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Y-wing- 1/48 scale scratchbuild diary


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hey this is great work - the boys at ILM will be proud to see their work continues to live on ..

 

I did not know this, but having read my 2nd hand .99p Dorling Kindersley Star Wars Cross Sections book last night (maybe a tad sad for a 50 year old's bed time reading but I'm not ashamed), the Y wing was manufactured with panel covers to enclose all these lovely bits of detail - however due to the amount of work the Rebel Alliance had to continually undertake, they chose to permanently remove the outer panel covers for ease of repair ... and, no 2 Y wings were the same... apparently.

 

Does this make me a nerd or just plain old and sad ? !

 

 

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Hi all,

 

For those of you who have chosen to reply, I thank you for all the kind words and I'm glad you are enjoying this thread!

 

For Gimme,  I have a couple of buddies who did not care to be referred to as Model Geeks.  They are both big fans of American football, so I asked a few questions.  Do you know the players?  "Yes."  Do you keep up with all the statistics?  "Yes."  Do you belong to a formal tailgating group?  "Of course!"  I see, I said; you guys are football geeks!  They started to get a little steamed, then cooled down; they had to admit that they are indeed football and modeling geeks.  Personally, I am happy to admit I'm a model geek; everyone is a geek about something.  So mate, no need to feel old and sad.  Embrace your inner geek and seek happiness where it lies.

 

As for the Y-wing, it is certainly true that no two movie model Y-wings were exactly the same, although for the most part they are actually pretty close for anyone who is not a Star Wars fan geek.  Remember too that no one who worked on those models or the movie itself knew that it would go Nova when released.  At that point, it became time to cash in with merchandise, media, models, and eventually, nostalgia.  That led to the novels, the cross sections books, and tons of other things.  They had to create new answers to the "why do the ships look like that?" questions.  And that, in my opinion, gives some modelers fits and others freedom.  There were something like five studio filming Y-wing models plus a few purpose-built pyrotechnic ships designed to be blown up.  A generation of modelers continue to figure out what pieces from what kits were used on each of those models and then recreate a particular Y-wing in studio scale.  I have to admire the time and effort and money that takes, but I have always wanted a smaller, less expensive version.  That said, I have to admit I've poured a lot of time and effort into my Y-wing, so maybe it's not so different after all.  To each his own!

 

Cheers all, Jim

Edited by Jim Kiker
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Lovely work Jim - a real inspiration.  I've been wanting a 1:48 Y-Wing since the Finemolds 1:48 X-Wing came out, and it doesn't look like I'll be getting my wish any time soon unless I rob your house later this year :ninja:  Keep up the fight! :thumbsup:

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  • 1 month later...

Hi all,

 

In the last episode, Our Hero was ready to assemble the vectral pieces, complete the cockpit and nose section, and begin final finishing…  Actually, by mid-May 2017 I was getting further and further behind schedule; I was planning on taking the finished model to WonderFest, one of the really neat modeling conventions anywhere.  This year the ‘Fest was held on the first weekend of June.  With two weeks left, it was still possible but I needed to get the front LED’s in place and add the fiber optics with the cockpit tub mounted.  That was not without its own issues.  With about four days left, I hit a snag in getting the upper nose into place; while I was thoroughly bummed I knew I just needed to leave her unfinished rather than completely screwing her up in a rush.

 

I previously showed a picture of the crew while still in work.  Here they are verifying the fit of them and the front seater's instrument panel.

 

38708165995_8586acf9b0_z.jpg

 

Once they were mostly complete I used some tan paint to prime them, then brush painted the base colors of orange (a bit faded in this case)and off-white for the back seater’s chest protector; the pilot has opted not to wear that bit of kit since it was not comfortable for her to wear.  Medium Sea Grey was used for the harness and parachute straps, dark gray for the chest packs, and so on.  I masked off the figures’ heads and spray painted the helmets a very pale gray.  I painted the faces with a base coat of flesh and a darker shade around the eyes, lips, etc.; I chose not to try to paint the eyes based on a figure painting guide I found and I like how that turned out. 

