BAN509 hex nut with bolt 1,9mm

A swap for a molded bump

Most kits deal with hardware by a compromise: at the place where a hex should be, a bland stub with soft edges is created. It is not negligence on the manufacturer's part, only the price of the technology, because a crisp shape could neither be made nor released in a steel mold. The modeler therefore has a simple intervention available which moves the quality of the surface markedly further than the work put in would suggest.

The intervention has three steps. Cut the old imitation off with a sharp knife level with the surrounding surface, sand the remainder with fine paper and make a recess in the center. Into it you then seat a part 1.9 mm in size which carries both the nut and the shank.

Where it pays off most

The best ratio of effort to effect is given by the places the viewer looks at close up: upper surfaces, the sides of superstructures, the area around hatches and lids. The undersides and the insides of a chassis, by contrast, often nobody will see, so there it tends to be more sensible to stay with the original casting.

What not to forget

Before cutting, note down how many heads there were at the given place and how they were laid out. Once you have cut them off, the original spacing can no longer be read from a smooth surface and an estimate from memory tends to be inaccurate.

Why we see the difference at all

A molded stub and a part set in differ in one single thing, and that is the radius of the edge. A soft transition scatters light into a smooth gradient, a crisp edge breaks it at once. Our sight is exceptionally sensitive to this difference, because in everyday life it judges the hardness of a material by it. A hex with a crisp edge is therefore read as metal, even though it is made of something entirely different and painted the same color as its surroundings.