5 ft. ANH “Wooden” Falcon

[Searun]

Finally got the nerve to start a thread on this site. Pictures show the model firmly standing on its tricycle, retractable landing gear ( a L/G fetish I have, but t’s another story). All major structure assemblies are removable for ease of building, detailing, painting and future access for servicing. My goal is a model of this incredible design that is structurally accurate to the open source drawings kindly provided by Andre and the “naked“ falcon renderings of Maruska. The plan is to apply aluminum armor after initial skinning, add a retractable air lock ramp, detail the cockpit, correctly position the (8) thruster jets for a smoke system, install lighting per original drawings, possibly design moving engine cowl flaps (another aviation fetish) and base it on a Cloud City helipad desk. Note I added side and bottom armatures for alternate flight display mounting. Beyond that, surface detail design, comes later.
Yes, I have knowingly taken the risk of “putting the cart before the horse” by not using kit parts or 3D fabricated greeblies to validate dimensions. However, time is of the essence. Have time left to build or collect rare kit parts, not both. My son is a serious Star Wars Collector and he looking into this for me. I am learning about parts maps.
Many thanks to Studio Kitbash, Sean, Eagle1, Gort and Geek1138 for response to PM’s on critical questions that have not been readily answerable in-spite of my rereading applicable threads. It is amazing to me how the components of a complex design fits together if one is careful to constantly watch material thickness and measure / level continuously. A real tribute to Andre and his team and those on this site who have offered advice.
Searun

 

[Moviefreak]

I read the title and thought, someone made a five foot tall wood statue of Falco

“Rock Me Amadeus!”

 

[TazMan2000]

"5 ft. ANH “Wooden” Falco"​

Der Kommissar instructs you to check your spelling.

TazMan2000

 

[Searun]

I read the title and thought, someone made a five foot tall wood statue of Falco

“Rock Me Amadeus!”
View attachment 1440758

Der Kommissar instructs you to check your spelling.

TazMan2000

Need to learn if I can edit my own mistakes. Asked administrator to fix. To engrossed in checking my content and missed the error in the title. Quite prompt & clever instruction however.

 

[TazMan2000]

Need to learn if I can edit my own mistakes. Asked administrator to fix. To engrossed in checking my content and missed the error in the title. Quite prompt & clever instruction however.

Not the first time I made a mistake on here.

On the bottom of your message there are two words. Report and Edit. Report is for alerting the admins that someone is breaking the rules. Edit is for correcting your, or your autocorrect.

TazMan2000

 

[Searun]

Not the first time I made a mistake on here.

On the bottom of your message there are two words. Report and Edit. Report is for alerting the admins that someone is breaking the rules. Edit is for correcting your, or your autocorrect.

TazMan2000

Thanks TazMan2000

 

[JediMichael]

I missed out on the spelling error.....but, a wooden Falco statue could have also been Falco from the Sega CD game, Sewer Shark.

...or perhaps Falco from the SNES game Star Fox.... (with that silly costume made for the manual)

But this FALCON you are making from wood looks pretty good so far.

 

[TazMan2000]

Searun
You see how starved for entertainment we are here? We jump all over spelling errors that remotely remind us of our childhood or teenagerdom (probably not a word)...and you just get the courage to make a post with your work on here.

I'll attempt to get this back on the rails (but no promises).

Are you planning on making it entirely out of wood and stain it or something or is this going to be the base where you will skin it with styrene?
It looks very promising.

TazMan2000

 

[Bjorn]

Wow Searun, great start to you and your son's build!

I love it.

 

[Pyramidrep]

Searun,
Well done on a very solid start to this project. The fact that your doing this in your 70’s ( and it’s not easy at any age), you have my admiration, Sir.

Can I ask did you build the other ship models in the background? They look incredible.

 

[Searun]

Searun
You see how starved for entertainment we are here? We jump all over spelling errors that remotely remind us of our childhood or teenagerdom (probably not a word)...and you just get the courage to make a post with your work on here.

