My 1/350 TOS Enterprise Build--- WIP

[trekriffic]

Update...

Earlier I related my work to replace the single flashing LED on each side of the saucer with two parallel wired "lighthouse" style LEDs I got from modelersbrand.com. That done it was time to prepare the plastic colored red and green (upper saucer) and clear (bottom saucer) domes for insertion of the LED's. To do this I first had to shorten the neck on the LED for the lower saucer domes as they insert into the clear part from inside the saucer rather than feeding thru the hull first. This picture compares the upper saucer LED on the left with the shortened LED for the lower saucer light to the right:


IMG_4414 by trekriffic, on Flickr

After drilling holes into the plastic kit domes I glued the upper saucer LEDs up and thru the holes in the hull leaving the colored domes off until after I finish painting; it will be much easier to mask cylinders as opposed to domes. Then I glued the lower domes onto the LED and left them free until it's time to glue the saucer halves together. I will need to mask the domes on the bottom though but that's what MicroMask liquid mask is for.

Moving on, I finished soldering the connections between the the secondary hull halves. I even added a white LED mounted between the pylon buttresses to provide extra light into the rear of the shuttle bay. I also afixed the flasher controller from modelersbrand.com (which will power the strobes) to the lower port side of the secondary hull using foam tape:


IMG_4419 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Even using heavy duty clamps after gluing with Testors cement and CA , the halves still had about a 1/32" wide gap to fill along the spine. I filled it with Tamiya epoxy putty:


IMG_4423 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I wanted to see how the shuttle bay looked installed with the lights on. The pic below was taken with the rear/side wall and upper ceiling lights on but not with the rear facing LED that sits between the pylons aimed at the rear gallery windows on:


IMG_4430 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I gotta admit, I''m pretty happy with the bay lighting! It will be even a little bit brighter once I have the rear window facing LED lit up. It's tied into the "E" LED strip light string with a 510 ohm resistor on the negative leg to handle 12 volts.

One thing I wanted to do was light up the 3 lights over the bay on the spine aft of the nacelle pylons. I think I accomplished that pretty well:


IMG_4429 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Today I did some sanding of the Tamiya putty then I gave the seams a treatment of the PPP:


IMG_4431 by trekriffic, on Flickr


IMG_4432 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I'll wait until later to go back and sand the PPP. Then I'll brush some Mr Surfacer on the seams and we'll see where we're at. Once I've got the seams smoothed to my satisfaction I'll start masking the windows. I'm hoping to use Mr Surfacer for light blocking along the seams. She'll then get another coat of primer. I'd rather not have to resort to undercoating the primer with a layer of black paint if I can avoid it.

That's all for now folks! Thanks for reading!

 

[Aries2]

The build is going great and I can't wait to see the finished article. Keep up the good work .

Update...

Earlier I related my work to replace the single flashing LED on each side of the saucer with two parallel wired "lighthouse" style LEDs I got from modelersbrand.com. That done it was time to prepare the plastic colored red and green (upper saucer) and clear (bottom saucer) domes for insertion of the LED's. To do this I first had to shorten the neck on the LED for the lower saucer domes as they insert into the clear part from inside the saucer rather than feeding thru the hull first. This picture compares the upper saucer LED on the left with the shortened LED for the lower saucer light to the right:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7349/9010336214_a0816e0546_b.jpg
IMG_4414 by trekriffic, on Flickr

After drilling holes into the plastic kit domes I glued the upper saucer LEDs up and thru the holes in the hull leaving the colored domes off until after I finish painting; it will be much easier to mask cylinders as opposed to domes. Then I glued the lower domes onto the LED and left them free until it's time to glue the saucer halves together. I will need to mask the domes on the bottom though but that's what MicroMask liquid mask is for.

