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Apollo Crawler at 1/72 scale


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HEY ALL,

This is my first posting at Brittmodeler, and I hope someone might be interested in my build project.

I will be building a scratch built rendering of the largest self propeled vehicle in the world. The giant Apollo era Saturn V Crawler. I plan on building a three part project: the Crawler, the MLP/LUT (multi launch platform, launch umbilical tower) and finally the great SaturnV rocket. I have chosen to build a rendering of Apollo 14, simply because a personal hero of mine was on that flight. Dr. Edgar Mitchell, has stood on the moon. But that is not the reason he is my hero, he's my hero because he quit working for NASA (never a straight answer) and is spreading the word that our worlds governments are lying to us about us having alien visitors. He is the only astronaught to quit and now works full time to get the worlds governments to admit that they know that we have had the alien visitors for a very long time now. And they are still comming here.

I chose this model because it is very complex and just cool to look at. It is a very industrial looking machine and, to me, has great textures and profiles that I think I would love to build this model. I chose a 1/72 scale so I could deal with all the very small parts and also at this scale it will very impressive size to view.

So now a few photos of the actual machine, and then off to the build. Thanks for vewing.

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So now I will start the build of this giant machine, as a large 1/72 scale model.

This first photo is of the main Chassis parts. This is the main floor and the roof structures. I have used white styrene at 0.5mm and I have a lot of cutting to do, as you can see.

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This photo is of the frame supports and the supports for the pipe chords.

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Here you can see a bunch of frame supports.

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In the next two photos you can see how the parts look as a rough cut, and then as I have cleaned up the parts right to the print lines and ready to install.

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This is the floor of the Engineers Controll Room. I have painted this with acrylic paint to match the floor of the original Crawler.

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After cutting out all the frame supports and all the clean up, I am now ready to start the basic assembliy of the main Chassis. So in this photo I have installed the first part and tied the part into place untill I can get all the parts installed and ready for guleing.

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The next photo here is of Engine Room with all the frames tied up for support.

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The next photo is a shot of the Chassis body with the frames all tied up and a look at the Corner Structures that support the truck assemblies.

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The next three photos are of the main Chassis with three different angles so you can see how the main Chassis is starting to take shape.

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Another angle.

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In this photo you can see the styrene welding of the support beams.IMG_1770_zpsfa481fae.jpg

This photo is how the chassis beams look all welded and cleaned up.

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Here you can see the chassis in one piece and now really starting to look like the Crawler main chassis.

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And now a close up shot of the main Chassis.

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So, this is where my build stands at the moment. I will try to post at least once a week, but sooner if I get a chance to do a lot of work at once.

I hope you all like this first posting and you will follow along as this build continues, and please let me know what you all think.

Thats all for now Thanks for viewing RichO

Edited by RichO
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Hello Rich, my busy Plastic man,


nice to meet you here in this forum and welcome! tach.gif


Secretly and quietly you are starting now with the 1:72 crawler built from plastic instead of paper, this is a big surprise and definitely tougher then the rest! shocked.gif


Have you printed the parts on sheet? How did you do that and to what thickness is that possible? undecided.gif


Keep on this amazing beast, I stay tuned! zustimm.gif


hallo.gif

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MANFRED,

What a nice suprise, nice to see you here!!

So this new build is going great so far as you can see. What I have done here is to go to my local printers and had the drawings enlarged to 1/72 scale and printed onto a thin print paper. I then sprayed a very lo-tac adheasive onto the paper sheets and "glued" them to the 16 x 24 inch styrene sheets. The spry adheasive is so "lo-tac" that once I have cut out the parts, I simply peel off the paper outlines, and it's ready for painting.

