Aliens apc

The follow up to my enterprise build, I have had this kit on the back burner until the enterprise was finished.

This was one of ray22's resin casts I picked up, or should I say had hand delivered by ray himself whilst I took a holiday in New York in August 2012.

Initial impressions were this looked a great resin kit online in his for sale thread, and upon closer inspection in real life I could see very minor work would be needed..... Rays done a great job in casting and prepping this to the buyer.

Now there is nothing wrong with how this kit was made by ray, but e dry keen modeller likes to make things there own and modify or decide to tinker with some parts..... And yes I tinkered some bits even tho I said to myself I wouldn't :facepalm

So lets begin, this kit is very much still being worked on.


The kit in all its resin glory, as you can see ray provides a pretty much ready to assemble kit


The electronics ill be using, a strobe kit, 4 white LEDs and 2 uv LEDs


As I'm going for a diorama as well some aliens swarm figures for peanuts on eBay



Some great detail on these figures





A purchase on eBay for a floor tile which scaled up to work, made a copy of it and decided to make myself multiples, I estimate near 100 will be required


I brushed the mold with a pigment powder before pouring the white resin, the result is this



Added some alien related damage


Soldering iron, epoxy glue mixed with yellow paint gave me this


Not to happy with the gunmetal pigment, so airbrushed some humbrol metal coat gunmetal and polished it up......perfect


The tiles start to multiply



Deviated to the apc itself now, the spotlight I'm adding an led




A test with the kit grille, took ages to dremel and file that bit


Window frame dremeled and filed and then rivets added with a 0.5mm drill bit


Window needs to come out now




Now as I'm adding spotlights this is where the true quality of the lump of resin I bought really began to show, I dremeled out the relevant holes that was easily an inch thick in places........a real mission to do



Here is how thick it was



Rear lights dremeled, that's hard due to the lack of thickness in the model. Apart from drilling out the light shape I also need to dremel through the rsin so the light source gets through....this was a delicate operation



Took some small scale pipes and added some gun barrels


Also decided to pin most of this model together to ensure it stays bonded


And opened up the gun a bit


Test fit of the pinned bits


Added some grab handles



This is we're I got to change my mind on some parts, remakes the grille with pipe and super glue



Also remade the front point


Added some towing clamps from necklace beads and pipe


Components so far


Now this is where rays prep work could really be seen, as I got smears, some glue spots I had to rub it down and decided to make the apc lines more defined......nothing wrong with rays stock model......I'm just being anal.
You can clearly see how much work ray himself had put into it as a base kit when you start sanding. Most people would simply supply a raw kit but ray obviously hadn't

Wow, this is looking cool already. I really like the extra detail work.

GO RICH! love the improvements you are making.

Nice improvements! Will it stay static, or is remote control operation in mind?

Woo - This is really a cool build.

will follow this, thanks for thw WIP.

What tool you used to cut out the window?

I did consider remote control with an old tamiya I have, but the chassis is an inch short and cutting most of the apc underside away seemed extreme. The wheels however will turn but its going to stay static really at the end

Inspiring!

Another inspiration, decided to have some sort of visible engines and pipe work under the mesh grilles, of course it means dremel time again and filing down. A trip to the local model shop gave me these 2 items


From which I selected some engine parts as the scale works well


So time to dremel out some parts




And made my final engine selection


Gave the whole body a good rub, once again you can see the work ray put in to it as a kit and I feel a bit guilty taking it all off


The parts go in


The light goes in



Light spread tested


The remaining greeblies added, the engine bits in the back, the rail system for the gun and ladder go on. The turret will slide




And a quick prime



The engine parts in position


Remaining parts on a dry fit



Gun turret turns freely


From behind


Other side grilles and the rear gun in its transport position


Rear light grab handles added from brass rods

Fao cosmic.........I simply used a dremel to bite it and open it, a small file set to file the edges neat. I also have a set of dremel bits that are very fine to get into the nooks

Nice!:thumbsup

Watching the progress on this is so good that it'll actually almost be a bummer when you get it done! :cool

Wow Rich you are really bringing that APC to life love the addition of engine greeblies thumbsup.

Bringing this up to its current date, apart from the window, the tow hooks ....... It's got all the parts in primer of which it will now be flatted back and the reprimed in white and then flatted back for paint. Once that's done the LEDs will be glued in and wired. Then the grilles will go on.

Anyway the build pics now up to date

Wheels to go on





Sitting on its own wheels




Some fun with the marines


Wheels masked


And primer


The beast primed







Certainly looking more like an apc now, the side door is on a clip in system, I intend to house the electronics and power switch and power source inside the tanks door.

Wow, that is some fine modeling. I model will huge once complete. You will need some serious space to display it.

Mike

Very sharp!

You will need some serious space to display it

Click to expand...

enterprise already takes 1000mm x 500mm x 500mm in a display case - this wont be that big

Great build, looking forward to see the final product.

You Know Rich of all the APC kits I have sold over a year now yours is the only one I have seen a built up. There is one other going on a friend who owns a toy and hobby shop in San Fransico who is building one also you have taken this model and have done awesome work so far I can't wait to see it painted.
Ray

White primer ahoy



2green tones, dark green for the highlights and olive drab


You can see a colour shift between lights, looks brown here but until I get good natural light he pics look different colours....my theory if I'm happy under halogen light it will be fine under natural light.


The tanks highlighting


And the wheels


Olive drab done


You can see where I have re highlighted over the drab on the gun


And on the front arch


Happy with the arches I continued another dark green line on the tanks hull and edges, then to start the weathered look I took a bit of 3m material which is used for rubbing down car paintwork.....it's like a bit of material but not harsh......this will give a panel mark look I hope as well as blending in the greens so they shimmer in the light

The turret line one and the 3m material used.... Blend is workin


Made some gerber edge graphics onto clear adhesive


And also tested one led



With the green line done and the rub down.... Under poor light at 3am we have a good base start for the final stages of weathering. I'm being careful not to make it look old.....lets face it the tanks from the future so no rust .....just battle damage and smokes

You can see now the green has changed after its rub


And closer up the fine marring on one of the panels to make it not so new


Here is the front end, bit more panel marring visible


And the first daylight view of this after 4 nights of painting up ....I'd rather paint in the day but life's routine doesn't allow it



Colour is really nice to my eye along with the toned down lines


Clearly the colour shift can be seen in shade and light, I wasn't planning on it too much but I really like it




I'm also really pleased with how the Perspex lights came out over the front and back




I think this pic sums the paint so far which is very basic to do........it looks mean
http://i1095.photobucket.com/albums/i475/st200rich/aliens%20apc/3581c143fad7eb5805177dd0003a05ce.jpg[/

So detailing time with humbrol metal coat enamels, the grilles, window frame, wire the LEDs, glue the wheels on the poles, some wider weathering is my next stage to do