Moving on, I finished soldering the connections between the the secondary hull halves. I even added a white LED mounted between the pylon buttresses to provide extra light into the rear of the shuttle bay. I also afixed the flasher controller from modelersbrand.com (which will power the strobes) to the lower port side of the secondary hull using foam tape:

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5468/9009154319_e446f3f62f_b.jpg
IMG_4419 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Even using heavy duty clamps after gluing with Testors cement and CA , the halves still had about a 1/32" wide gap to fill along the spine. I filled it with Tamiya epoxy putty:

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5321/9010336440_2b3c6bea17_b.jpg
IMG_4423 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I wanted to see how the shuttle bay looked installed with the lights on. The pic below was taken with the rear/side wall and upper ceiling lights on but not with the rear facing LED that sits between the pylons aimed at the rear gallery windows on:

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3770/9009153537_ffe9c5afe4_b.jpg
IMG_4430 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I gotta admit, I''m pretty happy with the bay lighting! It will be even a little bit brighter once I have the rear window facing LED lit up. It's tied into the "E" LED strip light string with a 510 ohm resistor on the negative leg to handle 12 volts.

One thing I wanted to do was light up the 3 lights over the bay on the spine aft of the nacelle pylons. I think I accomplished that pretty well:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7398/9009153775_503bc25842_b.jpg
IMG_4429 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Today I did some sanding of the Tamiya putty then I gave the seams a treatment of the PPP:

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2829/9009153781_fb3d1a0b28_b.jpg
IMG_4431 by trekriffic, on Flickr

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5449/9009153309_9e96b0414a_b.jpg
IMG_4432 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I'll wait until later to go back and sand the PPP. Then I'll brush some Mr Surfacer on the seams and we'll see where we're at. Once I've got the seams smoothed to my satisfaction I'll start masking the windows. I'm hoping to use Mr Surfacer for light blocking along the seams. She'll then get another coat of primer. I'd rather not have to resort to undercoating the primer with a layer of black paint if I can avoid it.

That's all for now folks! Thanks for reading!

 

[trekriffic]

The latest...

After sealing up the hull I noticed that the LED I had installed to light the rear wall windows of the shuttle bay was cool white with a slight bluish tint. This didn't work well since the other windows in the bay were lit with warm white LEDs with a more yellowish tint. So yesterday I went about replacing the cool white LED with a warm one. Luckily I had a spare warm white LED from the "N" wiring harness since I am not lighting the impulse engines...

Here's the offending cool white LED and it's resistor after I pried it loose from inside the hull with the aid of my newly purchased foot long hemostat. No Novacane was used:

$29
IMG_4434 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I used the same hemostat to glue in the new warm white LED. It's visible near the top middle of this photo inside two sections of Evergreehn tubing. The LED and legs slid inside a short piece of 7/32" O.D. tubing which itself slid inside a short length of 9/32: O.D. tubing that was glued to, and between, the pylon buttresses:


IMG_4438 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The rear wall lit up with the new LED:


IMG_4441 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Worked on the dome over the bay. The clear insert that fits inside the dome had clear rods at staggered heights that were painted with clear red, yelow, and amber paint:


IMG_4436 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Here's the dome lit up:


IMG_4453 by trekriffic, on Flickr

More to come!

 

[trekriffic]

After posting the photo of my shuttle bay dome I went onto a site with photos taken during the 1991 restoration and found this shot of the disassembled dome:


Hangar dome by trekriffic, on Flickr

I noticed something right off and that was the insert was made of what appears to be translucent dark green plastic with three rods of red, amber, and yelow projecting up from it at different heights. Of particular interest to me was the dark green plastic. The Polar Lights kit makes no reference to painting the kit insert dark green on it's face yet I think it's critical to giving the lit dome the greenish tint we saw on the screen. Since I've already jammed the insert in so tight it cannot be pried loose from the dome, I've gone ahead and painted the underside dark green being careful not to paint over the other colors. Once it dries I'll do another light test and we'll see how it looks.

Later...

