The Dauntless also had a number of very large slotted head screws that were actually a sort of "fastener" that you turned to release a panel... similar to those used in the furniture industry. In this section, I'll cover the techniques used to "rivet & screw" my cowl, which is the same technique I will use from here on out on the airframe.

The Tools
	The key to doing any job right is having the right tools in the first place. To simulate the raised rivets on my SBD, I use a tool called the "Hypo 25" which is a small plastic bottle with a large bore hypo needle in the cap. I mix up a concoction of glue that can be applied in small droplets onto the plane to form each rivet. Here's the info for purchasing the Hypo 25 bottles, which are bought by the dozen for $2.10 each... Gaunt Industries 9828 Frankilin Avenue Franklin Park, IL 60131 (847) 671-0766 http://www.gauntindustries.com The hypo bottles can also be purchased at RC Scale Products, including complete riveting kits... but not in bulk.
	Next is the "screw burning" tool. To produce slotted head screws and Dzus fasteners, I used a low temp soldering iron with a custom burning bit. To make the bit, I silver soldered a brass tube the size of the soldering bit over another brass tube, one size smaller in diameter. This acts as an adapter to get my screw head down to the right size. Lightly sand the edges of the brass tube end to make the circular edge "sharper." Next, I wedged a small sliver of brass inside the end of the tube so that it would burn the screw "slot" as it burned the outer ring. Mount this inside your soldering iron and you're ready to burn!

I first had to get the cowl in primer and panel lines added. To do this I used the same high build "Spot Filler & Primer" that I used on my fuse and wing, but used their "Flexible" version of it. This flexible version of the spot/scratch filling primer is designed for plastic and fiberglass auto parts like bumpers, so it should work great on the cowl.

Once primered and sanded, the panel lines were built with the primer and I laid out all the rivets and screw positions with a pencil. Make sure you've got good photo documentation to determine your rivet & screw patterns. I also used the Top Flite scale rivet template that gives you your rivet spacing for a variety of scale factors (1/4, 1/5, 1/6, etc.).

With the positions all marked, I started out with the large Dzus screw fasteners. At the right temperature, you just briefly touch the bit to the surface of the cowl and it will quickly burn a nice slotted screw impression into the primer. Hold it too long and you'll burn deeper into the glass surface.

Many guys will use something like a light dimmer switch to tune the temperature of the soldering iron down to the right heat. A "poor man's version" of this technique is to simply use shorter or longer lengths of brass tube for your bit. The longer the bit, the cooler it is at the end, and vice versa.

For true "screws" be sure to rotate your soldering iron at various angles for each screw burn to get a line of randomly rotated slots on your screws. However the large Dzus fastners like on this cowl, I recently found out that this is not the case. The slots are not randomly oriented. They go horizontal along the panel line and vertical along the vertical formers. On the wing they are spanwise and cordwise, In the corners they are 45degrees. Thanks to "pittsdriver" from RCU for the tip... I'll have to go back and fix mine!

Here is my "loose formula" for the glue mixture:

Thinning the glue too much will produce more evaporation, causing the "rivet heads" to collapse and look like a little raisin! Just mix up your glue in the Hypo 25 and begin tapping out droplets of glue onto each rivet pattern. Focus on keeping them in line, but more importantly, keep them correct and consistent in size.

The rivets on the fullscale planes were applied by hand and they were not all perfectly in line. I've even seen guys get points taken off for having their rivets "too perfect" so don't get carried away with the template... just use it as a guide. After a short while, the spacing will be automatic to you and you can focus more on shape & size... which should be consistent.