 

If you look back at the figures in work, you will see a fine white line across their faces; my plan was to mix up some clear epoxy, add some clear yellow to it, and just drop it into the top half of the faces, relying on the .010” plastic rod I had glued on to “catch” the epoxy and make a semi-clear visor.  It nearly worked pretty well.  Meanwhile, the seats got a coat of Medium Sea Grey, olive green padding, a gloss clear coat, some darker washes, and a clear flat coat before going into the cockpit.  As an aside, a couple of weeks after these pictures were made my buddy Wally informed me that Star Wars helmets cannot be a single color without some markings on them.  So I dutifully dug around in my decal stash and came up with some tiny round decals.  Here the crew is nearly done

 

39329349682_7cd8a62411_z.jpg

 

Next up was to build the instrument panels.  They were made with .015” clear for the main panels, with .020” solid rear pieces (actually the back side of the instrument panel) and .040” strip glued around the edges to make a shallow box.  I glued an additional .010” sheet onto the clear sheet that had been pre-drilled to make holes to represent the gauges. 

 

38708166185_796847d93a_z.jpg

 

The gauges were taped off and the whole box painted off black.  I had a set of old instrument decals which are black faces with the instrument markings left clear.  These I applied individually; this was a struggle with old decals that did not want to stay put.  If you scroll back up to the previous picture, you will see the finished panels as well as the crew.

 

I glued the cockpit tub into the nose, having added shims and made the cockpit floor as level and true as I could.  Once the instrument panels were ready, they were glued into place and holes were drilled into the side edges, going through the original side pieces of the main fuselage.  With that done I simply threaded one fiber optic strand into each end of the assemblies.  The plan was for the light to splash around inside the boxes and gently illuminate the dials from behind.  That almost worked but the light is very dim and will largely go un-noticed unless you look in from the rear angles.  Ah well… two strands might have done much better!  I then added two fiber optic strands on each side console of the pilot and the WSO, adding a heavy coat of clear red and clear yellow to the ends.  These turned out as desired, visible from each side but not bright.  In my experience cockpit lighting is mostly set to be dim to lessen the impact on the crew’s night vision.  In any event, to be honest it was a struggle to get everything into place; if the fiber optics remain unbroken through this time next year I will be very thankful!  The last cockpit items were the front coaming set over the pilot’s instrument panel, and the control sticks.  The sticks were made similar to modern fighters, a central short stick above a fixed pedestal (and by far the easiest way to fit a control stick into a cramped cockpit).  Being in a hurry at that point, I did not take a picture of the nose with the fiber optics in place before the top of the nose was glued on; still, you can see some of the strands in the picture below.

 

38481599105_2923df0498_z.jpg

 

Alternating between the front and the rear end, I figured out a way to build the rear maneuvering vectrals inside the rings.  These are only a general match for the usual Y-wing units, but I did design them as if they will work as thrust diverters mimicking the use of rudders and elevators on a real vehicle.  Remember too that these units should be a bit beefier to handle maneuvering with a higher bomb load.  The vertical pieces make up the rudder and a fixed forward support unit while the horizontal pieces represent the elevators.  Each vertical and horizontal piece has two thicknesses of .015” sheet making the skins, with .030” spacers in between; the horizontal pieces were assembled and then cut in half.  Here are the pieces ready for assembly. The assembly on the right is just pieced together for a fit check; not bad!

 

24697062367_2f6db0c43e_z.jpg

 

The vertical one piece assemblies were installed first with two pieces of .030” brass tube mounted from the outside in and pushed part of the way in.  The horizontal pieces were held in place on one side, and a single piece of .030” brass was used to go fully across the span of the elevators (through the rudder assembly).  This gives the two assemblies a bit more rigidity.  The upper and lower vertical pieces were then pushed home, all glued in with epoxy.  If you look at how thin the outer rings are (having been vacuformed, remember), I needed to build as much strength into these units as I could manage; even so they will always be somewhat fragile.  On the other hand, they do look pretty much in scale which pleases me a great deal.  Here are the finished assemblies, minus the inner rings which will be added soon.  Upper left shows the rudder on the back side; middle right shows the "front face" with the elevator pieces facing forward and the front of the rudder assembly.

