bianfuxia Posted January 17, 2018 Share Posted January 17, 2018 Well, I'm joining in with my Real Space Models Gemini and Agena kit which I will do as Gemini X. Gemini X was the first successful Gemini mission with Agena booster - Neil Armstrong's earlier mission did manage to dock and boost with Agena but there was a problem with the spacecraft so they had to abort the mission and other than great piloting skill they may not have made it. On some of the other missions the Agena didn't work. Gemini X was commanded by John Young who recently passed away - he was perhaps the most experienced pilot astronaut ever. I say "pilot astronaut" to distinguish him from those astronauts and cosmonauts who have spent many hundreds of days in orbit on Mir or the ISS. John Young wasn't in space anywhere near as long, but has flown more types of spacecraft and types of mission than anyone else. He flew two Gemini missions, and two Apollo missions during which he flew both the command and lunar modules and he also flew the Space Shuttle for the first time ever. Gemini X was co-piloted by Michael Collins, who did a spacewalk on the mission, and who then flew the command module on the Apollo 11 mission which was the first to land on the Moon. He later wrote the best astronaut memoir of the Apollo era (if not the best ever), "Carrying the Fire". But more important than that, for me anyway, he wrote a book for kids called "Flying to the Moon and Other Strange Places". I read it as a boy maybe 1,000 times and it set me up for a lifetime of rewarding interest in spaceflight which I am now enjoying passing on to my young daughter. At two, she could already indicate her preference for 747s and whenever she sees a picture of an astronaut she yells, "Spacegirl!". I'm away on business so I won't get started for a week or so. The kit I am using is a resin set from Real Space Models. The following pic is my own, which I provided to modelingmadness so don't worry about the copyright marking. 12 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colin W Posted January 17, 2018 Share Posted January 17, 2018 Great story and thanks for sharing. I was at the Smithsonian in the summer and they're displaying one of the Gemini craft. It's not very big considering the time spent inside. It's always good to see some variety in a group build but not often we see space craft included. I look forward to seeing you complete this. Colin W 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bianfuxia Posted January 17, 2018 Author Share Posted January 17, 2018 Ha, thanks! I'll do my best to complete it but I will certainly start it! I'm blessed with a beautiful but very time consuming almost-three-year old daughter. Let's see how I go! I saw that Gemini at the Smithsonian recently too - it's cool and as you say, really small. Jim Lovell (I think) said his 2 week mission in it was like living for a fortnight in a trashcan. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SleeperService Posted January 17, 2018 Share Posted January 17, 2018 4 hours ago, bianfuxia said: Ha, thanks! I'll do my best to complete it but I will certainly start it! I'm blessed with a beautiful but very time consuming almost-three-year old daughter. Let's see how I go! I saw that Gemini at the Smithsonian recently too - it's cool and as you say, really small. Jim Lovell (I think) said his 2 week mission in it was like living for a fortnight in a trashcan. Effort expended on the young will, in my experience, bring immense rewards for both parties later in life. Further to my post in chat I'm so happy that you're giving it a go. I also agree about Collins' book. Mine is looking very sorry for itself so I might get another copy. Great introduction I hope it all goes well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevej60 Posted January 17, 2018 Share Posted January 17, 2018 Great choice ,we hardly ever have real space subject's in these GB's. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bianfuxia Posted January 23, 2018 Author Share Posted January 23, 2018 (edited) So, last night I thought I'd get started. Just after I took these pics, something came up and I had to set it aside. But maybe I can get started tonight or in a day or two. I also found my picture of the Gemini at the Air & Space in DC, added here for interest. The kit is pretty basic as you can see. The large white thing is a sheet of gold paper (this shows the backside of it, sorry). Edited January 23, 2018 by bianfuxia 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bianfuxia Posted January 23, 2018 Author Share Posted January 23, 2018 Well, my wife is busy and my kid is on her allocated 15 minutes of screen time (tight ship around here). Peppa Pig, what else. So I grabbed two books from my very small collection of books on spaceflight to see if they had any useful pics for my build. They are reproduced here just as snaps from the book but they're all NASA photos and therefore on the public record, free