voozet Posted February 3, 2023 Share Posted February 3, 2023 I don't have the enthusiasm to finish my current projects, but I'm tempted by the workbench (apparently I'm best at doing rather than finishing 😉). So I started another project. The intention is to build an armed low-wing hover/jet with a vertical profile (height greater than length). The shape on the front is supposed to roughly resemble an inverted T). It will be a combination of trashbash kitbash and scratchbuild, because I want to use scrap and spare parts, but to compose it well I also need a lot of styrene constructions. A few days ago I was cleaning my room and found two things. First was an old Dell PC mouse (which I kept because it has a great shape). Second was the Academy MiG-29 1:48 kit (scrap I got from a friend). It occurred to me to combine these two things. Or at least to use some parts from the MiG. The model is in bad condition: missing parts, no decals, poorly glued elements. I decided to use the wings pictured in the middle and a few other parts. At this stage, I also gave up using black mouse overlays (clicking element). The easiest way would be to glue the wings to the mouse but I don't think it would look good. So I needed connecting elements. As it is not easy to combine a rounded mouse to flat sheets of styrene, this "connector" is constantly growing and becoming more and more complicated This part is an extended wing attachment at the initial stage. It has a sandwich form to make it look better. The hole in the center is the landing gear section. The triangular structure on top is the lower fuselage element. The mouse will be angled approximately 30-40 degrees to the wings to add dynamism to the ship's outline. Here you can see the next stage of building the fuselage. I glued a styrene wheel to the lower section, and on it I started to build the middle section (where the mouse will be placed). The ribbed gray elements are the air outlets from MiG (only one is visible here). The styrene rods are matched to the screw holes in the mouse, which makes it easy to fit and remove. Other gray elements are parts of some plane or helicopter from my resources. I put the cable cover only for the photo, I will glue it after painting the cables. The Fulcrum's air outlets are clearly visible here. On the right: part of the fuselage of another unidentified plane. Attaching the engine nozzle caused me the most problems. First I had to make the bottom part of the mouse. It only worked the second time. I used another styrene wheel but the mouse is not completely flat so it didn't fit perfectly (there were gaps). I masked them with a narrow strip of styrene. Around the mouse there is a groove for attaching the lower part, which greatly facilitated the attachment of the strap. Then I glued a nozzle to the wheel. As you can see: it doesn't fit well either, but it's the only part of this nozzle I have, so I had to use styrene again. I decided that I could not make a cylinder of such a complex shape so I decided to go a different way. It took me about a week to build so far. The fuselage is basically ready for the applying details (kitbash phase). The two big tasks for the near future are landing gear and cockpit. Especially the cockpit can be problematic, because I would like it to be glazed. I have some canopies but it will be difficult to fit them to the mouse. Cheers. Wiesiek. 21 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pockets Posted February 4, 2023 Share Posted February 4, 2023 Liking it , am intrigued to where you got the green conduit from . 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voozet Posted February 4, 2023 Author Share Posted February 4, 2023 2 hours ago, pockets said: am intrigued to where you got the green conduit from . It is a green stuff epoxy putty formed with Roll Maker (tool manufactured by GSW). 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pockets Posted February 4, 2023 Share Posted February 4, 2023 Ok thanks for that chap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete in Lincs Posted February 4, 2023 Share Posted February 4, 2023 This looks interesting. I'll follow along to see where it goes. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oileanach Posted February 4, 2023 Share Posted February 4, 2023 I'm looking forward to this one! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hunter Rose Posted February 5, 2023 Share Posted February 5, 2023 Nice! Off to a great start, looking good 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voozet Posted February 8, 2023 Author Share Posted February 8, 2023 Thanks. I'm done building landing gear. It looks a bit like a chicken leg. The wing is getting details. Missile launch rails are probably MiG parts. The barrels are aftermarket resin parts for Flakvierling (I think, because there were four in the set). I also added few details to the landing gear dock surface. Cheers. Wiesiek 13 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voozet Posted February 18, 2023 Author Share Posted February 18, 2023 It took me a few days to build the cockpit and cost me a few destroyed