Don't be, it's only 12v (or usually 5), it won't kill you. I specialize in automotive electrical diagnostics, so it's second nature to me. It's pretty easy stuff - learn ohm's law, remember that electricity is nothing more than flowing water, and get a breadboard - you'll learn as you tinker.
Greetings! And a Polar Lights NX-01 1:350 build
- Thread starter kevr
- Start date
It's been a busy week, and I've been jumping around a lot polishing off last minute details on the saucer sections.
Let's see, where to start...
Flight deck: I got the fiber optics in place for above the doors. Before gluing the back in place, I cut slits in the upper hull to route fiber optics above the doors. I thought I had taken pictures but I can't find them. You can see them in the shot of the registration lights optics on the inside of the hull further down in this post.
Anyway, I shaved the end of some 1.0mm fiber optics at a steep angle so they'd lay in that groove flush and throw light downward.
I like the end effect:
I drilled the missing hole for the light under the flight deck for the observation room. While I was there, I added the missing lights down the center rib of the hangar bay doors. These will be 0.50mm fiber optics and I think I'll put them on the strobe circuit - I think I'll like the added effect.
Then I glued a 'micro' LED in place to light the room and routed the wires through some reliefs I had cut in the under-structure for the flight deck. Now I can get that glued on. I'll spray a coat of black primer under the flight deck for light blocking before it goes in place.
I decided to open up these windows and use the frame from the paragraphix kit.
Ok, the registration spotlights - these were interesting. There were little knobs on the model for these. I removed the one for the forward light while doing the overhang. I started with the cargo hold lights to get practiced. I drilled a pilot hole through the center of the little nubby on the casting - I knew my drilling was going to wipe that out, to be replaced with the shaft of the fiber optic. I applied a little CA under the fiber optic and taped it down, then affixed them from the inside with Mod Podge.
Then the front light - this was trickier because of the thin plastic of the overhang.
I think the profile looks good. I shaped up the 'housings' on each light with putty. Apparently I didn't get finished photos of them, I'll get some tomorrow. They turned out pretty good.
There's three additional spotlight around the lower sensor (?) dome, so I added those and set 0.75mm fiber optics in there.
And then I played with lighting that dome. I've been kicking around a few ideas for how to do it, and I think I figured out a way to replicate the light pattern and color in the reference photos.
Of course the light doesn't come through in the photos the way it looks in person, but it's pretty dead on to the eye. I think I might also try to replicate that shaded pattern on the dome too. Tonight was just a quick light test, so I'll dive into this soon and let you all know how I'm doing it.
This hole - it's not in the reference photos, and the model instructions show it in the illustrations but don't show anything going into it. I can't find any un-accounted for parts that could go there, so I'm assuming it's an error - or maybe it's the missing hole for the lower observation deck! That's it, I found it, it was lost! Anyway, unless someone can shed some light on this for me, I'm going to fill it.
That's it for tonight
Let's see, where to start...
Flight deck: I got the fiber optics in place for above the doors. Before gluing the back in place, I cut slits in the upper hull to route fiber optics above the doors. I thought I had taken pictures but I can't find them. You can see them in the shot of the registration lights optics on the inside of the hull further down in this post.
Anyway, I shaved the end of some 1.0mm fiber optics at a steep angle so they'd lay in that groove flush and throw light downward.
I like the end effect:
I drilled the missing hole for the light under the flight deck for the observation room. While I was there, I added the missing lights down the center rib of the hangar bay doors. These will be 0.50mm fiber optics and I think I'll put them on the strobe circuit - I think I'll like the added effect.
Then I glued a 'micro' LED in place to light the room and routed the wires through some reliefs I had cut in the under-structure for the flight deck. Now I can get that glued on. I'll spray a coat of black primer under the flight deck for light blocking before it goes in place.
I decided to open up these windows and use the frame from the paragraphix kit.
Ok, the registration spotlights - these were interesting. There were little knobs on the model for these. I removed the one for the forward light while doing the overhang. I started with the cargo hold lights to get practiced. I drilled a pilot hole through the center of the little nubby on the casting - I knew my drilling was going to wipe that out, to be replaced with the shaft of the fiber optic. I applied a little CA under the fiber optic and taped it down, then affixed them from the inside with Mod Podge.
