the seam is quite visible and hard to get sanded nicely due to the area being of a convex shape. 

Also, the tail section connection is not copying the mid section of the hull perfectly, some sanding will be needed here too. And re-scribing. 

Main bodywork is finished. 

Started painting the wheel wells and bomb bays. 

Two racks of Mk.82s. The kit sports also an option to arm it with two racks of JDAMs, but since I want to depict an early 90's bird, I'm not going to use them. 

Dry fitting of the bomb bays equipment. 

I was looking for options how to replace the featherless exhausts on the Academy B-1B and couldn't find anything decent being offered by any of my favorite e-retailers. Then, I accidentally came across a local company I was not aware of, "Rise144Models", they look to be specializing in offering 144th scale upgrade sets, I grabbed the B-1B feathered exhausts set from their online shop (rise144models.com/1/..r-exhaust-early-open).

It came today, it seems someone spent some time on designing it well, including protection for packaging and shipping. 

The set is made of two different resins and sports nicely reproduced details. I'll finally be able to backdate my B-1B to its 80's/90's look 😉 

I'm done with preshading the airframe, let's dress it up into the SAC/Euro1 scheme now.