As far as the styrene thickness goes, of course there are several different thickness depending on the particular parts to be built. The main Chassis here, I have chosen a 0.20 inch-0.5mm thick sheet. To get to this figure I simply measured the thickness of the paper kit and enlarged the figures to a 1/72 scale and then matched as close as I could to the Evergreen Styrene sheets. On these Chassis parts, I feel is just ever so slightly thicker that the enlargement should be, but once again I have to go with what the manufacture has to offer. I felt I would rather go a little heavyer than thinner. The only down fall is that the styrene sheets are a bit tougher to cut by hand, but also this makes the model really stiff and heavyer.

So I hope you follow along again to watch the new improved crawler build. Thanks

Edited by RichO
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Hi Rich,

that is a great subject and an excellent start you have made. :thumbsup: There are quite a few modellers here who will be watching your progress with enthusiasm. :popcorn:

Thank you for sharing your build with us.

Mike

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COLIN,

Thanks for taking a look at my build! I hope you keep following along with this long and complicated project.

BTW, I can't build this thing without wearing a magnifying headset, even at 1/72

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MIKE,

I'm glad to know that there are Britts that are interested in the NASA space program. Altho it is only a shadow of it's former self these days. I hope you got the info I sent you about the paper kit. I was a major challange to work on.

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CHARLEY420,

Glad you like!! I have seen some of your model work, it comes as a compliment to me from a great modeler about skill level. Thanks!!

Nice number, 420!

Edited by RichO
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Great work rich...simply great! I'd love to build this myself, but in 1/144 scale. You mentioned plans. Could you point me in the right direction to obtain a set? Anyway, keep up the good work and I agree with you about Edgar Mitchell, he's a VERY brave man!

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GORDEN,

Thanks for the nice words and taking a look at my build. Keep following, lots more to come.

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LINEY,

Are you crazy??(LOL). At 1/144 scale you couldn't even see half the parts. You make my eyes hurt just thinking about such a small scale! In order to get the plans for this build you have to go to MicroArtwork.com and pay for the model kit, and then scale to the size you want to work with. I started at a 1/96 scale, which is a great size, but it was just killing my eyes to work with.

I have nothing but admiration for Dr. Edgar Mitchell!! I do plan on doing another build later on to celebrate astronaught Gordon Cooper and the Mercury rocket and launch program. For the same reason also. He went to his grave 100% sure that we have visitors having see for himself and telling the world that it's all true!!

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OK ALL,

SO, some more of the build today. These photos are mostly of the underside.

These parts are to support the pipe chords that hold up the roof of this beast. All these pieces need to be installed from the bottom.

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This next photo is a view of the underside with no supports installed yet.

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In this photo I show the slots that the chord supports are to slide into.

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Here is a bottom shot with all the pipe chord supports installed.

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And here is what all the pipe chord supports look like all installed.

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Now with all the Pipe Chords supports installed, it's time to install the frame stiffeners. I will be using Evergreen angle strips at a 1.5mm size. these will slip into small gaps to help support the center structures of the beam construction.

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And here is where the angle stiffeners will be installed. I will go around the entire project and install these little angles just about everywhere that can't be seen after the Main Chassis is built. I feel that building this model out of styrene is so much stiffer than building out of paper, however I will follow procedure and add all the angles to make this extreamly ridgid and tight

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That's all for today. I'll be back with the underside beam installation next, so stay tuned to this channel and keep watching all. Thanks!!

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LINEY,

Let me know how things work out at MicroArtwork. Thanks for nice words, keep watching! Thanks

Edited by RichO
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Hi Rich,


your restart with sheet looks really cool, and you can see that it gives you back a lot of fun. cool.gif


Nothing against paper modeling, but that's now all much more stable and easier to handle, and on top of that at this comfortable scale. That must just make fun, right? gut.gif


Keep up the great work, this will become a monstrously powerful crawler for heavy traffic. zustimm.gif


hallo.gif

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COLIN,

Thanks for taking a look at my build! I hope you keep following along with this long and complicated project.