Then the front light - this was trickier because of the thin plastic of the overhang.
I think the profile looks good. I shaped up the 'housings' on each light with putty. Apparently I didn't get finished photos of them, I'll get some tomorrow. They turned out pretty good.
There's three additional spotlight around the lower sensor (?) dome, so I added those and set 0.75mm fiber optics in there.
And then I played with lighting that dome. I've been kicking around a few ideas for how to do it, and I think I figured out a way to replicate the light pattern and color in the reference photos.
Of course the light doesn't come through in the photos the way it looks in person, but it's pretty dead on to the eye. I think I might also try to replicate that shaded pattern on the dome too. Tonight was just a quick light test, so I'll dive into this soon and let you all know how I'm doing it.
This hole - it's not in the reference photos, and the model instructions show it in the illustrations but don't show anything going into it. I can't find any un-accounted for parts that could go there, so I'm assuming it's an error - or maybe it's the missing hole for the lower observation deck! That's it, I found it, it was lost! Anyway, unless someone can shed some light on this for me, I'm going to fill it.
That's it for tonight
So, as promised, the sensor dome. This is really cool.
I got the light pattern I wanted by shining an LED about from about 6mm back through a thin piece of sheet styrene. I think the styrene is about 0.010" thick - I picked it up specifically for diffusion. So I had to make a light box for the sensor dome.
First was cutting out a circle that would go right against the base of the dome. Then a top of 0.040" styrene for strength. I used a compass for this one so I would have the punch mark in the middle to locate the hole for the LED. Then I cut a wrap of the thin styrene at 12mm high so the LED could mount all the way up to its base leaving the end of it 6mm from the diffuser.
Then I closed it up, checked my diffusion pattern and glued the LED in the top and wired it up.
Looking good so far....
Now to replicating that aztec-y pattern on the dome. I masked off the lightest area on the pattern and hit it with a light coat of transparent smoke for the medium layer. Then I added a mask on top of the medium layer to airbrush the darkest pattern. The darkest one got a hair too dark, but I'll live with it.
Then a thin coat of transparent yellow over the top of the pattern. The LED is a cool white, so the yellow combined with the color of the light will give that pale yellow-slightly greenish color in the reference photo.
Of course it looks a little darker in the photo.
The end result is a dead ringer though:
.....except the dark part of the pattern is a touch too dark, but it can't all be perfect. As usual, the camera is exaggerating the difference, too. It seems to do that when photographing the lighted bits. Anyway, I sprayed a coat of black on the outside of the light box to block any bleed-through from the interior lighting and then a coat of white. Painted and polished the little nub on the bottom and glued the dome to the light box.
The finished dome, ready to go in:
Got a good start on the flight deck - this one is going to sand down really quickly, it doesn't have far to go. While I had the putty out, I hit that errant hole behind the sensor dome.
Got the lower observation room glued in place. I sanded the bottom down flush and masked off the windows, then glued the top on.
I primered up all the puttied spots on the lower hull, (except the hole I just filled). I'll get that flight deck done, get all the perimeter docking port lighting installed and glue up the saucer sides, Then it should be ready for a final sanding, primer, light blocking and a white coat on the inside and ready for paint.
G'night all
I got the light pattern I wanted by shining an LED about from about 6mm back through a thin piece of sheet styrene. I think the styrene is about 0.010" thick - I picked it up specifically for diffusion. So I had to make a light box for the sensor dome.
First was cutting out a circle that would go right against the base of the dome. Then a top of 0.040" styrene for strength. I used a compass for this one so I would have the punch mark in the middle to locate the hole for the LED. Then I cut a wrap of the thin styrene at 12mm high so the LED could mount all the way up to its base leaving the end of it 6mm from the diffuser.
Then I closed it up, checked my diffusion pattern and glued the LED in the top and wired it up.
Looking good so far....
