Quarky Posted November 3, 2012 Share Posted November 3, 2012 Looking good - did you build the circuit yourself? Only comment is I reckon the off time should maybe be slightly longer? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted November 3, 2012 Author Share Posted November 3, 2012 I did yeah, ive been messing around with the resistors and capasitors for a bit trying to get a good speed, i might have another look and see what i can do but i like how it is Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
khimbar Posted November 3, 2012 Share Posted November 3, 2012 Where did you get your flasher chip if I can ask? I want to play with them now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted November 3, 2012 Author Share Posted November 3, 2012 I used a circuit diagram from DLM. Then changed the capasitor to change the blink rate Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted November 8, 2012 Author Share Posted November 8, 2012 (edited) I ended up filing and sanding off a lot of the original 'detail' in the lower secondary hull. The level of detail was appauling and because of the mould the panel lines were very shallow. I started by sanding off the detail on the part sloping up to the fan tail. This was then replaced with some plastic card. The PE detail for the base of the aft intermix chamber is then glued on. For PE parts that have to be precisely placed, the method I found very useful was to place them in the correct place (well duh!) without glue at first, then use a strip of masking tape to hold them in place. You can then peel the masking tape back, apply the glue (i just used plain old super glue) and then when you rest the masking tape back down the parts should be in the correct place. A little bit of filler is applied, and bit of sanding here and there: Forward intermix chamber: I then work a little more on the panel lines, and filling. I also attach the underside cargo bay doors, and rear landing strut bay doors: Then the forward bay doors: And finally, a coat of grey primer is applied: It still needs a small bit of filling at the front and on the phaser array, but I will do this later on. The picture below shows where the hole for the brass tubing stand will be drilled, and also where the lower anti collision beacon will be: As far as I can tell from references, this lower light does not flash, so it will not be hooked up to the flasher circuit, and I may just use the light from the inside lights rather than an independant LED. Keep checking back, I light it up next EDIT: Just a quick addition. Lit up the aft torpedo launchers.The orange LEDs were a little bright so I used 390ohm resistors instead of the usual 270, this took the edge off the brightness. They are wired up in series, and then covered with some aluminium tape. Edited November 9, 2012 by Chablar 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quarky Posted November 9, 2012 Share Posted November 9, 2012 Good to see she's coming along nicely - impressive work on the accurisation (if there is such a word!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted November 13, 2012 Author Share Posted November 13, 2012 Ive been cursed by Quarky's bad luck with Federation Starships. Upon drilling the hole for the brass tubing stand the ship suffered from a catastrophic structural integrity failure. It almost split completely in half... Its been fixed up and ive used some miliput to secure the tubing in the correct position, crude I know Two 3mm Superbright orange LEDs are secured for the forward torpedo launchers, wired up and then surrounded with insulation tape and aluminium tape to keep the light away from the main deflector. Ive also made another 'light trap' from cardboard and aluminium tape again. The deflector panel is then attached, and the LEDs look like this: For the main reflector I used a 5mm Superbright LED, filed flat to have a wider spread of light. I also made a light trap again from card and aluminium tape like so: And this is the result: Take care guys 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quarky Posted November 13, 2012 Share Posted November 13, 2012 Sweet! Good update. Can I ask is that how you will secure the brass tube or are you doing anything else? Something that's puzzling me as to how to a) secure it to the model and secure it to the base Want to avoid having to have to buy a tap and dye set. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted November 13, 2012 Author Share Posted November 13, 2012 Same here. I just drilled the hole .5mm larger than the tube, fixed it in place with some araldite, or 2 part resin and then used miliput to keep it in place. The idea being that the stress will be taken by the miliput rather than the join line on the secondary hull. Thats what i did with the enterprise and its worked fine. For the base ill probaby buy a brace of some sort and screw it in. A lot of my methods on this kit are a bit crude (miliput, cardboard bulkheads) but they work just fine and are a lot cheaper Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
khimbar Posted November 13, 2012 Share Posted November 13, 2012 Great work. When I finally get round to setting up my modelling space and start this kit I'll be stealing all your ideas. Just so you know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted November 13, 2012 Author Share Posted November 13, 2012 Lol i love the 'dont arrest me' grin. which ideas? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quarky Posted November 13, 2012 Share Posted November 13, 2012 Cheap is good... This hobby already costs me more than I'd like to admit to my better half... Thanks for your help! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted November 14, 2012 Author Share Posted November 14, 2012 Its ok, its the same with me. Plus its all inside the kit anyway, so if it does the job right who cares if its from a colgate box? Lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted November 17, 2012 Author Share Posted November 17, 2012 Lighting in the engineering hull is now complete. The fan tail and warp nacelles are glued on to the secondary hull and the gaps filled in like so. The primer will need touched up obviously before the main paint is applied, but onto that later. The wires for the fantail section, torpedo launchers and navigational deflector are wired into a piece of strip board as a hub. Then I set about making this evil contraption.... Its a piece of plastic card, with one side labelled as positive, and the other as negative. The LEDs are wired onto it in parallel through one 270ohm resistor. I hooked this up to the central hub in the engineering hull, and later decided to add two more 