BTW, I can't build this thing without wearing a magnifying headset, even at 1/72

Hi Rich, I was an industrial modelmaker for 26 years one of the projects was a North Sea oil rig for Shell Oils, in 1:50 scale, something to your crawler. I take it you are aware of the Plastruct range of steel sections, very useful, especially their architectural range. They are moulded in ABS so you'll need methylene chlodride as a solvent.

Colin

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COLIN,

I am aware of Plastruct products. In fact I had seriously concidered useing there products to build this model with. However the construction process of this build was such that I could not use most of there products. I thought of using the "I" and "BOX" beams that they offer, but I would have to redesign the construction process to include these. And really I just did not want to make the build any more complicated than nessesary. If you look close, the Pipe Chord Supports are the center webs of the "I" beams and also run down the middle of the box beams for support. I will however use their other products like hex rods for bolt heads ...ect. Unfortunatly for me, I had already ordered the material for this build before I realized that Plastruct offers sheet styrene in a grey color. This would have saved me time to paint this thing.

And to let you know, I already use Methylene Chloride to weld these parts together. Some nasty stuff, but It works really good!! Thanks.

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MANFRED,

Thanks for the nice words. I thought I was having fun last time with the paper build, but this is really GREAT at this size. So much easyer to work with!!

TABIO,

Thanks for dropping in to see whats up. I'm going to need all the fans I can get to make it through this very large build. Thanks!

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HI ALL,

The construction continues today with the starting of the box beams on the underside of the Crawler.Construction wise, these box beams are much stronger than than the "I" beams and the entire bottom end of this machine is a box construction and has to hold everything else out of the dirt. In the real world the bottom of the Crawler is about a building "story" up in the air with many componants attached (that comes later).

So lets see what I have been working on the last couple of days

.

This first photo is of "C" corner. Nice and clean with tight welds.

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The next photo is the start of the box beam construction. The "box" is constructed of four individual sides, with the Pipe Chord Supports running down the middle. Constructing the beams in this mannor makes it possible to keep the Pipe Chord Supports together in a single piece rather than more individual parts. This makes construction much simpler.

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Here you can see how the box beam construction is proceeding. The open ends of the Crawler must need extra bracing here to support the weight of the MLP because ther is no body to help with this chore.

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In this photo you can see the extra support structure for the fuel tanks. The Crawler is up side down in this photo so you can see the reenforcing webs that help support the 2000 gallon capacity fule tanks.

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This IS looking into the belly of the beast!!

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So now I come to a piont that I have no more cut parts to build with. I will have to take the next several days to cut the new parts and clean for installing. While I'm cutting, the next delivery is on it's way to me, and I also have an Armory build that I'm in the middle of. So plenty to keep me busy for a while untill the next posting.

You can see in this next photo, a sample of the cutting that I have to do to proceed with the box beam construction. Just a taste.

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Thats all for now, I'll be back when I get my next shipment of supplies, Thanks All for viewing. Keep Building All!

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That is an awesome project. Well done so far. Your assembly work looks very clean which will help later in the build. I was completely unaware of the MicroArt product but will be getting one now. Maybe in 1/48th if yours works out....

But seriously 1/96 will be big enough I think. We all have a dream project it looks like you are actually going to build yours. Great stuff.

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SLEEPER,

Thanks!! This is a dream project for me, and it keeps getting bigger. I am now planning on trying to build the MSS ( Mobile Service Structure). That would be the Armming Tower. The MSS is the giant latice work structure that did all the services for the prep work befor launching.

471px-Saturn_V_and_service_structures_zp

I'm looking forward to years of self abuse!!

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Hi Rich,

I'm slowly worried about you, you're a dreamer, but not the only one, and everybody have to have dreams. gut.gif

omgsign.gif this is a monster project that you are planning, you've got a contract from the NASA?
After you've now built on your paper model for one year, you know all the steps by heart and you can benefit from it. cool.gif
I wish you a lot of perseverance and patience on the rocky road, and first of all a lot of fun. :thumbsup:
Do you already have drawings for the LUT and the MSS?
hallo.gif
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