Now to replicating that aztec-y pattern on the dome. I masked off the lightest area on the pattern and hit it with a light coat of transparent smoke for the medium layer. Then I added a mask on top of the medium layer to airbrush the darkest pattern. The darkest one got a hair too dark, but I'll live with it.
Then a thin coat of transparent yellow over the top of the pattern. The LED is a cool white, so the yellow combined with the color of the light will give that pale yellow-slightly greenish color in the reference photo.
Of course it looks a little darker in the photo.
The end result is a dead ringer though:
.....except the dark part of the pattern is a touch too dark, but it can't all be perfect. As usual, the camera is exaggerating the difference, too. It seems to do that when photographing the lighted bits. Anyway, I sprayed a coat of black on the outside of the light box to block any bleed-through from the interior lighting and then a coat of white. Painted and polished the little nub on the bottom and glued the dome to the light box.
The finished dome, ready to go in:
Got a good start on the flight deck - this one is going to sand down really quickly, it doesn't have far to go. While I had the putty out, I hit that errant hole behind the sensor dome.
Got the lower observation room glued in place. I sanded the bottom down flush and masked off the windows, then glued the top on.
I primered up all the puttied spots on the lower hull, (except the hole I just filled). I'll get that flight deck done, get all the perimeter docking port lighting installed and glue up the saucer sides, Then it should be ready for a final sanding, primer, light blocking and a white coat on the inside and ready for paint.
G'night all
Still making progress although it's been a little slow lately.
I got the two side docking hatches done and lit.
And drilled the holes for the maneuvering thrusters. These (and the rest of these thruster arrays around the hull) will receive 0.75mm fiber optics running off a dimly glowing UV LED. I know they're supposed to be blue, but I'm claiming artistic license here because I think the purple-y color of the UV looks futuristic and cool, and they'll make a nice accent they way they're spread out around the ship.
Because of the angle of the arrays, I had to carve out some room on the back for the fiber optics to come out the rear instead of the bottom. These aren't as thin as they look in the photo, but they'll get light blocked before the fiber optics are installed.
One of the mount points for the piece with the docking hatches ends up directly over the holes for the nav and strobe lights so I'll need to cut some of the attachment point away to make room for the LED (for the nav light) and the fiber optic (for the strobe) to come up through. I didn't test fit this before doing the docking port lighting - I wish I had, because removing material so close to that 0.25mm fiber optics is going to be tricky.
Speaking of nav lights....
And the red navs, waiting for my new airbrush to arrive on Monday. The Badger is officially dead - I barely got the green lights done before it died completely. Nothing I've done has been able to bring it back to life. It simply won't spray anymore. Sometimes it bubbles air up through the siphon cup, sometimes it does nothing at all.
I'm waiting on the airbrush to finish up painting the nacelle chiller grills and begin assembling the nacelles. In the meantime I got a coat of primer and light blocking black on the grills. The aluminum buff will go on next, and then I'll have to paint all the recesses by hand.
Once that's done I can paint and assemble the nacelles with the electronics and EL strips. In the meantime I'm working on cleaning up the casting seams and smoothing things over.
These rear side pieces didn't want to fit quite right, there was a big angled gap at the rear between the back of these and the hull, and a large gap between them and the hull pieces behind them. I forgot to get pictures of the gap, but you can kind of see it from the back in this photo.
Seems like the best way to fix this is with a styrene sheet to fill. I'll sand and shape the filler piece tomorrow.
And the finished flight deck, because we like pictures
That's all for tonight. G'night all.
I got the two side docking hatches done and lit.
And drilled the holes for the maneuvering thrusters. These (and the rest of these thruster arrays around the hull) will receive 0.75mm fiber optics running off a dimly glowing UV LED. I know they're supposed to be blue, but I'm claiming artistic license here because I think the purple-y color of the UV looks futuristic and cool, and they'll make a nice accent they way they're spread out around the ship.
Because of the angle of the arrays, I had to carve out some room on the back for the fiber optics to come out the rear instead of the bottom. These aren't as thin as they look in the photo, but they'll get light blocked before the fiber optics are installed.