of copyright for non-commercial use. the two books are America in Space, which I've had a while, gift from my amazing wife, and Moonshots, which my brother kindly got me just before Christmas. Can't honestly say I held out much hope for pictures that would help much, and indeed, these both have these famous Gemini images (these are in Moonshots but they're also mostly in AIS). But the Moonshots book had this fantastic view of Agena (the Agena was a "docking target - the crew would fly up to it, practice docking, and then if successful it would then boost them to a higher orbit. Obviously learning to do all this was essential to learning how to fly to the Moon, land on it, then rendezvous and dock with the Command Module or mothership to get back home). And America in Space had this obviously posed shot taken from within the Gemini simulator. What a simulator! Bear in mind it was the early-mid 1960s. That Agena in the window was real - a little model! But it certainly looks as real as a CGI kind of modern simulator. Maybe more so - like how the models in original and recent Star Wars movies look better than the CGI in the middle three "films". Hahaha. Last of all, here's Neil Armstrong after their Gemini mission. i am so getting a new pair of Connies. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bianfuxia Posted January 23, 2018 Author Share Posted January 23, 2018 AIS also has these pretty cool pics for inspiration. The second one is Young and Collins after Gemini X, which is the one I am building. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bianfuxia Posted January 23, 2018 Author Share Posted January 23, 2018 And later tonight I did some painting. These are just the first go-overs. I am going to need to do some sanding/cutting on the small rocket motor section, though I have decided not to spend any time sanding out minor blemishes on the flat or curved surfaces. Sanding sucks and sanding resin sucks even more! The white sections have been painted flat white though you can't tell. Many different panels on that main tube will be silver and I think I'll use a mix of silver paint and some silver adhesive foil I have. the detail on the crew part of the spacecraft (what you call that, the crew module?) is actually pretty nice. It should look good once I paint on some more details like the prominent red lines and the windows. Sorry the pics are a bit blurry - cellphone. I'm not one to spend a lot of time on the photography until it's finished, as I get little enough time as it is! 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PZRGREN Posted January 23, 2018 Share Posted January 23, 2018 I think I will get me one of those sets!! following with interest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colin W Posted January 26, 2018 Share Posted January 26, 2018 Looking Great already. Thanks for posting the pics from NASA, it really puts it in perspective. Colin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bianfuxia Posted January 27, 2018 Author Share Posted January 27, 2018 Tonight I spent most of my modeling time looking at this and other pictures to try to work out how to scratchbuild the gold coloured framework on the rear or motor end of the Agena. You can see it in this cropped image. I even had my ruler and protractor out on another side on image, trying to work it out, then spent a while drawing on paper before I had test run. I got nowhere with that as it turns out - well, let's be honest, it didn't turn out, I've known it since high school - that I am pretty hopeless at maths. So my supporting beams were way too long. Back to the drawing board. Here is the stretched sprue I am working with. Gave myself a headspin preparing that tonight. Plastic fumes are a lot worse than I remember. The other day I also used a blade to clean up that resin part. It looks a lot tidier now. 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bianfuxia Posted January 30, 2018 Author Share Posted January 30, 2018 today my new Tamiya tape arrived from taobao so soon I can move on to the next step which is masking all those horizontal lines on the main body of the Agena. Last night I gave the Gemini spacecraft another coat of matt black. No need for a photo of course. Still no further luck on the stretched sprue framework. Saving it for a time when I'm not so tired (because: fatherhood...). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Black Knight Posted March 10, 2018 Share Posted March 10, 2018 How are you getting on with this? We're not far off the half-way point in the GB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bianfuxia Posted March 11, 2018 Author Share Posted March 11, 2018 See above: "because fatherhood". Add in family holiday, business trip, wife and child in hit-n-run bike crash, wife in hospital for unrelated operation. I'll get back to it in the next week or two. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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