Did a light test and the dome was TOO green so I thinned the paint with some thinner and it looked much closer to screen accurate. Unfortunately, I discovered something else I hadn't noticed before and that was a crack all the way across the dome. It either happened when I installed the insert or when I was trying to remove it but the dome was ruined. I am now forced to use the clear plastic dome. On the upside I now had the insert free from the dome so tinted some Future with green dye and brushed that on the inside dome-facing surface of the insert. That should look even better than the green paint which I wiped off the underside of the insert.
For now, I have coated the inside surface of the clear dome using Floquil Flat Finish which gives it a milky translucense similar to the translucent white plastic of the original dome.
Here's the now translucent dome with the insert after I brushed on some Future mixed with green dye. I also sanded down the red rod just a little and repainted it so it doesn't butt up against the inside of the dome. I also sanded the insert's edges so it's not so tight as to crack the dome:


IMG_4459 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I liked the Floquil so much I did the bussard domes too:


IMG_4456 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I just loaded it onto a soft brush and sort of flowed it all around inside the dome. The key is to get an even coating. Holding it up to the light it gives you a beautifully translucent effect:


IMG_4458 by trekriffic, on Flickr

This was the same technique I used with my 1/1000 model, outer domes frosted with Floquil Flat and inner dome painted with Tamiya Transparent Orange. The difference this time of course is these bussards will have the rotating fan blades and colored lights:


IMG_1676 by trekriffic, on Flickr

 

[trekriffic]

Weekend update...

Took the plunge and redid the LEDs on the bussard boards.

First thing was to clipm off the kit LEDs leaving as much of the legs attached to the board as possible so I had something to solder the new LED legs to:


IMG_4460 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Then I used my Helping Hands to hold the board in place while I positioned the new LEDs onto the old LED leg stubs using a second set of Helping Hands. Here's the first board after resoldering. Not that I had to run jumpers from a green flasher over to the blue flasher opposite it to get the blue flasher to fire. For some reason that port on the board went dark on me:


IMG_4481 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Things went smoother with the second board:


IMG_4488 by trekriffic, on Flickr

After installing the amber LEDs (which required 2V max) along with their 47 ohm resistors onto the always on posts and white , blue, pink, and green 3V LEDs onto the flasher posts I powered the board up and saw I had a problem... the always on LEDs lit up fine but the flashers did not. After a little trial and error I discovered that when I removed the amber LEDs the flashers started working. I had fallen victim to that rule about mixing LEDs with different forwarding voltages- current will always flow to the LED with the lower current draw and ignore the LED with higher current needs; in this case it was the amber LEDs that hogged the current. Once I swapped out the amber LEDs for 3V white ones and stuck with 3V on the flashers the problem went away and everything lit up:


IMG_4469 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The resoldered board with the plastic tower part was a little thicker than before so I had to grind down the tabs inside the bussard housing that butt up against the bottom of the PC board so the assembly would sit lower enoguh in the housing to allow the clear (now translucent ) outer dome to fit properly:


IMG_4534 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Here I installed the PC board and the light tower part into the bussard housing. I used reflective silver "stars" paper under the LEDS. The mirror button in the center is shown here but it was later removed (it didn't do anytihng to enhance light bounce as I had hoped) and I went with mirror shards instead like the original studio model:


IMG_4483 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Lights on:


IMG_4485 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The light effect with the spinner in place:


IMG_4472 by trekriffic, on Flickr

And with the outer dome:


IMG_4475 by trekriffic, on Flickr


IMG_4478 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The effect with the flashers going is pretty awesome IIDSSM.
I'll post a video once I've got the motor attached so you guys can see it all lit up with the blades spinning.

 

[trekriffic]

The images above are a little dark so I adjusted one of the bussard photos to give you a better idea of how bright they really are:


IMG_4478 by trekriffic, on Flickr

 

[trekriffic]

Update... the nacelles...

Spent yesterday and today fine tuning the bussards and nacelles. After gluing the bussard housings into one half of each nacelle I attached the motors with silicon tubing to the spinner axles, powered them up, and after a minute or two I noticed an annoying squeak coming from the bearings inside the bussard housing. Some adjustments to the spinners-usually involving pulling them a little more forward and lubricating the bearings with 3-in-1 household oil eliminated the squeaks. Had to be careful though and not pull the spinners too far forward or they'd rub up against the inside of the outer domes. Finally got them just right.
Here's the port nacelle motor and bussard:


IMG_4537 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Foam pipe insulation was stuffed with some of the leftover thin foam protective sheets from the model kit:


IMG_4536 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The foam tubes were cut into sections and laid along the length of the nacelle to eliminate the tendency of the hollow cylinder to resonate like a pipe organ pipe would. A flat was cut along the sides of the foam tubes to accomodate the inboard nacelle trench:


IMG_4538 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The nacelle halves were glued together with Testors cement and wrapped with rubber bands to dry:


IMG_4539 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I wanted the blades to be more visible underneath the translucent domes so I used adhesive backed foil strips to cover the PE blades I'd painted with Testors aluminum previously. I also used foil on the center hub:


IMG_4540 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I think it looks quite a bit like the 11 footers bussard domes now:


image3 by trekriffic, on Flickr


I made a short video showing one of the bussards spinning so you guys could hear it. It's not completely closed up yet, still have to glue in the trench screens and attach the end caps, intercoolers, and reactor loops so I'm thinking it may get a little quieter still:

1/350 TOS Enterprise nacelle with spinning bussard-noise test - YouTube

 

[metal wood]

i was wondering if you ever tried using a motor from an old cd player, they are small, but creepy quite as long as you dumb it down to the appropriate speed.

great build thus far, very drool worthy!

 

[trekriffic]

Progress from this past week...

I took the impulse engines and glued in the clear part. Then I backed the clear ports with black tape before gluing the part to the saucer. I also gave it a shot of Dullcote for a matte look:


IMG_4543 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I worked qutie a bit on the shuttle bay. I glued the clear control room to the top of the open bay door part then glued the doors to the stern with CA. I placed a white decal behind the control room window so it will glow but won't cause lens flares when I take pics of the stern. I took the ParaGrafix PE after heating to soften it and bent it around a round xacto tool handle so it fit around the clear control room piece without springing back on me. Then I glued it to the clear part with CA:


IMG_4550 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I took a break from the shuttle bay and worked on the nacelles. After a couple of sessions of puttying, seam scraping, sanding, and priming all the seams disappeared. The parts weren't bad as far as seams go; I've seen a lot worse. Then I attached the flux constrictors, intercoolers, and the stern "vents" with Testors cement. After another session of puttying with PPP around the edges of the aforementioned parts to fill any gaps I applied 3 coats of Duplicolor primer:


IMG_4551 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I'll save the end caps and ships "balls" for the end after I paint them.

The clear fantail lights were painted red, green, and amber orange using Model Master enamels. I also painted the top edge with black enamel for light blocking. ParaGrafix provides a PE piece to wrap around the face which really blocks extraneous light leaks. It also gives you nice, sharp, frames around the lights. I primered it preparatory to gluing it to the fantail with CA:

IMG_4552 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Aligning the top edge of the PE part with the bay floor left a slight rim projecting over the lower rim of the fantail so I used PPP to blend the lower rim of the PE part in with the uncercut:


IMG_4560 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Window masks were cut from Tamiya tape. I used dividers to measure the length and width of the windows before translating the measurements to the tape:


IMG_4562 by trekriffic, on Flickr

For the round windows I used a nail set to punch out holes in the tape. Actually "punch" is the worng term. What I do is stick the tape down on a vinyl mat; then I press the tip of the nail set down into the tape and twist back and forth until the tape is cut alround. I have 3 sizes of nail sets and it took them plus a couple of sizes of Harbour Freight hole punches to do the masks for all the round windows and ports in the saucer halves and connecting dorsal.

The last thing I did involved the saucer halves...

Sunday they got their first airbrushing of the base hull color:


IMG_4567 by trekriffic, on Flickr


IMG_4568 by trekriffic, on Flickr

After allowing a few days to dry I used a plastic flexi ruler and a compass to draw the radial and circular gridlines on with a sharp 2H pencil. Having the gridlines will certainly help a lot with decal placement. I used the smoke colored saucer domes with holes drilled dead center to anchor the pin on the compass arm for making the circles:


IMG_4569 by trekriffic, on Flickr\


IMG_4573 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The lower saucer was given a second airbrushing of the hull color over the gridlines to make them more subtle:


IMG_4571 by trekriffic, on Flickr

To those who think only the upper saucer had gridlines originally I'm fairly certain there were faint gridlines on the lower saucer as well because I've seen evidence of them in blowups of black & white photos taken of the ship during production at a low angle to starboard. I'm sure most of you are familiar with these photos. They are hard to see but they are there if you look closely.