One of the mount points for the piece with the docking hatches ends up directly over the holes for the nav and strobe lights so I'll need to cut some of the attachment point away to make room for the LED (for the nav light) and the fiber optic (for the strobe) to come up through. I didn't test fit this before doing the docking port lighting - I wish I had, because removing material so close to that 0.25mm fiber optics is going to be tricky.
Speaking of nav lights....
And the red navs, waiting for my new airbrush to arrive on Monday. The Badger is officially dead - I barely got the green lights done before it died completely. Nothing I've done has been able to bring it back to life. It simply won't spray anymore. Sometimes it bubbles air up through the siphon cup, sometimes it does nothing at all.
I'm waiting on the airbrush to finish up painting the nacelle chiller grills and begin assembling the nacelles. In the meantime I got a coat of primer and light blocking black on the grills. The aluminum buff will go on next, and then I'll have to paint all the recesses by hand.
Once that's done I can paint and assemble the nacelles with the electronics and EL strips. In the meantime I'm working on cleaning up the casting seams and smoothing things over.
These rear side pieces didn't want to fit quite right, there was a big angled gap at the rear between the back of these and the hull, and a large gap between them and the hull pieces behind them. I forgot to get pictures of the gap, but you can kind of see it from the back in this photo.
Seems like the best way to fix this is with a styrene sheet to fill. I'll sand and shape the filler piece tomorrow.
And the finished flight deck, because we like pictures
That's all for tonight. G'night all.
I'm more worried about melting the kit lol. You'd think i'd remember more from votech but it's been a very long 20 years. It's looking good, the tiny little version i have is being parted out for other things as i accidentally broke a warp nacelle that's only about as big as a sharpie marker. How many lights is this going to have?
Wes, that sucks about your kit. Are you going to pick up another? Maybe a 1:350? It's been a lot of work so far, but worth it for the scale. If there's anything I can do to refresh your memory about electronics, feel free to PM me.
As for how many lights, that's a good question and I'm not even sure of the answer yet. If you mean individual LEDs, it depends on how many fiber optics I can stuff onto one LED. If you're talking about lights viewed externally, the short answer is everything. I'd have to go count them all, which is something I'll do before its finished.
Hi All
Thought I would give a quick update since it's been awhile.
In looking over what needs to be done to get the nacelles sorted, I ran across this. It really shows up when I shine a light in the inside. It looks like I'm going to have to fabricate an entirely new bottom to the recess these lights sit in.
So I'm going to put this aside and think about how I want to fix this. I really wanted to get back to the main hull and get onto finishing it.
It got a healthy light blocking coat with black primer, then a white coat and the interior lights - a warm white:
Seeing this has me motivated now to get this thing done!
With paint happening soon, I had to finish up the bottom hull. Since I'm doing the shuttle bay control room windows, I had to relocate the mounting pole. I made a really solid block out of stacked pieces of 0.040" styrene sheet for the support, then glued that to the inside of the lower hull. Then I took the hull to the drill press to drill the hole for the mounting pole.
With that finished up, it was ready for paint. I gave it a clean grey primer coat - it looked pretty cool in primer - I meant to snap a pic but apparently I forgot. One of the employees at my LHS gave me a tip that the metal paint I'm going to use goes much better over a gloss black, which works out fine because I wanted to do a light blocking coat on the outside anyway - the light from the fiber optics was shining through the hull wherever they passed through. So, this is what Enterprize NX-01 looks like in gloss black. (well, the lower hull anyway....)
While that cures, I figured I'd knock out the deflector. Mostly the same as before, but this time a light blocking coat on the outside of the deflector, followed by a coat of silver. Then I fabricated those support rods like last time, only I used a smaller diameter styrene rod for the angled supports.
...aaand finished.
It's going to start coming together pretty quickly soon. Hopefully the gloss black coat is cured by tomorrow and I can get the final hull color on, then move on to adding the clearance lights and hull lights and then gluing up the sides.
More later
Thought I would give a quick update since it's been awhile.
In looking over what needs to be done to get the nacelles sorted, I ran across this. It really shows up when I shine a light in the inside. It looks like I'm going to have to fabricate an entirely new bottom to the recess these lights sit in.