5mm super bright LEDs to increase the amount of light going to the windows. I used a piece of the kit's sprue to make a pylon to attach the lighting rig too, the photos below shows it with the additional 2 LEDs and also attached into place. I'm also going to stick in a second pylon to support the forward section of the rig. I also stuck the central hub down with masking tape, and covered it with aluminium tape to optimise the light distribution. And this is what it looks like when lit up: You may note that the light looks different from different angles, this is because of the lack of windows in the ship, you can also see the wires through the windows if you look carefully enough. This will be solved after painting and varnishing by Micro Kristal Klear, which will be put into the windows and will catch the light bouncing around the ship and stream if through the window more evenly, if that makes any sense at all . Let me know what you all think Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
khimbar Posted November 17, 2012 Share Posted November 17, 2012 (edited) Lol i love the 'dont arrest me' grin. which ideas? All of 'em! More great work, thanks for the updates. Edited November 17, 2012 by khimbar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted November 24, 2012 Author Share Posted November 24, 2012 (edited) Finally, another update. I've got her together at last. Just a few pictures of the hull before I put her together. The 3 parts of the ship (fantail section, primary and secondary hull) are modular in the sense that they work independently. So they are all wired together into a piece of strip board. The upper primary hull, under the masking tape section behind the bridge is located the new flasher circuit. With some help from my friend Ian Lawrence, we thought the best bet was to use a chaser circuit, but leave all the other ports empty. So instead of lighting one LED after the next, it only lights the one at regular intervals. There is a video below to show this, but its a lot better than the standard 555 IC circuit, and i've got to say this one was quite a challenge. I then put her together with a little masking tape to take some shots of the completed lights. Next step is obviously to glue her together, fill her and stop light bleeding, clean her up. I've also got to add some detailing to the warp nacelles that is missing from the kit, but more on that a different day. Anyway, this is the completed lighting: Forgive the blurry shots, i'll try and get some better ones later on. And here is the video showing the strobes. Take care guys Edited November 24, 2012 by Chablar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quarky Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 Looks amazing mate...proper job! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Davec_24 Posted December 13, 2012 Share Posted December 13, 2012 Looking great, that! Looking forward to seeing her "in the flesh" over Christmas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted January 11, 2013 Author Share Posted January 11, 2013 Glad to report after a 6 week hiatus over christmas im commncing work on her again. Masking is done and the first layers of paint to follow in the next few days Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quarky Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 <blockquote class='ipsBlockquote'data-author="Chablar" data-cid="1212111" data-time="1357872601"><p> Glad to report after a 6 week hiatus over christmas im commncing work on her again. Masking is done and the first layers of paint to follow in the next few days</p></blockquote> Yay! Looking forward to your update Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 (edited) Finally managed to get a spare few hours after Christmas, I must apologise for the lack of updates and hope you didn't all lose interest. Ive finished filling her in, masking her, and have applied the final primer coat, admittedly I should have left her until this stage to prime her only the once to try and preserve detail. I am however quite pleased with how smooth she has turned out, it really is a nicely detailed kit and the accurising (again, if that's even a word...) looks very nice.  I've got just a couple of pictures to show how she looks at the moment. The next step is to paint a couple of coats of my base grey, and then begin work on the panels on the hull. Im still toying up whether or not to pre-shade her, what do you guys think? At first glance it should look really good, and there is a lot of opportunity to do it on the kit due to their being a large amount of recesses. But after looking at the ship in the series it looks as though the panel pattern will be sufficient. Anyway, I hope you all had a great Christmas, and keep checking back for more piccies  NOTE: For some reason it's not letting me post my pictures properly so I'll just have to put up the links to my photostream and you can follow those  http://www.flickr.com/photos/84675628@N07/8375707833/in/photostream/  http://www.flickr.com/photos/84675628@N07/8375706979/in/photostream/# Edited January 13, 2013 by Chablar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clift Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Very impressive! I can't even imagine all the work involved drilling out those windows alone. Hat's off to you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barry136 Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Sold me on this one. A fastastic build. I must find one and make it my next project. Well Done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted January 14, 2013 Author Share Posted January 14, 2013 Its a brilliant kit, definitey worth a buy. I've stuck a few more pictures of her lit up on my photo stream if you want to see: Â http://www.flickr.com/photos/84675628@N07/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chablar Posted March 14, 2013 Author Share Posted March 14, 2013 Started on the paintwork. First she's given a coat of Light Ghost Grey.Then I get to work on the panelling. I've got small piece of card and cut a few different sized rectangles into it, this is then used as a mask in certain places to get the desired effect on the panels. For this I use Dark Ghost Grey. Pictures below.Without FlashWith FlashI'm happy with the result of this. It looks just as subtle as it should do, and as you can see the result looks different with and without flash, and will definitely look different in natural light so I'll take some more pictures in the morning and see how she looks. Let me know what you thinkRich Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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