Space Shuttle Endeavour with ET and SRB's in 1/96 [Part 7]

Hi friends. Here I am again.
In the time inbetween posts I've been quite busy. I hardly find myself at my desk with paper, glue and some music these days. I wish it was a little different, but I really have to keep a couple of china plates spinning on long flexible sticks, it seems. And to be honest, I do like what I am doing at the moment.
Anyway, enough about that. How about that Space Shuttle Stack I was working on? Well, here's where I am now. ET nearing completion.  How I got there is in the story below.

First, after the last enty, I did some nice mindful detailing and accentuating work. The External tank has small foam ramps for aerodynamic purposes all over its hull, all close to the larger obstacles running over its sides. I used quadrupled-up yellow card for mimicking them.

Then, I took the same colour of paper but twice as thin to roll the fuel line that runs from the LH (liquid hydrogen) tank on top to the rear end of the shuttle where its engine section is. It looked the part but I decided it could use a little toning down, I thought it was too bright. I painted it with the same paint I used for the corrugated section. You can see the difference below, where I added the curved part to go into the shuttle's engine section. It is a tad too dark but I don't really care. In reality the External tank has had so many different nuances of orange, no one will really notice it isn't the actual right colour for this specific flight. And frankly, I don't even care. It looks nice.

Then I spent a couple of days thinking about how to tackle the struts that hold the shuttle to the tank. Or the thank to the shuttle, if you will. I kind of see the tank as the central aspect of the stack.
For the strutteries I used David Hanners' build photos and a couple of pictures I found online. I know it isn't 100% accurate but I think it is close enough. I wasn't planning an museum quality model, just one for me to look nice and be on my book shelves for years. That is at least where I entend it to be.

And then I was on a roll and I didn't take any pictures of the creating process and there it was. Almost finished, just the lower feed line of the LOx tank part to be made.

That will be up next. Some additional and final strutteries to add. Then the front wishbone like part of the struts that holds the shuttle's nose will be made and then it will be off to the boostery bits.
Leaves me with these bits and pieces to show you what an experimental scratchbuild this often becomes. Oh, and a little story. About the hole you see here on the picture below.

I was working on the rear struts and I drilled a hole in the tank to create a foundation for the vertical struts. To enlarge them some more I took a routing tool for in my powertool and after just a few spins in the hole, I realised I forgot to tighten the drill head. The router bit fell into the tank. 
Now I could have left it in, But I wanted that stupid router bit back. I needed it and I was disturbed by the thought that it would sit there inside the tank for ages to come. Nope nope nope.
I then realised I could open up the tank at its bottom because it would be camouflaged anyway with three small overlapping circles. So, I created a hole there. But.
The darn bit was one "floor" further up. I used quite a few reinforcing circles inside the tank all over its length and well, I realised I had to make another hole. Which I did, but of course I couldn't just shake the bit out that easily without damaging the tank from the inside. Aargh! Eventually, a tiny but very strong magnet I held on to with my tweezers did the trick. It pulled the bit straight out. I had my router bit back and the "damage"  to the tank was marginal.

So, up next, some additive strutting work and then it is SRB-time. I might build the booster twins parallel to one another. That will prevent large discrepancies between them, I hope. We'll see.
See you all next time!
--PK