[ratdat]

First step in sorting the front end out is cutting the inner wings off but leaving the chassis legs in place.



I shaped a 5mm strip of plastic sheet and aytached it to the rear of the inner wings then glued them back in. This sorted the front/rear alignment but they were still way to short and more importantly not tall enough.



So... there's nothing for it but to extend the height of the inner wings using plastic sheet. Shaping some of the bits was a bit tricky but here it's coming together...



Here I have got the lower part of the firewall cut away from the upper part (from the Revell 510 kit) and fitted it in place ...the upper part was not tall enough, was the wrong shape to fit and didn't look anything like a real Nissan Auster firewall ...so I'll have to make it!



I used several pieces of sheet laminated together to extend the chassis and form a front crossmember. The method of attaching the chassis in this model require me to make it out of layers like this. Here it is from the underside. Notice that the chassis legs on the Revell kit are hollow..these will be filled in. Still needs filing and shaping in these shots...



After getting the chassis extended I cut more plastic sheet to extend the inner wings to the front panel then filled all the joins and rough bits. Here it had some shaping and is beginning to look decent. The chassis is beginning to look like it's meant to fit there ..



I made the upper part of the firewall from some sheet plastic and shaped it to fit the scuttle and the curve of the hood apeture as best I could while keeping it looking something like the real car. After some more filler and sanding the engine bay is starting to look good!...