My SS TIE Fighter

Beautiful work already...yeah, don't talk about acrylic ball (what a pain that is:behave) Btw, what's the thickness of that acrylic globe?
 
Alright RPF I need your help. I'm in search of a part from the vintage 1/700 Tamiya Shinano. I thought I had the vintage kit but I have the newer version which doesn't help me at all. If any one has this part and is willing to loan it to me so that I can mold it send me a PM. Thank you!

Shinano Part.jpg
 
Alright RPF I need your help. I'm in search of a part from the vintage 1/700 Tamiya Shinano. I thought I had the vintage kit but I have the newer version which doesn't help me at all. If any one has this part and is willing to loan it to me so that I can mold it send me a PM. Thank you!

View attachment 711511
I can get you the part, but your box is full [emoji12]

Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk
 
Awesome thank you! I can't believe how fast my inbox fills up. I need to do some serious house keeping this weekend. Okay I made a little space. :)
 
Hi SWGeek.

Really nice build you have here. Love it. I've got a question for you. When you were cutting your acrylic spheres on the lathe, it looks like you first made a jig to hold the sphere half (brilliant), but it also looks like you filled the half sphere with expanding foam. Can you explain a little about that. Thanks so much.

-emojo5/ed m.
 
Thank you! I've unfortunately had to set this project aside for the near future due to work, life, etc.

As for the jig, I cut two pieces of equal sized 3/4" thick mdf and screwed them together, making sure the edges were lined up perfectly. Next I drilled four holes for the bolts that were going to hold the jig together. I also drilled a pilot hole in the exact center for later operations. I then unscrewed the two halves of the jig. On one half of the jig I drilled a 4" hole, using the pre-existing pilot hole from the earlier operation. On the other half of the jig, I drilled three 3/4" holes within a two inch radius from the center. I then took one of my hemispheres and sprayed the inside with mold release. Once that was ready, I bolted the hemisphere in between the two halves of the jig, making sure not to tighten the bolts too much and crack the hemisphere...again (oops). Also the open end of the hemisphere was facing the three holes I had drilled in the one half of the jig. Once everything was secure, I poured urethane resin into the hemispere through the holes I had drilled earlier. I drilled three holes because I wanted to make sure the urethane would hold securely to the mdf. Of course urethane being what it is, it shrank a little bit once it cooled, but not enough to make a difference. Hope that helps.
 
Hi swgeek.

Thanks so much for responding to my question. Very helpful information. Will come in handy on a SS project that I doing right now. Thanks again for your thoughts and revealing your process as well. One last question, when you needed to cut openings that ran across the 2 sphere halves, did you create a new jig or did you cut the openings in halves (1 half sphere at a time). Thanks again.

-emojo5/ed
 
I basically used the same jig, now mounted vertically. Instead of using the top half of the jig I used a 3.5" disc with a center hole and ran a bolt all the way through to the back. I used this disk to bolt the hemisphere on to the jig. I discovered the hard way, that the back side of the cut need to be supported or the acrylic would shatter. So I clamped a piece of mdf against the back side of the hemisphere where I was making the cuts.
 
Alright, so I've finally made some progress on the TIE Fighter.

Finished the inner wing pylons (cough...for the third time...cough)
20180420_190329.jpg
20180420_190405.jpg

Next it was time to scribe the ball (my least favorite part of model making, so hard to get right and so easy to screw up.) And add all the detail bits and kit parts. I realized looking at these pictures I forgot a tiny part above the wing pylon on the starboard side, I'll have to add that.

20180629_133530.jpg
20180629_133601.jpg
20180629_133650.jpg
20180629_133657.jpg

Next I'll move on to the wing...orrr the dash, I haven't decided.

20180424_224230.jpg
20180420_190329.jpg
20180420_190405.jpg
20180420_190329.jpg
20180420_190405.jpg
20180629_133530.jpg
20180629_133601.jpg
20180629_133650.jpg
20180629_133657.jpg
20180424_224230.jpg
 
Last edited:

Your message may be considered spam for the following reasons:

If you wish to reply despite these issues, check the box below before replying.
Be aware that malicious compliance may result in more severe penalties.
Back
Top