Anyway, the upper saucer will also get a second coat of hull color to mute the gridlines but first I need to spray on some rust for the rust ring!

 

[Proper]

The lower saucer was given a second airbrushing of the hull color over the gridlines to make them more subtle:

To those who think only the upper saucer had gridlines originally I'm fairly certain there were faint gridlines on the lower saucer as well because I've seen evidence of them in blowups of black & white photos taken of the ship during production at a low angle to starboard. I'm sure most of you are familiar with these photos. They are hard to see but they are there if you look closely.

Looks great! If there were grid lines on the lower section, they were extremely faint and drawn on lightly with a pencil. But I don't see any here: http://www.modelermagic.com/wordpre...03/kg_star-trek_tos_1701_studio_model-006.jpg

But they can barely be seen here: http://www.modelermagic.com/wordpre...03/kg_star-trek_tos_1701_studio_model-011.jpg

 

[trekriffic]

Looks great! If there were grid lines on the lower section, they were extremely faint and drawn on lightly with a pencil. But I don't see any here: http://www.modelermagic.com/wordpre...03/kg_star-trek_tos_1701_studio_model-006.jpg

But they can barely be seen here: http://www.modelermagic.com/wordpre...03/kg_star-trek_tos_1701_studio_model-011.jpg

Great photos! That second photo definitely looks like the gridlines on my lower saucer IIDSSM.

Here's the saucer masked off with blue painter's tape:


IMG_4574 by trekriffic, on Flickr

And after airbrushing the rust "ring". Not a ring so much as an arc really:


IMG_4575 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Tape removed. The flash makes it look darker than it is:


IMG_4576 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I need to spray the nacelles and the secondary hull (need to mask the windows) with hull color too so I'll wait until I'm ready to spray them before I do the overpray on the saucer.

 

[Atlanthia]

It just doesn't get any better than this! That shuttle bay is astounding and I ould love to see some shots looking directly into it....
C.A.H!!!

 

[trekriffic]

Thanks Atlanthia! That shuttle bay can be a bear to get right. What does C.A.H. stand for by the way?


I took a little break from the ship to work on the base over the weekend.
One thing I'd been mulling over was coming up with some type of illumination for the underside of the ship; some kind of lights on the base.

To that end I looked at my tubing stock and got to work...

I cut some square styrene tubing into sections and made four brackets:


IMG_4588 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I drilled holes for insertion of an axle made from piano wire.
I also drilled out a hole to insert a hollow aluminum tube thru the base of the bracket to allow for wires to pass thru into the base:


IMG_4589 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Plastic tubing was inserted thru holes drilled into the corners of the base and glued in. The bracket slides in and can rotate 360 degrees:


IMG_4590 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Upper hinge ears were cut from .040 styrene sheet. Plastic mounting rings were cut:


IMG_4591 by trekriffic, on Flickr


IMG_4592 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The rings were glued into the upper bracket. The upper and lower bracket hinge will allow the spotlights to pivot up and down:


IMG_4593 by trekriffic, on Flickr

An aluminum tube was cut which fit the diameter of a 5mm Ultrabright white LED. The aluminum tube slides into another plastic tube which itself slides into the ring m ounted to the hinge bracket assembly:


IMG_4594 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I cut some cowlings from plastic tubing (the same diameter as the rings) at a 45 degree angle. All parts were primed with Tamiya lacquer primer then sprayed with Tamiya Bare Metal Silver:


IMG_4597 by trekriffic, on Flickr


The completed spotlight:


IMG_4607 by trekriffic, on Flickr\


IMG_4608 by trekriffic, on Flickr


IMG_4609 by trekriffic, on Flickr


IMG_4612 by trekriffic, on Flickr


IMG_4613 by trekriffic, on Flickr


IMG_4621 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Four UltraBright spotlights that can turn 360 degrees and pivot to nearly vertical should allow me quite a bit of lighting flexibility with the Enterprise.

The spotlights have their own rocker switch and will operate independently of the switches for the ship's lights and motors.

