Some V3 modifications, pics...

[Robiwon]

Do a search for "threaded brass inserts". Check your local home improvement type store or hardware store. These are made for wooden projects. If you have trouble finding one let me know, I have an extra. It's the same one that Colin posted above. Matter of fact I may put an interest thread in the junkyard for these inserts as well. Shouldn't cost much to ship them overseas.:cool

 

[Guy Cowen]

Can anyone help me with details of where I can order a couple of these inserts. I'm in the UK and have managed to get a couple of the right Panavise mounts, but still need inserts to mount my V3 and Viper when I build them...

Thanks for your help.

Chris

I'm off on holiday this week but send me your address As i bought a bag of 50 on ebay? I'll send you some when I get back. Where did you get the panavise from in the UK its near impossible to find em?

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

Where did you get the panavise from in the UK its near impossible to find em?

I ordered my panavise through a dealer in Solihull: www.brianhyde.co.uk. Their website just goes on about spirit levels, so ignore that and just email them about the panavise. I got on to them through the US panavise site, which in its international section lists this company as its UK dealer.

 

[w8cmp]

I'm off on holiday this week but send me your address As i bought a bag of 50 on ebay? I'll send you some when I get back. Where did you get the panavise from in the UK its near impossible to find em?

Thanks very much Guy - I'll PM you separately with my address...much appreciated.

I ordered a couple of Panavise mounts direct from the US as I couldn't find a source here in the UK - even though my uncle works in the security camera business - even he couldn't get them except like me from the US.

Thanks again everyone...

Chris

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

Colin, with warps, some very hot water and weights are your friends!

Martyn, if you're around, or anyone else - what's the actual drill with this? It takes all the strength of my hand to close this gap when test-fitting, by the way; do you think the hot water and weights'll still do it? If so, what exactly do I do? (Thought it best to be absolutely sure of what I'm doing. Don't want to bugger this up...)

Sorry for the idiot questions, but hopefully they'll be useful to others out there new to this studio scale game...

 

[Nwerke]

Hi Colin, sorry, no access on weekends right now. Simple as can be: just give the pieces a good soak in very hot water and then lay them on something dead flat, with the heaviest weight you can contrive without damaging them. Should do the trick. Lay a towel over them first, then some books or something. NOT something so heavy that the whole fuse will splay outwards or anything like that, of course. Use your best judgement and keep an eye on it.

You can probably use near-boiling water from a kettle safely, but test it on scraps of resin first if you're worried. My V3 wings went all floppy just from summer heat in my shed and not being laid flat! Would have been up above 47oC in there some of the time.

 

[Robiwon]

Colin, I had a slight bow in my upper hull. I tried the soaking in hot water, I nuked it in the microwave for 25 seconds and even took a propane soldering torch to it. I couldn't bend the hull. What I wound up doing was gluing and clamping, gluing and clamping. I used epoxy and super glue on the hull. I started at the front and glued and clamped the first few inches. After that had set I moved on and did the same for the next few inches. This worked for me.

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

Hi Colin, sorry, no access on weekends right now. Simple as can be: just give the pieces a good soak in very hot water and then lay them on something dead flat, with the heaviest weight you can contrive without damaging them. Should do the trick. Lay a towel over them first, then some books or something. NOT something so heavy that the whole fuse will splay outwards or anything like that, of course. Use your best judgement and keep an eye on it.

You can probably use near-boiling water from a kettle safely, but test it on scraps of resin first if you're worried. My V3 wings went all floppy just from summer heat in my shed and not being laid flat! Would have been up above 47oC in there some of the time.

Where would I be without you people? Amazing, Martyn, thanks.

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

Colin, I had a slight bow in my upper hull. I tried the soaking in hot water, I nuked it in the microwave for 25 seconds and even took a propane soldering torch to it. I couldn't bend the hull. What I wound up doing was gluing and clamping, gluing and clamping. I used epoxy and super glue on the hull. I started at the front and glued and clamped the first few inches. After that had set I moved on and did the same for the next few inches. This worked for me.

Thanks so much for bringing the wisdom of your experience to this! Very glad you came up with this alternative; it'd be just typical of my fate to marinate the thing and still achieve no result!

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

Glued on the two pieces that go under/above the phantom engines, and became extremely excited. Set her up for a rear view and took some photos. Posted them in arty b/w to underline the glorious proximity of the kit to those unpainted pyro photos. Plus a close wide angle side shot. The nose in all photos is experimentally placed slightly differently from the first photos, with a gap of almost 3mm at the bottom. Starboard wings approx. laid out in last picture.

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

Been messing around with the stand and thought I'd ask: has anyone ever mounted through the buttplate with no armature but just a panavise and one of these threaded inserts? (sorry for the unfortunate wording, lol) I'm still mounting through the belly as well, but it'd be great to have the option of a C-stand look too, if possible, displaying the belly free of the stand.