So I'm going to put this aside and think about how I want to fix this. I really wanted to get back to the main hull and get onto finishing it.
It got a healthy light blocking coat with black primer, then a white coat and the interior lights - a warm white:
Seeing this has me motivated now to get this thing done!
With paint happening soon, I had to finish up the bottom hull. Since I'm doing the shuttle bay control room windows, I had to relocate the mounting pole. I made a really solid block out of stacked pieces of 0.040" styrene sheet for the support, then glued that to the inside of the lower hull. Then I took the hull to the drill press to drill the hole for the mounting pole.
With that finished up, it was ready for paint. I gave it a clean grey primer coat - it looked pretty cool in primer - I meant to snap a pic but apparently I forgot. One of the employees at my LHS gave me a tip that the metal paint I'm going to use goes much better over a gloss black, which works out fine because I wanted to do a light blocking coat on the outside anyway - the light from the fiber optics was shining through the hull wherever they passed through. So, this is what Enterprize NX-01 looks like in gloss black. (well, the lower hull anyway....)
While that cures, I figured I'd knock out the deflector. Mostly the same as before, but this time a light blocking coat on the outside of the deflector, followed by a coat of silver. Then I fabricated those support rods like last time, only I used a smaller diameter styrene rod for the angled supports.
...aaand finished.
It's going to start coming together pretty quickly soon. Hopefully the gloss black coat is cured by tomorrow and I can get the final hull color on, then move on to adding the clearance lights and hull lights and then gluing up the sides.
More later
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
Progress:
I got the lower hull and secondary hulls/symmetrical warp field generator section painted their final color. I had to get the final color applied before I could install the nav lights and glue up the sides, since the nav lights are under one of the mount points for the sides. Also so that I could get the shuttle bat lights installed as the fiber optics have mushroomed ends for lenses so had to be pulled through after painting.
I was going to use Model Master Aluminum Plate Metallizer but: 1) enamel over acrylic just wasn't happening on the blue nacelle grills (the transparent blue is Tamyia acrylic) and 2) I thought the metallizer was way too silver and bright both in person and compared to what's seen on screen. So I went with a new brand - Vallejo Metal Color, "Duraluminum". It's much warmer and more toned down than the Model Master paint.
I couldn't be happier with the results of this paint. It's airbrush ready, It sprayed on very, very smoothly and covered extremely well. The end result is an absolutely amazing shimmer of dark metal - it looks incredibly realistic - I couldn't stop looking at it for 2 days! ...and no buffing or special sealing is required. It's exactly the color this ship needed. The photos just don't do this paint justice. It looks stunning in person.I can't wait to get to the aztecing.
The first coat of this metal over the gloss black blew me away - it blended in with the black and looked like something out of a terminator movie - it presented as a very industrial futuristic metal like nothing I'd seen before. I wish I had thought to take a photo of it after its first coat. I really can't rave enough. I'm definitely going to keep this brand in my back pocket for metal paints.
So anyway, with that done, I got onto getting the lighting finished.
I think the first thing I did was glue that sensor dome in there. I've been waiting to see it against the silver hull. It looks awesome. I didn't get a photo of that, but you can see it in the other photos.
Then I went after the nav lights, then the hull perimeter lights (lit via fiber optic). There are 6 of these on the lower hull. I used the clear inserts that came with the model and glued fiber optic to the back of them to throw light into the clear piece. The result looks good.
I used some 1mm LEDs I picked up at my LHS for the floodlights below the launch bay control room. They fire directly out those openings and man, do they throw some light. They help add some ambient lighting to the outside of the hull.
The openings on the outside will be filled with Micro Krystal Klear a bit later, encasing the LEDs in a lens. With that done I installed the control room I had made earlier.
I wanted the windows to be very see through and since I used the paragraphics detail for the windows, I had very thin window frames to work with. Rather than krystal klear, I cut a window out of thin clear styrene and glued it in place with krystal klear before the control room went in. I'll get some pictures of this and the nav lights, and the other exterior stuff once I get the inside done and turn my attention to touching up the outside of the hull.