canopies. It was difficult to fit them to the shape of the mouse. I had to discard some others because they were on a very small scale, and I was afraid I would fail at painting. In addition, I made a mistake earlier by closing part of the fuselage under the cockpit, which limited access to this part of the ship. Thus, by necessity, the pilot's seat is rudimentary. There's nothing more I can do with my skills. The canopy I chose was slightly wider than the place where I planned to put it, so I had to make an additional element that would compensate for the differences (or hide them). I also filled most of the holes in the mouse because I thought they didn't look realistic. I left a few, I will use them as sockets for external equipment. You may have noticed that new elements have appeared on the fuselage. When the putty dried (and it took a while, because there was a lot of puttying), I added few greebles. I also glued the wings of the MiG (but the lower and upper parts of the wing are not glued yet). This is how it looks now. The ship stands on the armament mounting rails, not on the landing gear. I started to wonder if it doesn't look better in this configuration? Because it looked earlier a bit like Baba Yaga's hut, standing on a chicken leg 🤣 Thanks for watching. Wiesiek. 15 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richard E Posted February 18, 2023 Share Posted February 18, 2023 33 minutes ago, voozet said: The ship stands on the armament mounting rails, not on the landing gear. I started to wonder if it doesn't look better in this configuration? Could you mount the ship on a piece of clear acrylic rod and attach some umbilical cables to it to create the impression that it is moored to an anti-gravity dock.....? On 2/3/2023 at 11:51 PM, voozet said: I don't have the enthusiasm to finish my current projects, Hope you're motivated to "dust off" the Remora build at some time in the future. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Little Timmy Posted February 19, 2023 Share Posted February 19, 2023 This is genius!!! Your ability to imagineer is impressive. Can't wait to see where it goes next. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hunter Rose Posted February 19, 2023 Share Posted February 19, 2023 Nice! Love the cockpit 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voozet Posted March 1, 2023 Author Share Posted March 1, 2023 The ship already has base colors. I had doubts which scheme to use. At first I considered military greens, it's a fighting vehicle after all. But I love yellow. Can a combat vehicle be yellow? Why not. After all, this is the distant future, and the far corner of the galaxy 😉 As a complementary color, I chose a dark gray. Now is time for the differentiation of shades, then decals, weathering etc. I decided to make a base for the model: a mini diorama showing the landing pad, with elements of a planetary outpost. About 30x30 cm. Mostly trashbash, partially supplemented with styrene. The module with the wall is a room temperature regulator. Two, actually. From one I made a wall and part of the floor, from the other: the base of the reactor. The reactor housing is, in turn, the thermostat knob of the heater. The rail on the wall is a piece of laser printer cartridge, I think. This part of the FFP2 mask looks like the outlet of the ventilation shaft. The pandemic is over, so why do I need masks? These things seem to be part of the cables from the video camera. They look like chests of the future, so that's what they will become. The electrical switchboard used to be part of a children's creative kit (green). I want the "nuclear" glow to be visible in the reactor holes. I think it's part of some fancy lighter with flashlight. It fits perfectly. I just need to come up with a "core" that will conduct the light. General view with the hover. The landing deck will be about a centimeter above the "land", which is supposed to be sandy and desert. Of course, the diorama still needs a lot of work and lots of details to make it look good but i think it's a good start. Thanks for looking. Wiesiek. 14 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hunter Rose Posted March 1, 2023 Share Posted March 1, 2023 Cracking details on the base, and oh man I love the yellow! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Rat Posted March 1, 2023 Share Posted March 1, 2023 Inspired madness, the sort of stuff I LOVE! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete in Lincs Posted March 1, 2023 Share Posted March 1, 2023 2 hours ago, voozet said: but i think it's a good start. It certainly is. I too like the yellow choice. Under a different sun, would it be the same shade? The base is looking good too. Looking forward to more. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voozet Posted March 7, 2023 Author Share Posted March 7, 2023 Thanks for the positive feedback, gentlemen. I thought my outpost should have a droid. Judging by the recently watched sci-fi series, there is no place in the universe where those annoying creatures do not appear. I was considering gonk first. But I figured it would be simpler to just combine some parts from my stash. And thus the hybrid of the WALL-E and the vespa scooter was born 🤣 The wheels come from some plane kits. The beige elements, including the fire extinguisher, seem to be a set of the British Matilda tank. I can't identify the rest of the pieces, but it's about 10-15 pieces glued together. Thanks for watching. Wiesiek. 