 

38481593555_9811580941_z.jpg

 

See you all next time!

Cheers, Jim

Edited by Jim Kiker
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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi all,

What with long summer and a big yard to care for, not to mention the strange case of Photobucket, I took an unexpectedly long break from the Y-wing.  I have now picked things up again, so welcome back!  At the last posting, I managed to get the upper nose section glued on, but with a small error.  The back edge should have had an overhang at the rear but wound up almost flush with the rear bulkhead , as well as being a bit messy.

 

36099823571_10346a776a_z.jpg

 

After much thought, I decided to make a strip about 1/16” wide to fit from one side to the other.  The piece runs straight across and kicks forward on both ends to match the line of the rear upper edge. This results in a tiny edge to edge surface for gluing; to give some additional gluing area I made a “reinforcing plate” for the center back of the bulkhead from .020” plastic sheet.   I chose to paint, attach, and finish this little plate before trying to glue on the edge piece.  I also cut out the two nose side pieces and glued them in place and competed several rounds of fill, sand, and smooth; I thought I would need to have the rear ends in place to give a bit more gluing surface for the edge strip at the ends. 

 

38726606115_01fe6742c7_z.jpg

 

I also added a short length of solder on the outer sections of the strip to represent some pipes running just under the trailing edge in order to provide some extra gluing surfaces along the outer ends. In the following image you can see the faired in upper trailing edge of the nose.  I also set the vacuformed canopy partially in place; it needs a tiny bit of spreading to seat fully against the upper nose area.  The windows have been taped up and once I glue the canopy into place I will be ready to paint the entire front end.

27845598549_8e675e4574_z.jpg

 

Well, it took a while to get the sides of the nose in place and sanding things down was tricky due to the thin plastic, but I've got that done and the added trailing edge looks good; a coat of paint to serve as a primer will tell the tale.  More to come!

Cheers, Jim

 

Edited by Jim Kiker
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  • 2 weeks later...
On 12/05/2017 at 2:05 PM, Jim Kiker said:

Hi all,

 

For those of you who have chosen to reply, I thank you for all the kind words and I'm glad you are enjoying this thread!

 

For Gimme,  I have a couple of buddies who did not care to be referred to as Model Geeks.  They are both big fans of American football, so I asked a few questions.  Do you know the players?  "Yes."  Do you keep up with all the statistics?  "Yes."  Do you belong to a formal tailgating group?  "Of course!"  I see, I said; you guys are football geeks!  They started to get a little steamed, then cooled down; they had to admit that they are indeed football and modeling geeks.  Personally, I am happy to admit I'm a model geek; everyone is a geek about something.  So mate, no need to feel old and sad.  Embrace your inner geek and seek happiness where it lies.

 

As for the Y-wing, it is certainly true that no two movie model Y-wings were exactly the same, although for the most part they are actually pretty close for anyone who is not a Star Wars fan geek.  Remember too that no one who worked on those models or the movie itself knew that it would go Nova when released.  At that point, it became time to cash in with merchandise, media, models, and eventually, nostalgia.  That led to the novels, the cross sections books, and tons of other things.  They had to create new answers to the "why do the ships look like that?" questions.  And that, in my opinion, gives some modelers fits and others freedom.  There were something like five studio filming Y-wing models plus a few purpose-built pyrotechnic ships designed to be blown up.  A generation of modelers continue to figure out what pieces from what kits were used on each of those models and then recreate a particular Y-wing in studio scale.  I have to admire the time and effort and money that takes, but I have always wanted a smaller, less expensive version.  That said, I have to admit I've poured a lot of time and effort into my Y-wing, so maybe it's not so different after all.  To each his own!