Hope you guys like my spots!

 

[Atlanthia]

CAH, stands for Cool As Hell!
Those spotlights are unbelievable!!!!:eek

 

[Aries2]

Thanks Atlanthia! That shuttle bay can be a bear to get right. What does C.A.H. stand for by the way?


I took a little break from the ship to work on the base over the weekend.
One thing I'd been mulling over was coming up with some type of illumination for the underside of the ship; some kind of lights on the base.

To that end I looked at my tubing stock and got to work...

I cut some square styrene tubing into sections and made four brackets:

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3759/9190231050_9cafb5b926_b.jpg
IMG_4588 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I drilled holes for insertion of an axle made from piano wire.
I also drilled out a hole to insert a hollow aluminum tube thru the base of the bracket to allow for wires to pass thru into the base:

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3752/9187433683_cd6e13a515_b.jpg
IMG_4589 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Plastic tubing was inserted thru holes drilled into the corners of the base and glued in. The bracket slides in and can rotate 360 degrees:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7444/9187433725_788812d692_b.jpg
IMG_4590 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Upper hinge ears were cut from .040 styrene sheet. Plastic mounting rings were cut:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7311/9190230810_a446c6e887_b.jpg
IMG_4591 by trekriffic, on Flickr

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2816/9190230766_b752e6e572_b.jpg
IMG_4592 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The rings were glued into the upper bracket. The upper and lower bracket hinge will allow the spotlights to pivot up and down:

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3731/9187433371_cceede8507_b.jpg
IMG_4593 by trekriffic, on Flickr

An aluminum tube was cut which fit the diameter of a 5mm Ultrabright white LED. The aluminum tube slides into another plastic tube which itself slides into the ring m ounted to the hinge bracket assembly:

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2812/9187433063_1cd17a224e_b.jpg
IMG_4594 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I cut some cowlings from plastic tubing (the same diameter as the rings) at a 45 degree angle. All parts were primed with Tamiya lacquer primer then sprayed with Tamiya Bare Metal Silver:

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3724/9187432957_6eaa2a55f5_b.jpg
IMG_4597 by trekriffic, on Flickr


The completed spotlight:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7374/9187432815_4d411cdb03_b.jpg
IMG_4607 by trekriffic, on Flickr\

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5326/9190230252_c1b47903af_b.jpg
IMG_4608 by trekriffic, on Flickr

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7336/9190230154_9557e0a14a_b.jpg
IMG_4609 by trekriffic, on Flickr

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5479/9190229858_0f8fd23bf1_b.jpg
IMG_4612 by trekriffic, on Flickr

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5511/9187432407_2af872c20f_b.jpg
IMG_4613 by trekriffic, on Flickr

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5441/9190229708_cce1337929_b.jpg
IMG_4621 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Four UltraBright spotlights that can turn 360 degrees and pivot to nearly vertical should allow me quite a bit of lighting flexibility with the Enterprise.

The spotlights have their own rocker switch and will operate independently of the switches for the ship's lights and motors.

Hope you guys like my spots!

I a word, Fabulous!!

 

[trekriffic]

Update...

Sorry for the delays in posting any progress updates. I got sidetracked last weekend working on installing a neighbor's kitchen faucet and dealing with the plumbing problems that ensued so haven't spent as much time as I might on this build. Here are some of the latest developments...

After masking the windows and lights on the secondary hull and priming with Duplicolor I noticed the seams needed a little more attention so there followed a few more rounds of puttying and sanding until I got them where I liked them:


IMG_4622 by trekriffic, on Flickr


IMG_4623 by trekriffic, on Flickr

You can see the shuttle bay doors in their closed configuration in the these pics. I made the center section removeable. The fit is so precise that the doors stay in place with just a friction fit and with the lights on there are no light leaks between the cracks. I probably spent 4-5 hours altogether just working on the doors to get them right.

For the neck I had previously sprayed it with my custom "concrete" base color. Then I went back and sprayed the leading edge with MM Hellblau:


IMG_4627 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Hellblau is an interesting color. It's kind of a blue-green gray which leads me to believe that's why some folks think it's greenish and some think it's bluish; actually it's both!