Could the stand and the model take the stress, do you think? If so, are the combined walls of the buttplate and the wall it sits up against thick enough to take the insert..?

Probably just a pipe dream, but thought I'd run it by you chaps...

 

[Robiwon]

Probably just a pipe dream, but thought I'd run it by you chaps...

That's what you would need! The stress would be to much I think. Run a small diameter threaded pipe from the toilet to under the cocpit area.

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

Thanks for that Robiwon. I'll look into it at some point.

Meanwhile, I made some progress: Nwerke's water thing worked for the warps, and your own guiding hand has seen me safely through the drilling and inserting!

Below are some fotes. I can't tell you how good it is to get her up off that damn desk! Straight away I began looking at the nose modification in earnest. Using some white blu-tac I began sculpting away, pushing the thing around, exploring the form. Very quickly I increased the extension to 4mm. That's quite an increase (might change my mind in the morning!), but I felt I was seeing a closer shape overall (i.e the entire fuselage) to the impression I've always had of the X-wing form.

This subjective impression may be wrong; it's been formed by the reference, but as some have pointed out, the pool of reference itself may be untrustworthy due to distorting camera angles, lenses and so on. Nevertheless, this subjective impression - basically a fractionally longer, sleeker X - is what I'd like to recreate until a digitally scanned replica of a surviving X emerges. ( I wrote this essay to show I don't claim God-knowledge of the X's true form!)

Included, though, are 2 of the hundreds of photos that make me want to make the alteration.

 

[Nwerke]

Glad to hear your warps are solved, Colin.

Sorry I haven't got back to you on the nose/cockpit questions yet. I haven't been able to check out exactly what you mean yet, but it probably calls for a bit of photogrammetry, I think.

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

Glad to hear your warps are solved, Colin.

Sorry I haven't got back to you on the nose/cockpit questions yet. I haven't been able to check out exactly what you mean yet, but it probably calls for a bit of photogrammetry, I think.

It would be interesting to make an attempt. Though views are split on this board whether any metric evidence derived from photos is worth a hoot...

There are certainly difficulties, that's for sure. Anyway, I don't want to get into a proving thing here; those things tend to get nasty, and I'm not positive myself about the truth of the situ (unlike in the FM mandibles fight over at SSM, which are demonstrably wrong). But I am going to 'trust my feelings' on this... though my eyes may deceive me, lol....

However, just to deflict any idea that I am totally mad and blind, I give you the noses of my V3, and Red 1 and Red 3. The V3 in this photo is already extended by 1.5 -2 mm or so, and to my eye, still presents a squatter outline than the others...

 

[Nwerke]

Nah, yer mad and blind, son, mad and blind.

I'm all for modding noses, have fiddled with both of mine, and I do think there's possibly something in what you're saying. I can't crosscheck for you though as I'm short of some references right now.

One thing to keep in mind is the distance from camera. Suspect the ILM top views were taken at a pretty fair distance, how close was yours?

 

[Robiwon]

Looking good Colin! And here is something else to consider, It's your bloody model! Build it the way you want! If you want to extend the nose go for it. All any of the master builders can do is extrapulate off what they percieve with their own eyes. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think your doing a bang up job so far.:thumbsup

Glad I could help with the insert. It definately takes on new life up in the air doesn't it? I only wish the mounts were hollow to faciltate running wires down thru into a base.

 

[PHArchivist]

So glad to see someone tweaking the nose on the V3 kit. As outstanding a kit as it is, the nose has always seemed off to me.

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

One thing to keep in mind is the distance from camera. Suspect the ILM top views were taken at a pretty fair distance, how close was yours?

Absolutely right. I'm well aware of, and sensitve to, the role of distance in all these shots. Distance increases chances of orthographic representation. Those plan views of Red1 and 3 are pretty close to ortho taken from a great distance. My plan view of the V3 was taken with it on the floor, and me standing on a chair using a zoom lens. I have a massive 10x zoom on my camera, so I can take virtually ortho shots from great distance. The photos I've posted are a mix of close-in wide angle and distance zoom shots. Now I've got the model on the stand I'll take some even more ortho shots from across the other side of the room at some point...

 

[Colin Droidmilk]

Looking good Colin! And here is something else to consider, It's your bloody model! Build it the way you want! If you want to extend the nose go for it. All any of the master builders can do is extrapulate off what they percieve with their own eyes. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think your doing a bang up job so far.:thumbsup

Glad I could help with the insert. It definately takes on new life up in the air doesn't it? I only wish the mounts were hollow to faciltate running wires down thru into a base.

Thanks, Robiwon. Yeah, and these panavises are incredible - you can pose the thing in just about any position you like. As to your last point - ah, the joy of no lights! lol