Vendetta conversion

Not exactly ground-breaking I know, but here's how I do them.  For the fuselage las-cannon I start by inserting a piece of plasticard from the rear of the cowling, which then gets a 6-mm disk magnet green stuffed to it.




For the las-cannon itself, I start with the las-cannon that comes with the Valkyrie kit, cut off the upper sensor spine and add one of the las-cannon barrels from the Baneblade kit with a little filing for a nice fit.  This assembly gets a 1/8" magnet set into it (remember to make sure it's properly polarized for the fuselage magnet!)

For the wing las-cannon, I use 4 of the las-cannon from the IG heavy weapons kit.  To create the pairs I first drill a 1/16" hole through the gun using the socket for the power cable as a reference.  I use a piece of plasticard rod or tubing through the holes to align the guns and set the spacing.  Once, that joint is set, I cut a length of sprue and file it to a 'aerodynamic' shape to create the mounting pylon.

 To magnetize the wing weapons, I start by drilling a 1/16" down through the top of the weapons pylon from the Valk kit; this serves as a guide hole for subsequent drilling.  I then enlarge the hole with progressively larger drills until I get to a 1/8" hole.  I then put a 1/8" magnet into the bottom of the pylon flush with the bottom. 

To put the magnet into the gun assembly, I drill a 1/16" pilot hole into the desired spot on the 'sprue-pylon' followed by a 1/8" hole for the magnet,  I usually start with the smaller bit as it has less tendency to wander off the desired spot. Then after checking the polarity about 3 times, I put a bit of green stuff into the hole followed by the magnet.  Since a single magnet like this would allow the gun to pivot, something I don't won't, I add an alignment rod to the back of the 'sprue pylon that engages the slot in the bottom of the kit weapons pylon.  This alignment rod is just a bit of 1/16" plastic rod filed to a half round shape and glued into place.

And there you have it.  I do the same sort of magnetizing for the other weapons options,  one caution, its much easier to do the multiple rocket pot if you drill the hole for the magnet just deep enough to seat the magnet.