 

Cheers all, Jim

I have somehow managed to keep hold of the nearly-disintegrated copy of "The World of Star Wars" magazine that I got when I saw a Star Wars and Empire Strikes Back double bill in Aberdeen in '81 or '82. My impression of it that it is partly is re-used content from a pre-Empire publication with a few extra articles written after the release of Empire. Its article "The Spaceships of Star Wars" (which seems very much like a pre-Empire article) has the following to say about the Y Wing:

Quote

Chopped and hot-rodded attack gunships of the Alliance. Body shell has been stripped aft of cockpit by Rebel mechanics for ease of access. Twin laser cannon in cockpit turret.

Even back then there was some thought being given about not just how ships should look but also why they look like that. I think it's cool how even when it was an obscure low budget production the people creating Star Wars were world (galaxy) building while they were also building props.

 

In addition, George Lucas was into hot rods, cruising and street racing in his early years, so stripped-back and modified ships like the Millennium Falcon and the Y Wings could well be those that are closest to his heart.

 

Edit: I really shouldn't have forgotten to say how amazing this build is!

Edited by ChrisL
I had failed to provide the well deserved compliment to Jim for his amazing build.
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  • 3 weeks later...

Hi all,

 

It's time and past for another update to my Y-wing.  I finished work on the nose section and glued the canopy in place.  You may recall that I made a shallow raised lip around the cockpit.  I chose to mix up some two part epoxy, spread it along the inside edge of the entire canopy, then gently set it into place and taped down the front and rear ends of the canopy.  Almost no squeeze out occurred, and I think and hope I got a continuous seal all the way around the canopy. I used the tape lines I laid on the canopy earlier to add masking for the front, rear, and side windows as you can see below; this is the last time we will be able to see the crew very well.  With all that done, I used clear cling-wrap and tape to mask off the rear of the model prior to painting; it saved a ton of time and masking tape and has served well through all the base color painting.

 

28414894129_bd897560f7_z.jpg

 

First up was to paint the canopy with it's interior color and also put some primer on the nose.  I chose a medium blue gray paint (same as one of the shades in the interior) to do both jobs at once.  This revealed a number of small spots along the edges of the nose that needed more filling and sanding.  This gets us to this point:

 

39297020955_d8cb37b656_z_d.jpg

 

Next, it was finally time for some base paint which I applied to the entire nose.

 

28414893799_dcbd836ae9_z_d.jpg

 

As you can see, it's starting to look like the front end of a Y-wing!  Next time we will continue with masking and spraying the Yellow "swooshes" and the canopy will get its main color coat.  Stay tuned!

 

Cheers, Jim

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  • 2 weeks later...

Good evening all,

 

At this point the Y-wing’s nose section had been painted in the base pale gray color.  Painting the yellow-gold “swooshes” and the canopy are next.  Using my scale plans, I laid out the lines for the swooshes.  I made several copies of these in case they were needed.  My buddy Boz then laid out some 2” Tamiya tape on a cutting board.  The swoosh shape was cut out, received some tacky glue, and was then pressed down onto the tape.  The shape was cut into the tape by hand.  Then we turned another swoosh upside down to get a mirror image and cut a new piece of tape, then repeated the process twice more.  The result is a three-piece set of tapes for each swoosh, and enough repeats to do the top and bottom of the nose.  All these pieces were cut a bit “long” to give some wiggle room; once the pieces were in place, the rest of the front end was taped off.  With these fairly simple shapes, the swoosh masks could be cut by hand, albeit a professionally trained one (not mine!), but could have been passed to one of the professional masking makers out on the internet.  I used a dark yellow shade of paint and laid on the swooshes.  Shortly after paint application I carefully peeled off the masking to let the painted edges settle a bit; this helps keep me from having noticeable ridges of paint along the masked lines.

 

Once the swooshes cured, I masked off around the canopy and covered the rest of the nose and painted the canopies, using a mixed shade similar to RAF Medium Sea Gray.  Here is a look at the top of the nose with all this painting done.