The neck was glued to the secondary hull. The seam was filled with AVES Apoxy Sculpt:


IMG_4628 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The AVES went on so smoothly that I shouldn't need to do any sanding at all but I'll probably give it a once over with 600 grit just in case.

Next, I came up with an idea for the impusle engines involving this cheap Dollar Tree push light:


IMG_4655 by trekriffic, on Flickr

 

[division 6]

Watch out, those cheap Dollar Tree lights tend to have different color LEDs in them (warm. cool mixed)

 

[trekriffic]

Watch out, those cheap Dollar Tree lights tend to have different color LEDs in them (warm. cool mixed)

Thanks for the warning but I'm not using the LED's just the switch.

More on the impulse engines...
I'm pretty old school when it comes to the original series Enterprise so at first I thought I'd just leave the impulse engines dark. But then I got to thinking how neat they looked lit up in the remastered episodes so... I came up with an idea for having it both ways.
First thing was to cannibalize the push light. In addition to 3 LEDs the light also had a pushbutton switch inside. A little desoldering freed it from the circuit board:


IMG_4630 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The switch was wired up with the "N" wiring harness and connected to an LED for testing with power from the PC board. It worked quite well:


IMG_4633 by trekriffic, on Flickr

A shaft was cut from Evergreen rod with a black tip cut from some scrap kit window smoked plastic to fit in the hole between the vents. It was then glued with epoxy to the switch button:


IMG_4637 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The switch was the perfect size to fit inside the back of the impulse deck directly behind the hole in the center between the exhaust vents which I drilled out. I also cut new clear plastic for the exhaust vents as the original kit part had gotten scratched and clouded while I mucked about positioning the switch:
:

IMG_4642 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The switch was glued in with CA and the new vent covers were glued in with Krystal Klear. The kit impulse vent decals were also applied from the inside:


IMG_4644 by trekriffic, on Flickr

A light box was constructed for each vent with an amber LED glued to the back wall. The LEDs were also painted with Tamiya transparent orange acylic. The insides of the boxes were painted black except for the rear wall which was covered in reflective foil:


IMG_4645 by trekriffic, on Flickr

Here are the impulse engines in their dark mode more like what we saw in the original episodes:


IMG_4652 by trekriffic, on Flickr

And here thay are with the pushbutton switch pushed in and lit up like the remastered episodes:


IMG_4650 by trekriffic, on Flickr

I was able to spread out the light using a few layers of .030 styrene sheet pressed in just behind the clear vent covers. The styrene sheet came with a semi-opaque protective film on both sides to prevent scratching; I left the film in place and it did a great job as a diffuser.

The impulse engines were then glued into the lower saucer hull:


IMG_4653 by trekriffic, on Flickr

The next thing I need to figure out is if I want to do something similar with the nacelle screens or just leave them dark. It might be possible to have a pushbutton in each warp engine, perhaps accessible through a small hole in the recessed ring just in front of the endcaps. I'd need to remove some of the foam tubing to wire up the SMD LEDs though.

Decisions.... decisions...

 

[vaderdarth]

brilliant!!!!

 

[JMChladek]

I'm at the painting stage on my own model as well. Yes, Hellbau does have some blue green characteristics and in SOME ways it actually seems to match the coloring of the plastic more closely than Tamiya XF-12 with white. So as I see it, it COULD be used as a base hull color for the TOS E when mixed with a little white (using the full strength color for the neck pylon to get some contrast in there) if somebody wants something shifted slightly more to the blue end of the color band rather than green. In my own case, I'm sticking with XF-12 as the hint of green gives the base coat more personality. But, I wanted to throw that out there if anyone else wants to consider it as an option.

BTW, MM Canadian Voodoo gray is also kind of close as it seems to be like XF-12 mixed with white when used straight, but it has no blue or green tint at all. However, it may not work too well as a base color given that it is now out of production and I barely managed to snag a couple bottles of it before my Local Hobby Shop ran out of it. Your concrete color actually looks kind of close to Voodoo gray, so it should be a nice choice when all the markings are on the model.

Very nice work on the impulse engine lights BTW, they look good!