It's getting messy in layers inside this hull. I also glued the control board in.
The fiber optics for the shuttle bay lights:
On a side-note, something I should have done differently - the black primer light blocking coat and white reflective coat before any fiber optics went in - spraying over the fiber optics, I think the primer etched into them a bit. It doesn't seem to affect light output at all, but it made them brittle in several spots where the paint got thick. I broke and had to repair one of the cargo bay lights just as it came out of the hull inside - I just cut it off flush with the hull and glued a new fiber optic to the cut end. I used CA so the ends would melt together slightly and not diffuse the light. It seems to have worked, I can't tell the difference between it and the unbroken one on the other side.
A couple of the hull clearance lights:
And I got the LEDs drilled and fiber optics attached for all of the optics on this bottom layer of the hull. The second photo is the shuttle bay lights. I had to use 2 LEDs - there are a total of six 1mm fiber optics and four 0.5mm fiber optics.
Getting all this done allowed me to get the mess of fiber optics and wires sorted and tidy. Well, relatively tidy anyway...
The next layer of fiber optics will be the sides. There are four optics each for the two docking ports and three optics each for the four little thruster/sensor panels. Then the deflector dish, small impulse engines and lights (I gotta do some cutting and fabricating here), paint the landing deck, do some touch-up, and the lower hull should be complete.
Progress:
I got the lower hull and secondary hulls/symmetrical warp field generator section painted their final color. I had to get the final color applied before I could install the nav lights and glue up the sides, since the nav lights are under one of the mount points for the sides. Also so that I could get the shuttle bat lights installed as the fiber optics have mushroomed ends for lenses so had to be pulled through after painting.
I was going to use Model Master Aluminum Plate Metallizer but: 1) enamel over acrylic just wasn't happening on the blue nacelle grills (the transparent blue is Tamyia acrylic) and 2) I thought the metallizer was way too silver and bright both in person and compared to what's seen on screen. So I went with a new brand - Vallejo Metal Color, "Duraluminum". It's much warmer and more toned down than the Model Master paint.
I couldn't be happier with the results of this paint. It's airbrush ready, It sprayed on very, very smoothly and covered extremely well. The end result is an absolutely amazing shimmer of dark metal - it looks incredibly realistic - I couldn't stop looking at it for 2 days! ...and no buffing or special sealing is required. It's exactly the color this ship needed. The photos just don't do this paint justice. It looks stunning in person.I can't wait to get to the aztecing.
The first coat of this metal over the gloss black blew me away - it blended in with the black and looked like something out of a terminator movie - it presented as a very industrial futuristic metal like nothing I'd seen before. I wish I had thought to take a photo of it after its first coat. I really can't rave enough. I'm definitely going to keep this brand in my back pocket for metal paints.
So anyway, with that done, I got onto getting the lighting finished.
I think the first thing I did was glue that sensor dome in there. I've been waiting to see it against the silver hull. It looks awesome. I didn't get a photo of that, but you can see it in the other photos.
Then I went after the nav lights, then the hull perimeter lights (lit via fiber optic). There are 6 of these on the lower hull. I used the clear inserts that came with the model and glued fiber optic to the back of them to throw light into the clear piece. The result looks good.
I used some 1mm LEDs I picked up at my LHS for the floodlights below the launch bay control room. They fire directly out those openings and man, do they throw some light. They help add some ambient lighting to the outside of the hull.
The openings on the outside will be filled with Micro Krystal Klear a bit later, encasing the LEDs in a lens. With that done I installed the control room I had made earlier.
I wanted the windows to be very see through and since I used the paragraphics detail for the windows, I had very thin window frames to work with. Rather than krystal klear, I cut a window out of thin clear styrene and glued it in place with krystal klear before the control room went in. I'll get some pictures of this and the nav lights, and the other exterior stuff once I get the inside done and turn my attention to touching up the outside of the hull.
It's getting messy in layers inside this hull. I also glued the control board in.