38579553240_819946de8f_z_d.jpg

 

Now it is time to do some weathering.  First up was to put an acrylic gloss clear coat over the solvent-based paints to seal the whole nose.  Thanks to my deeply scribed panel lines and the dark-ish undercoat, the lines were visible but not as uniform as I prefer, so I mixed a wash of medium gray-blue using oil paint and naphtha (lighter fluid) and added that to all the panel lines in a pin wash.  They actually look darker than I normally prefer (due to the depth of the scribing), but they fit into the Star Wars universe pretty well so that was good enough.  Next I did some paint chipping.  I used the pale gray base coat on the swooshes and a darker gray to do chips in the pale gray base color, all done by dry brushing.  The torpedo blast tubes got a very thin coat of dark gray paint followed by some pastels.  I later sprayed some clear gloss to seal that and added another layer of pastels in and sealed it again.  I’m not entirely satisfied with them, but I do not want to get them overdone.  Here is the lower nose after the first couple of weathering passes.

 

38579552960_35cb04f81e_z_d.jpg

 

And here is the top of the nose.

 

39493292025_fce62c9939_z_d.jpg

 

I added pastels here and there around the nose to create smudging and some sort of dirty stains, trying to give the impression of dirt and gunk being blown back when the vehicle passes through atmosphere.  The trick is to not be symmetrical; sort of a logical but abstract effect.  Applying the pastels with a small, stiff brush I use for dry brushing gives very subtle effects even when I use straight black pastel.  I added more small paint chipping on the left side of the nose.  The canopies open up to the right, so the left side gets a lot of foot traffic resulting in more chipping and accumulation of dirt.  Since the swooshes were fairly dark, I took some white pastel and brushed it over parts of the yellow to lighten it up a bit and blend them into the overall paint.  Here is the bottom again...

 

38578915230_ae0fc63acf_z_d.jpg

 

Finally, I applied some chipping along the bottom edges of the canopy, and used colored pencils to add wear to the canopies’ edges.  I masked off the dividing point between the front windscreen and the two canopy sections and drew on the panel lines with a sharpened, soft leaded pencil.  The canopies and the rest of the nose then got a clear flat acrylic finishing coat.  Besides sealing everything in, that also flattened the metallic sheen of the pencil lines, turning them into normal-looking joint lines.  Note that the finish is just a touch off of dead flat; once I got that done I really liked the look versus “dead flat” so I quit while I was ahead!  And now the moment of truth was at hand.  I peeled away the masking of the cockpit windows.  To my relief and happiness, there was no hint of overspray having gotten into the cockpit during painting.  There are a few spots on the outside of the canopy that need a bit of clean up where the masks did not stay quite snug on the surface, but that is not a big issue.  Sierra Hotel!

 

38578915560_324b64648d_z_d.jpg

 

I'm getting towards the end of the journey now.  The rear vectrals are assembled and will soon be mounted to the booms.  There are lots of detail pieces to be made and added, but it's all straight forward.  Onward!

 

Cheers, Jim

 

 

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This is the first time I've seen this thread and have now just caught up. Firstly, thank you so much for taking the time to replace the photos so that people like me can catch up on your amazing work. Secondly, this is incredible. I am extremely envious of your ability to scratch build, but am grateful for you sharing this so that I hopefully learn how it's done.

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great to see this back on the work bench - looks fantastic

 

I went to the Star Wars Identities display at the O2 in London twice last year to see the display of SW film miniatures - sadly there was No Y wing on display which was a great shame as the Y's were always my favourites of the original Alliance ships. Great to see you have the time and energy to recreate one

 

May the Force be with you, Always

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  • 3 weeks later...

Gentlemen,

 

Thank you very much for the words of encouragement, they are much appreciated!  We are on the home stretch now, I have painted the insides of the vectral ring assemblies.  They will be mounted at the ends of the struts and those little assemblies on each mounting will be added a piece at a time.

 

Meantime, here are a few shots of the current state, something of a dress rehearsal before the final curtain rises.  First, an overall shot showing the nose as finished and the top of almost the entire ship.

 

Y-nose top fini 2 s

 

I also wanted to checkout how the lighting looks, so here is a picture of the cockpit area taken in low light.

 

Y-front quarter lit s

 

And finally, here is a shot of the engines lit up; if you look carefully you can make out the dim lighting in the cockpit as well.

 

Y- engines lit vectrals to go s

 

Sorry chaps; the cockpit lights, especially the instrument panels, are quite dim and do not show up hardly at all here.  In any case, there will be more to show when I have gotten the vectral rings mounted.  That's all for now!

 

Cheers, Jim

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ditto to the above - stunning work - nice to have something of this incredible level over on this forum as opposed to the RPF site which is where I would normally expect to find a scratch build of the same (now you are going to tell me it on the RPF too..)

 

Looks simply amazing - shame you are on the other side of the pond and that we very likely wont be seeing it at any UK shows once completed (I assume...)

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  • 3 weeks later...

Good evening all,

At this stage the model is complete accept for the vectral rings and their maneuvering surfaces.  The plan all along was to complete the T-bar structural pieces with a flat section at the very ends.  I then bent that flat piece to match the curvature of the vectral ring, yielding four contact points for each ring.  One thing I did not do well is work the stiff brass into a really snug fit on the outside of the rings; that came back to haunt me later.

 

39411047930_6bcb9d56f7_z_d.jpg

 

In any case, it became time to mount the rings and build the little “piston” sub-assemblies that sit on the rings at the end of each of the booms.  I chose epoxy to provide some joint strength and to fill in gaps between the brass bits and the plastic rings.  I mixed the epoxy and applied it to the underside of the struts’ ends, slid the rings in between the struts, and gently raised them into a vertical attitude and slid them into the bent strut ends.  Here is the ring assembly in place.

 

41221264101_edb8385610_z_d.jpg

 

After the fact, I found that the epoxy did not “stick” so well to the rings; my assumption is that they were too smooth.  But given that the rings were vacuformed and about .015” thick, there was not enough material there to do any significant sanding to rough up the mounting points.  So it was Gorilla super glue to the rescue, and I’m hoping the finished pieces will be able to stand an occasional glancing blow.

 

As shown in the picture above, the final task back here is to build “piston” sub-assemblies over the end of each strut.  As you can see it consists of 10 pieces.  

 

The two vertical sides are cut from .015” sheet.  The top cross bar is 3.32” rod and is glued into place first to give the sides something to hold on to.  The sides are then glued in place.  The main piece of the piston is 3/32” plastic tube and is added next.  1/16” rod makes the lower cross piece of the piston and is added next, and then the lower piece of the piston itself made with .060” (nearly 1/16”) half round stock is added to complete the insides of the assembly.  On the outer sides of the assembly I have a strip of .030” x .030” stock to hide gaps at the bottom ends of the side pieces and lend a little support to the assembly.  Finally I created a shape from .010” plastic sheet to somewhat match the look of the units found on the movie props.

 

Here is a picture of a movie prop ( the one which was given to producer Alan Ladd) showing these rear piston assemblies for comparison.  Given the half-studio scale I’m working in, I did have to simplify the assembly somewhat.

 

27347243198_ded136303c_z_d.jpg

 

Believe me, if I ever do something like this again, I will learn how to cast and reproduce bits like this in resin rather than building them up from individual, tiny pieces!  So, I have now completed three of these piston sub-assemblies which means I only have five more to go.  Then it is the last of the painting and a little pastels/weathering to indicate hard use.  And then she will be done!

Cheers, Jim

Edited by Jim Kiker
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Really fantastic work, as has been the ongoing theme of this build. I can't quite tell what you mean by simplifying the assembly compared to the half-studio scale. To my eye, I would say yours look slightly more detailed. Either way, yours is absolutely stunning, and I'm in awe. Thank you for sharing.

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Hi James,

 

Sharp eyes you have there.  I had a different picture of the vectral rings from a different filming model, then at the last changed to the one I posted.  Wouldn't you know it- the piston assemblies are a bit different between the two movie models.  In the other picture the pistons are in three sections.  Who would have thought?  :-)

 

Good catch!

 

Cheers, Jim

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