Avanaut
Well-Known Member
A few years ago I purchased a 1/24th scale Fujimi Spinner to save for a rainy day. I hunted down a PE set to go with it a little later and put it all in a box. A couple of months ago I dug it up and just began building.
First I worked out a plan for lighting the thing. I did not want to just light the dashboard and some spots here and there, I wanted it all. So, I spent days figuring out how this could be done, the biggest questions being the front wheel covers, top dome lights and the lit yellow slits on the sides. Then I drew a plan.
One thing I wanted to accomplish was the way the lights on the roof and bottom flash properly. It's not an on/off thing, it's more complicated than that and I did some research. The full size car used old fashioned rotating flash reflectors (top domes) and they give an appearance of gradually brightening and diminishing flash. Leds don't do that unless forced to. I found a seller who had led driver boards with simple stepper program simulating an old incandescent light brightness pattern on, say, a railroad warning light posts.
I do not know how to calculate resistors, ohms and all that stuff is alien to me. I needed a lot of help with that and I got it. After many mails I knew what I needed and ordered three boards, two of them specially tweaked for a faster than stock flash rate. The boards are still in mail and I should expect to receive them soon.
Having cleared the boards I ordered a set of nano leds from a UK based doll house shop I've used several times. This purchase wasn't all that straightforward as with the earlier builds. The driver boards I had ordered had resistors on them, the regular order from the doll house shop has resistors prewired, but they left those out from the ones I needed for the boards. I only hope I can solder the little buggers on, the wires are thin as hair. It's convenient when placing the leds inside the model, but not that convenient when you try to solder them.
Meanwhile I worked on the model. First, I cut the dumb plastic tires off the wheels and sourced my spares box for proper replacement tires. I found an old (from 1980's) set of four Goodyears. I sanded them down and carved the insides bigger to accommodate the Spinner wheels.
I didn’t want a Deckard or a Gaff figure in the cockpit, I'll just use a 1/24th scale driver figure from an old Fujimi garage staff kit found in the spares. It’s perfect for this.
For the cockpit I made some minor tweaks. I added some tubes on the photoetched rear wall to liven it up. Nothing dramatic. The biggest change was on the front center console dome for which I simulated the lit tube on top with a clear piece of styrene sheet wedged in a sawed slit. It is lit from the inside with a blue nano led. I left out the similar tubes on top of the main instrument compartment, it was too big a challenge for me to tackle. Another small compromise there.
I wasn’t sure I could fit a power source inside the build, it was hard to estimate how much room everything planned would take. The flash boards are small and I only need to fit two in the back, one goes in the front. I decided to give it a go and if everything goes well, this will be a self contained fully lit model that can be displayed in action without any wires on sight.
Concealing the power switch was another tough call. There has to be one since this model will carry the power souce within, I think I found a cool solution for that. See, the Spinner’s wheels are designed to be built glued on, they don’t rotate. Except on my Spinner, one of the wheels does just that; it rotates. I plan to glue one wheel on to a rotating switch placed inside the chassis. By turning the wheel I can switch this thing on and off. This way I do not have to carve a visible hole for the switch anywhere on the fuselage. Magic!
At this moment I am almost ready for airbrushing the blue main coat on the Spinner's body. It needs to be painted before assembling due to the roof light arrays. There is a marching order that must be followed; paint first, prewired dome light support on, wires in through a pre-drilled hole, solder them on to driver boards inside the chassis, glue the bottom and top halves together... It's a frightening puzzle to put together and I'm not sure at all I can keep in track with all the thin-as-hair electric wires. I've never soldered anything like this and it's going to be horrible. Fingers crossed.
Tbc.
First I worked out a plan for lighting the thing. I did not want to just light the dashboard and some spots here and there, I wanted it all. So, I spent days figuring out how this could be done, the biggest questions being the front wheel covers, top dome lights and the lit yellow slits on the sides. Then I drew a plan.
One thing I wanted to accomplish was the way the lights on the roof and bottom flash properly. It's not an on/off thing, it's more complicated than that and I did some research. The full size car used old fashioned rotating flash reflectors (top domes) and they give an appearance of gradually brightening and diminishing flash. Leds don't do that unless forced to. I found a seller who had led driver boards with simple stepper program simulating an old incandescent light brightness pattern on, say, a railroad warning light posts.
I do not know how to calculate resistors, ohms and all that stuff is alien to me. I needed a lot of help with that and I got it. After many mails I knew what I needed and ordered three boards, two of them specially tweaked for a faster than stock flash rate. The boards are still in mail and I should expect to receive them soon.
Having cleared the boards I ordered a set of nano leds from a UK based doll house shop I've used several times. This purchase wasn't all that straightforward as with the earlier builds. The driver boards I had ordered had resistors on them, the regular order from the doll house shop has resistors prewired, but they left those out from the ones I needed for the boards. I only hope I can solder the little buggers on, the wires are thin as hair. It's convenient when placing the leds inside the model, but not that convenient when you try to solder them.
Meanwhile I worked on the model. First, I cut the dumb plastic tires off the wheels and sourced my spares box for proper replacement tires. I found an old (from 1980's) set of four Goodyears. I sanded them down and carved the insides bigger to accommodate the Spinner wheels.
I didn’t want a Deckard or a Gaff figure in the cockpit, I'll just use a 1/24th scale driver figure from an old Fujimi garage staff kit found in the spares. It’s perfect for this.
For the cockpit I made some minor tweaks. I added some tubes on the photoetched rear wall to liven it up. Nothing dramatic. The biggest change was on the front center console dome for which I simulated the lit tube on top with a clear piece of styrene sheet wedged in a sawed slit. It is lit from the inside with a blue nano led. I left out the similar tubes on top of the main instrument compartment, it was too big a challenge for me to tackle. Another small compromise there.
I wasn’t sure I could fit a power source inside the build, it was hard to estimate how much room everything planned would take. The flash boards are small and I only need to fit two in the back, one goes in the front. I decided to give it a go and if everything goes well, this will be a self contained fully lit model that can be displayed in action without any wires on sight.
Concealing the power switch was another tough call. There has to be one since this model will carry the power souce within, I think I found a cool solution for that. See, the Spinner’s wheels are designed to be built glued on, they don’t rotate. Except on my Spinner, one of the wheels does just that; it rotates. I plan to glue one wheel on to a rotating switch placed inside the chassis. By turning the wheel I can switch this thing on and off. This way I do not have to carve a visible hole for the switch anywhere on the fuselage. Magic!
At this moment I am almost ready for airbrushing the blue main coat on the Spinner's body. It needs to be painted before assembling due to the roof light arrays. There is a marching order that must be followed; paint first, prewired dome light support on, wires in through a pre-drilled hole, solder them on to driver boards inside the chassis, glue the bottom and top halves together... It's a frightening puzzle to put together and I'm not sure at all I can keep in track with all the thin-as-hair electric wires. I've never soldered anything like this and it's going to be horrible. Fingers crossed.
Tbc.
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