S-foil deployment mechanism upgrade - 1:48 MPC X-wing

Just a thought about the back plate on X-wings. On red 5 (Luke Skywalker's) X-wing the little hatch points downward unlike the rest of the X-wings, including the way that the MPC is molded. With your design could the hatch be attached the other way.

Here is a pic of the back plate of Red 5.
View attachment 467495

I've seen that image and I agree with Robert that it is likely the result of the cap part being put on upside down or rotating down because it was loose. You never see it that way in the movie that I know of. There are several kits that follow that orientation as a result of this prop being shook up and using that as the reference.

At any rate, in answer to your question, yes the hatch could be turned either way. With a slight modification it could still snap in place rotated up or down. However, I'm going to make it default up like in the movie. :)
 
Wow!,

Just read this Thread,
Fascinating design you got there Hagoth!
Nice work!
Mike Salzo was telling me the specialized resin he has to use for the V4 hinge components is a bit of a paint to deal with, but you need the strength.
(of course 1/24 scale is a lot more demanding in stress than the MPC 1/48)

It sounds like the perfect product to sell on Shapeways ( or a similar site), plenty of material options that the right properties in Shore Hardness & Strength

This has nice potential

Thanks for the complements!

I'm hoping I can retain the required strength in the mounts as this scales up. One advantage is that the pivots come out balanced as far as motion is concerned so the motor in the motorized option can be small but there is still a bending moment on the wing root.

I have looked at Shapeways and not all the parts could be printed by them as they exceed their resolution limits. Since there are four 2" long parts and several more longer than 1" it would come out a little on the expensive side but that is still an open option. The two critical high resolution parts would need to come from another source. Clear acrylic is the best material I've found for this so far. ABS works well for the bulk of the parts but I can't get the high resolution parts in it. If anyone knows of a printer that can print ABS at 16 micron resolution let me know.
 
Hagoth, I see that a looser 'fit' is probably okay with the telescoping parts, as long as its not so much as to cause binding. Also, you probably could get away with partial tubes [the green & red parts] -i.e., tubes with cutouts- because they primarily function to align the clutch plates. If your cutouts leave 'end rings' so to have a continuous surface at the point of engagement, then it still allows for smooth, supported operation yet would require less volume of material. Of course, the green tube shaft would need to retain sufficient strength because it shares the torque load with the primary shaft when engaged. Don't forget to allow for venting, in case the tolerance becomes 'airtight' - especially if you are considering allowance for lubrication.

Again, if the mounting space tolerances become too tight in certain implementations, there is always the option to discard the clutch and just have a 'pop-top' hatch and Allen wretch or Torx socket to engage an external operating tool. The goal of having the *very cool* remote operation using a motor might be possible if the motor & drive was at the forward end of the shaft, located in the 'cargo bay' area of the model. Certainly possible with the larger X-Wing models where there is more space to work with.

Fascinating project; I'm glad it is going so well.

Regards, Robert

Thanks Robert. You just described an early concept of the clutch parts which were in part inspired by a ball point pen mechanism. I considered for a time making the hatch pop out action spring loaded. After some experimentation I went with solid walls to eliminate possible "catching" as the parts moved and turned inside each other. The additional material turned out to be very small.

Good point on the "airtight" potential. I could see where that might be a problem so I tried it out with both machine oil and Vaseline. Turns out the tolerances are not tight enough to make this air tight and I discovered that lubrication makes a mess and didn't help much. Taking off the sharp edges and opening up the tolerance about .002" made all the difference I needed.

The pop-hatch with a separate tool to work the mechanism will certainly be an option. Just glue the driver clutch on the flat end of the sliding clutch and you have a tool to engage the end of the shaft. I found that using a screwdriver to fit in the slot on the end of the drive shaft just chewed it up. The hatch will pop on and off on its own. I'll call it "The Robert Config" just for you. :p


The cool thing about the motor option (at least for the 1:48) is that the motor is a 6 mm diameter 9 mm long stepper that fits in the same area as manual clutch. The clutch housing will be swapped out for a motor mount and a different drive shaft is used. This leaves room in the cargo area for the Bluetooth interface, motor driver board, sound chip and the recharge port hidden in R2 with the system on off switch.:D

For the 1:35 scale mechanism, currently in the scale up design stage, the motor will go in the cargo area. For larger scales the motor could possibly fit right inside the mounting spindle for something even more compact. Still weighing the pros and cons on that one.

Thank you for your continued support and comments.
 
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