I'll attempt to get this back on the rails (but no promises).

Are you planning on making it entirely out of wood and stain it or something or is this going to be the base where you will skin it with styrene?
It looks very promising.

TazMan2000

Quite clever responses. I am terrible at proof reading. That’s why we had secretaries do typing and specifications were only done by the typing pool. Regarding calculations and drawings, engineers do not make errors, they make revisions.

Skinning will be .032 aluminum and copy the Bandai PG Falcon armor segment pattern. Nibbler makes perfect notches as shown by others on this site.

The story on landing gear fetish: Goes back to the mid 60’s when I did a hitch with the airlines after working fixed base on light aircraft. DC-6’s were still being used on the Martha Vineyard run from Logan. On my walk around, I noticed one of the micro switch brackets on the linkage was cracked. Located on each landing gear leg, these give a down and locked green light to validate slight rotation past 180 degrees. That physically prevents collapse upon landing. I made the deficiency entry but refused to sign the log book to release the flight. Most A/E’s ( now called A&P) will never risk their license when they spot something wrong. Management released the flight. Upon reaching its destination, that aircraft landing gear strut collapsed with a full load of passengers after taxing to the gate. My Falcon gear will not collapse.

 

[Searun]

Searun,
Well done on a very solid start to this project. The fact that your doing this in your 70’s ( and it’s not easy at any age), you have my admiration, Sir.

Can I ask did you build the other ship models in the background? They look incredible.

Thanks. Yes, built from original drawings and pictures. They are remote control. Unfortunately, I have there removable super structure off at the moment and the pictures are terrible.

Years ago I did an approximate 7 ft. Disney Nautilus skinning it in .032 brass plates that were drilled and riveted before application. Since I now know about this site and it‘s large size qualifies somewhat as a Studio Scale, I will post some pictures when next visitI get my son’s house. Some of these models take a long time to build as you all well know. Hence, even now retired at 75, this is why my focus on the Falcon needs to be prompt-dedicated effort. Good thing is I got my COVID shots. That buys me some time.

 

[darthjord]

Wow, great start on your build. looking forward to seeing more of it!

 

[joberg]

Searun, you're the exact type of builder we need on this board: old school, but young at heart, hard working and making great plans for that Falcon Bells and whistles are not going to cut it with you, it seems. You want/need the whole cake and cherry on top: my kind of model-maker/engineer No need to say that I'm eager to see your next update!!

 

[Searun]

Thanks joberg. This Johnston/Lucas design real got to me. There are other movie space ship props that are also incredible artwork from the fertile minds of model builders of the past. The craftsmanship displayed by the folks on this site go far beyond my capabilities. But, setting the bar high will get the best out of those that become addicted. Now, back to work.

 

[JediMichael]

One thing I do LOVE about this place, is how there are SO many talented people here, and where other sites might see SO much arrogance from that talent, that its not even worth staying. But I've have found here, that everyone is very helpful and will go out of there way with ideas and useful info.
Guess thats why so many do get banned to keep it a friendly place.
I've learned SO much in these last 7 years being here that I would have never probably tried on my own.
Although, as you can see, we can be quite the sarcastic bunch. haha

Always fun to see another 5 footer in the works and the different ways each person builds it.

 

[Studio Kitbash]

She is a thing of beauty. Impressive work!!!

 

[eagle1]

Magnificent work there Searun. How you are going to incorporate all those planned mechanicals is beyond me, but sounds like that is your forte & will make your Falcon very unique indeed!.
Looking forward to your progress very much!

 

[Searun]

Thanks eagle1, the Falcons big and small on this site are the inspiration. My “mechanicals” go back to the time when single channel remote control model airplanes used rubber bands to power a servomechanism. In any case, I have shamelessly copied your web thread and those of others as references. Chalk it up to Abbie Hoffman writing “Steal this Book”

 

[Ogibendogy]

Beautiful start Searun! Keep those progress updates coming.