And… another ANH 5FT falcon. My second attempt.

[JediMichael]

Yes Michael, for the 'mid-section' (the yellow stuff) In retrospect it's not the most efficeint way. My motivation was, I would be looking a long time at it... so it would better be cool looking. Wood / plexi would be more efficient (time and money wise). But thats what it is now.
My full writedown will follow. For everyone doing the builds differtent, it's a matter of each his skillset / available money and resources / time etc.
For me this approach was the one I feel most confident with... especially becasue this was my second attempt.

Yeah, I'm totally the same way with doing what I'm most comfortable with. Although I can't even begin to tell you how many times I start something, and realize, I SHOULD HAVE DONE IT THIS WAY INSTEAD OF THAT WAY.
Its all in the learning experience, and doing what we all enjoy.

 

[Dimitri-Ajith]

Yeah, I'm totally the same way with doing what I'm most comfortable with. Although I can't even begin to tell you how many times I start something, and realize, I SHOULD HAVE DONE IT THIS WAY INSTEAD OF THAT WAY.
Its all in the learning experience, and doing what we all enjoy.

Yeah for sure... although this was a sum of my own research and advise from Stu and some other people.
And the doing the domes seperate this way.. on top of the midsection gave some opportunity to Test if this approach worked.
In essence the Midsection of mine is the same as Stu his midsection but 3D printed and Acrylic sheet. And Stu's one is from MDF.
So that was a no brainer...
The Domes where a questionmark for a long time... but very confident on them now! But more on that later......

 

[joberg]

Really looking man

 

[Searun]

Clean and crisp Dimitri construction. The sign of a good modeler and something I always struggle with.

Revisited your thread from the beginning. Looks like you have recognized and addressed some hard spots. You had a unique approach to building the basic structure to dimensional specification. It paid off. Great photos. Also, your use of key kit parts to confirm thicknesses & length clearly shows. So many times the larger greeblies literally show you the way.

 

[Dimitri-Ajith]

As promised some more details about the build so far...

Not sure where the photos went but when I completed the yellow mid section printing, I glued everything together (Duh..)
And had plexi lasercut, 3mm thickness.
I am working of the updated CAD file from joshua (Maruska) and have made my own version from this.... in the meantime it became a lot more different than the original. (more on that later).
And ofcourse It is fully customized for the printing build I am doing.

I had a ring printed in the mid section, and some notches cutout in the plexi to align the ring.
The sections I printed would 'lock' in the ring.

Since I have to work backwards with finding the cutouts for the pits in the dome, do the plating, jawbox and walkways first.. or at least the locations. And then find and confirm the pitholes; I made an overlay in cad from the bandai blueprint. So I can add ribs and support for the dome but without interfering with the pits cutouts. (Or actually it's the other way around .
Keep in mind, I just used the bandai overlay for a crude measurement, you can get a lot of data from it. (with the correct scaling ratio), but beaware of some possible differences. So always DYOR, look at original ref. photos.

The underside of the dome. I also had to keep in mind that I had to print parts. So printbedsize was also a factor.

Here you can see the inside getting epoxy coated. This will make the prints strong as F.

The cleaned up walkways, these are from 7 years ago from my first attempt. The bottom ones will be a little bit more efficient. (Lighter)

That's it for now.
Not sure what is next, have to finish te plating on the mandibles.
And then I am going to do the plating and kitparts from the upper jawbox I think.
The engine deck is printing now, looking forward how that will look especially the 'Lip' section, it was a lot of CAD work to get that right...

 

[eagle1]

She's looking great Dimitri.
Now you have the basic shape & adding the subassemblies such as the walkways & jawboxes, you can have fun & jump into some of the fine detailing as you said. I found doing this helped in keeping going & to keep sane haha. It's all progress though right.
Very happy your well thought out build methods have proved successful mate, we are all enjoying seeing your build progress!.

Stu

 

[joberg]

Excellent work...eager to see your next updates

 

[RealDaveWinter]

That looks great!

 

[Dimitri-Ajith]

So... Bjorn reminded me to post an update here.

I'll keep it short this time

Since last time:
- Top dome on there
- Engine deck, still figuring things out, nothing glued on there. Working out the center parts, still not confidnt to glue the first parts down.
The vents are just placeholders.
- Cockpit tunnel on there. On the top, long section, I glued most of the kitparts. (not finished)
did the measurements for the plating.
- Jawbox is on there, started with cutting plating.
- Sealab, yes finally 1 got one. The target was to have at least 1 vintage Sealab on there.

 

[Searun]

Dimitri,
Thanks for the photographs, especially the pilot tube photo which helps me with those small greeblies. Great fuselage construction. All around dimensions look very sharp. Critical kit parts confirm this, something you certainly know by now at this stage.

While the engine deck is one of the more difficult puzzles, the greeblies there are all interconnected. Placing confirmed groups glued on thin moveable “skid plates” may help arrange things so they can be squeezed within the engine deck boundaries.

Great work on your build. You can see success happening. It takes a lot of time and persistence. I am still about another year away from required detail work even with the good fortune of knowledgeable kit part help (a learned, but evaporating skill, that takes many years of dedicated research and rare material collection know-how).

 

[Bjorn]

That is a massive update to see it at this point. Well done.

Per Searun's comments, I love the care of placement and workings out in pencil. Much like another master Falcon builder that has not posted for a while here...

And congrats's on that Sealab. They are so hard to come by. Very much looking forward to seeing the new one when it is released soon.

 

[joberg]

Great update and looking very good