11 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voozet Posted March 9, 2023 Author Share Posted March 9, 2023 Work on the base is basically finished. It will look a bit different than I planned at the beginning, because there were a few new ideas, and a few I considered bad and gave up on them. In place of the electrical switch box, I will put a communication station. It looks much better IMO. The basis of this structure is the part of the plane cockpit I think. The interior had no texture, but the external shape is great. After adding a few details, including the radio, I thought it fit perfectly. The beige item will be the computer monitor. I'll stick an printed image on it. I also made another monitor, this time much bigger. That's the plug of the HDMI cable plus a suitable piece of polystyrene, on which I will also stick the printout. I want to put it above the workbench. Or not... 🤣 And this is the repair robot arm. It is a conglomerate of small elements, including aircraft rails for mounting weapons (the gray element to which the arm is attached and the gray clips of the pliers). I will place it on the left side of the workbench. Workshop module. I also made the "core" of the reactor. It's an aluminum perfume bottle cap. And a plastic cap, which I sanded with sandpaper to better diffuse the light. At the top of the reactor is the light-conducting part from the optical mouse. I hope that after painting I will be able to keep the light dot effect. Landing pad. The frame on which it will be mounted. It's a cutted polystyrene box for computer memory cards. Earthworks. Sand and wood glue. Thanks for warching. Wiesiek. 11 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete in Lincs Posted March 9, 2023 Share Posted March 9, 2023 Fabulous. Love the droid. And the base is really looking better every time I see it. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voozet Posted March 11, 2023 Author Share Posted March 11, 2023 Hi! I used tamiya paints to paint the outpost. XF-88 which the manufacturer describes as dark yellow is a bit sandy, so I thought it would be perfect as a camouflage color for the desert. A few elements, including the reactor and the droid, I painted white (X-2) to diversify the composition. I also covered part of the black primer on the reactor with masking tape to create a contrasting stripe on this object. Unfortunately: the plastic from which the temperature regulator was made (workshop module of my base) does not hold the paint very well (also glue). Some of the paint under the screen came off with the masking tape, I'll have to fix that. The airbrush phase is over. The colors are a bit flat for now, but it's time for brushes, oils and weathering, which should give depth to all objects. At least that's what I hope. Thanks for watching. Wiesiek. 9 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hunter Rose Posted March 11, 2023 Share Posted March 11, 2023 That is looking excellent, I love the droids, fantastic use of bits! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GRK Posted March 11, 2023 Share Posted March 11, 2023 This is looking great! Love the vesper droid and the grabber arm! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voozet Posted March 20, 2023 Author Share Posted March 20, 2023 Another small step forward. The base elements and the ship already have decals, or at least most of them. Unfortunately, my decal resources are much smaller than @Hunter Rose's, so I had to improvise with what I have 😉. And it's mostly simple stuff for armored vehicles and aviation. As mentioned before, I didn't like the chicken foot landing gear (left), so I made another one with a much lower profile (right). By the way, the ship is more stable thanks to this. I found something in my stash that I did when building the previous hover. Either I forgot about it during the final assembly or I thought it didn't fit and gave it up then. Anyway, I thought it should fit here. This is how it looks now, without part of the armament and the cockpit Thanks for watching. Wiesiek. 10 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete in Lincs Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 Curiouser and curiouser said Alice. It gets more and more weird, yet better and better all the time. Please carry on, Wiesiek. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voozet Posted March 20, 2023 Author Share Posted March 20, 2023 There's something about it, Pete . Like Alice, I don't much care where I want to get to, so as the Cheshire Cat said “Then it doesn’t much matter which way you go.” I call it improvisation to hide that I have no idea what I'm doing 🤣. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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