The fiber optics for the shuttle bay lights:
On a side-note, something I should have done differently - the black primer light blocking coat and white reflective coat before any fiber optics went in - spraying over the fiber optics, I think the primer etched into them a bit. It doesn't seem to affect light output at all, but it made them brittle in several spots where the paint got thick. I broke and had to repair one of the cargo bay lights just as it came out of the hull inside - I just cut it off flush with the hull and glued a new fiber optic to the cut end. I used CA so the ends would melt together slightly and not diffuse the light. It seems to have worked, I can't tell the difference between it and the unbroken one on the other side.
A couple of the hull clearance lights:
And I got the LEDs drilled and fiber optics attached for all of the optics on this bottom layer of the hull. The second photo is the shuttle bay lights. I had to use 2 LEDs - there are a total of six 1mm fiber optics and four 0.5mm fiber optics.
Getting all this done allowed me to get the mess of fiber optics and wires sorted and tidy. Well, relatively tidy anyway...
The next layer of fiber optics will be the sides. There are four optics each for the two docking ports and three optics each for the four little thruster/sensor panels. Then the deflector dish, small impulse engines and lights (I gotta do some cutting and fabricating here), paint the landing deck, do some touch-up, and the lower hull should be complete.
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I got the sides glued up and the second "layer" of fiber optics in:
It's been difficult wrangling all the wires and fiber optics. Were I to do it again, I would put the fiber optics in last - I've broken a couple - I'll have to replace the shuttle bay spotlights. To connect the fiber optics to the LEDs, I was flattening the top of the LED and drilling out most of the center so there was something for the fiber optics to stick into. I found that the body of the LED worked as a lens, so drilling into it created a hotspot in the center, so not all the optics got equal light. It worked better to flatten the top and glue the optics directly onto the flat spot.
Anyway, the sides got a coat of paint, and I think I'm going to do a black wash in the ridges that run all the way around the perimeter to add some dimension and realism.
So, on to the blue strip behind the deflector. I trimmed down the EL strip so the height was the same as the deflector and glued it to a strip of styrene. This will be glued in directly behind the deflector when I glue it in, very soon.
I tried, but I couldn't let it go - the small impulse engines in the back of the saucer section. They needed to be cut out and a piece of clear put behind them to be lit, just like the main impulse engines. They pretty much got the same treatment with the grooved styrene.
I robbed a couple of the small SMD LEDs from the same cool white strip I used for the main impulse engines, because I wanted something small back there.
Tomorrow I'll try to get these put together and finished. Then all that's left of the lower saucer section is to do some paint touch-up in a couple places where I accidentally gouged the paint, re-do the shuttle bay spotlights and glue in the deflector. Then it's on to the upper hull. There won't be much to do there.
And then I did this because Attention Deficit Disorder:
It's been difficult wrangling all the wires and fiber optics. Were I to do it again, I would put the fiber optics in last - I've broken a couple - I'll have to replace the shuttle bay spotlights. To connect the fiber optics to the LEDs, I was flattening the top of the LED and drilling out most of the center so there was something for the fiber optics to stick into. I found that the body of the LED worked as a lens, so drilling into it created a hotspot in the center, so not all the optics got equal light. It worked better to flatten the top and glue the optics directly onto the flat spot.
Anyway, the sides got a coat of paint, and I think I'm going to do a black wash in the ridges that run all the way around the perimeter to add some dimension and realism.
So, on to the blue strip behind the deflector. I trimmed down the EL strip so the height was the same as the deflector and glued it to a strip of styrene. This will be glued in directly behind the deflector when I glue it in, very soon.
I tried, but I couldn't let it go - the small impulse engines in the back of the saucer section. They needed to be cut out and a piece of clear put behind them to be lit, just like the main impulse engines. They pretty much got the same treatment with the grooved styrene.
I robbed a couple of the small SMD LEDs from the same cool white strip I used for the main impulse engines, because I wanted something small back there.
Tomorrow I'll try to get these put together and finished. Then all that's left of the lower saucer section is to do some paint touch-up in a couple places where I accidentally gouged the paint, re-do the shuttle bay spotlights and glue in the deflector. Then it's on to the upper hull. There won't be much to do there.
And then I did this because Attention Deficit Disorder:
