Mutara Nebula DeBoers E and R Build

Update #33

I have finally gotten the insert to look decent. Took about 50 iterative attempts to get there, the angles and radii of the curves drove me NUTS. So of course there had to be other issues, L The cutter would not cut through my 0.020 styrene, so had to drop down to 0.010 which means double the number of parts to cut, clean up and glue together. The inserts are going to be little stacks of these cut outs glued together like a laminate. Hope it works out well. I need to build a little jig to compress the plastic bits together while they are glued up, to keep everything straight. The next pic is of most of the electronics installed into the nacelles. I do not have the Enterprise spot lights installed yet. I have to do some assembly of the model to get the LEDs to line up properly. I am debating on whether to glue the pylons to the nacelles to get these LEDs installed properly. Once the nacelle is closed up, they will not ever get opened again. The last two pics are of the retirement box I am making for a friend. Getting closer, but have to drive back up to Dallas to use some machine to get back to right angles. My hand finishing could be better, oh well. The construction of the box is about complete. Once I get down up in Dallas, will complete the finish on the box, and then will need to order the hardware. I have the leather that is going into the top of the box sitting in my office.

Cheers,
James

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Update #34

There were PAINFUL, but got the first one much closer to being complete. I need to fix the front alignment of the pieces coming off of the nacelle, but that will be some sanding and more putty work. The lamination process is working well and creating really flat parts. I am using some jointed flat Birdseye and Curly Maple as the side of my little press, which is really funny. Not quite what it was supposed to be used for but, works great for this though. I am really happy how much straighter this is compared to what came from the molds. Also, I will get the parts completed for the inserts, finish cleaning up the parts and shoot some primer. The shoot some white, paint the inserts black and install them into the nacelles. Getting closer on these guys!

Cheers,
James

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Update #35
Some pretty good progress on the E and R. I have gotten all of the nacelle inserts into the 4 nacelles, woohoo! Of course it took a tad bit longer than expected. Moving on to getting the nacelles aligned with the hulls and mark them up with some pencil marking so I can start cutting the holes to mount them to the pylons. Maybe do some gluing this weekend? A couple of other issues popped up. The reliant pylon has a fitment issue when you put the top hull on, so, that will take some thought on what is the best way to get all of that to fit, with minimal sanding and putty work. The shuttle bay from NemVia productions showed up! Woohoo. Mark is well known for the construction of 4 of these models, which doubly insane and was kind of enough to sell me a shuttle bay. I have yet to take it apart, but look forward to get this into the E and I will use this to base the shuttle bays that are going into the R on. Good progress the last few days.

Cheers,
James

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Update #36
I have found a few more differences between the studio model and the DeBoers E. The point at which the pylons connect into the nacelles is too low and if I try and shift it up, to be more accurate to the studio model, I lower the nacelles even lower in relation to the saucer. So, I think I will be attaching them low on the nacelle. The first two pics show the studio model with the ratio of nacelle and saucer and the proper connection point of the pylon into the nacelle. The DeBoers is close, but until I studied the studio pics, I would have never have known that it was not 100% accurate. So, is this a problem, do not know. I do not think so, she still looks pretty amazing!

Have been working on adding the extra reinforcement needed on all of the large parts that will be blued together. The walls on the cast resin parts are too thin to directly glue to each other. So, lots of Apoxie sculpt and sanding, get the parts to a good state to have enough surface to ensure a strong joint that will not break instantly. I have 2 of the 4 nacelles done, but they are taking about 2 hours each, so will get the other two done tomorrow night.

Cheers,
James

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Vismus,

Huge thanks for the kind words!

Update #37

I have gotten the bottom 8 of the grill things installed into the nacelles, they look pretty darn good, however the close up of the photo just reveals ALL of the problems. The white paint inside the recessed area will not be touched going forward, the outer stuff will get painted and sanded again. You can see the unsmooth surface in between the two nacelle halves that will get cleaned up. The other two pics are of the painted nacelle halves. I have started working the top grill insert on one of the nacelle. My first attempt is painted, waiting for the paint to dry before I install the part.

Due to geometry of the parts, there will be micro gaps around the inserts. I am ok with this due to the vastly improved straightness and definition of the grills. The solution will be to do some light blocking on the backside of the inserts, which I plan to do with aluminum tape, plus everything else is pretty much in its own light box.

One day, you will get to see why I go crazy with light boxes, one day!

Close up photos are SO demoralizing.

Cheers,
James

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Update #38

Sand, putty, sand, putty, sand, putty, PRIMER!, crap, sand, putty, sand, putty, sand, putty, PRIMER! Base color! Oi. :(

Pheww, well, I got all of the inserts into the nacelles, woohoo! More work to go on them, but on to the next step of drilling holes and work the mounting onto the pylons. First pic is of one of the nacelles with the inserts and the second shot is starting to work on the hole placement for the Reliants nacelles. These are much easier nacelles to mount, so these are the ones I am starting on. After the pylons are glued up, get to do some soldering on the wiring and spot light LED placement on the Enterprise, that is going to be exciting, then, glue up the nacelles, and then sand, putty, sand, putty, sand, putty, PRIMER! To break up this monotony, I am starting to work the Enterprise shuttle bay.

I really like the shuttle bay I got from Mark, but, I am going to clean up some of the detail in the casting. This will also be used on my Reliant shuttle bays, so it is a two fer! I plan on using the Silhouette to cut out some of the larger plastic detailing and photo etch on the tiny detailing. I will take pics of the various parts as they come out of my work flow. I am also looking into cutting the elevator tube thingies out of acrylic, more on that, when I hear back from Matt.

Last couple of pics is of 7th Continent. My daughter and I FINALLY lifted the Voracious Goddess curse, took 6 play sessions to do it, but we had a BLAST playing the game. We have 3 more curses to go. I am hoping we get all of the expansion stuff, early next year right when we complete the 4th curse. That would be good timing.

Will work on the mounting tomorrow. I always seem to be behind, I had to work most of today though, which is not Bueno, however, I am almost done with the retirement box. I got the leather glued in today, and looking to buy the last bits of hardware to install.

Cheers,
James

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Update #39

Got the Reliant pylons and nacelles glued up. The pic shows how level everything ended up. The good thing is that they are within about 1/8 inch when measuring all of the upper surfaces. However, the nacelle on the right was twisted when glued to the pylon. :( Major sadness on my part, I did not notice it when I was gluing the first time. So, I very carefully cut it off of the pylon, sanded everything flat, AGAIN, and reglued. This time, both the left and right nacelle have the same amount of negative camber. If I cut them both off to try and eliminate this 1/8 inch over the height of the nacelle, I am not sure I can get all of the other alignment stuff the same, so, going to live with the slight issue. I bet no one, who does not read this, will never notice! I hope.

The Enterprise nacelle have yet to be glued to the pylons. I need much more working time with the epoxy than the 5 minute stuff will get me. So I ordered 30 minute epoxy. The issues I am running into on this are of course different than the Reliant. The Reliant was relatively easy, not much to really mess up, except of course what I did, lol. The Enterprise has more to get right, but, it also has 2 screws that I can use to physically attach the nacelle and pylon. Will take some shots of that in the next post. I want to commemorate how they are wired up and soldered before I glue them shut. So, when the epoxy comes in, I will do some sanding and glue them up. Oh, the problem I am having with the right nacelle, to continue the car alignment analogy, is that the toe on the right nacelle is out compared the left nacelle. So I installed a washer as a spacer on the back screw and going to test a double washer tomorrow night. If this fixes the toe, then all of the dimensions will be within 1/8 inch on these nacelles also, which would be fantastic.

Family is in town this weekend, so probably not much going to get done on the models, but nearing the completion of 4 large sub-assemblies. I have also attached the photo etch mask I designed up for the shuttle bay inserts on the Enterprise. Also you can see the plan to cut the storage bay thingy in plastic. I will cut several 0.010 thick parts and glue them together to get the correct thickness. I plan on using some of the same design elements in the Reliant, to help tie the two models together, since there is no official shot of the Reliant that I know of.

Cheers,
James


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Update #40

I got one of the Enterprise nacelles glued to the pylon today, my 30 minute epoxy came in, woohoo. I also got all of the soldering done on one of the Reliant nacelles. One pic shows the soldering and heat shrinking of everything, the second is a close up of screws I am using as additional strength. I have cut some recesses on the other side of the nacelle to allow me to pack some more epoxy into this area when I glue this thing up. I am ready to glue up the first nacelle, I did several practice clamp ups, but got different results each time I practiced. So, going to put it down tonight, and try again tomorrow night, getting tired, long day.

Should get the first nacelle glued up tomorrow, the second Enterprise nacelle pylon glued and the second Reliant nacelle soldered and wires dressed up.

I need the nacelles glued up so I can start doing some work on the Enterprise secondary hull and try and figure out where the center of gravity is for the Reliant model.

Plugging along on this journey.

Cheers,
James

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Update #41

More progress and a setback, which makes me sad. I got the second Enterprise nacelle epoxied to the pylon and glued up the second Reliant nacelle. DISASTER, well sort of. AS part of the test clamping and test fitting, I ran into problems where I needed to remove parts of the pylon and parts of the top of the nacelle, basically, I needed to sand down it down some to minimize future work on the seam line on the bottom of the nacelle. However, I got a little excited while sanded, and cut 2 of the wires the run from inside the hull into the nacelle. Fortunately, one of those wires does not carry any signal, the other one controls the light underneath the crystal. So I faced an existential crisis. I had to sit there for several minutes and debate whether or not to run another wire. I made the right choice and ran another wire. Pheww. I do not think it will be that difficult to go back in and fill my little channel needed to run that repair wire.

Finally got to use the jig to align the LED needed to light up the neck, woohoo!

First three pictures are of the repair wire, and gluing up the nacelle. Next picture is from the movie, and the last picture is of my aligned LED in the nacelle shinning down on the neck in all of its glory!

Cheers,
James

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Update #42

DISASTER, a much BIGGER disaster than what happened yesterday. Take a look at the crap picture, and I think you will see my problem quite clearly. I aligned from the back of the nacelle, and everything look ok, a little twist, but from the front, OMG, DISASTER, super sad. So lunch was spent tearing apart that joint without damaging any of the wires. The good thing I learned was just how strong these joints are. I cut through about 90% of the joint before I could wiggle it apart. I did not want to damage the wires, so would not even cut near them this time around. The biggest issue I had was the metal screws I had installed to provide extra strength in the joint. I spent over an hour just realigning the darn thing, and then, put down two hot glue dots to steady the joint, and have applied two layers of epoxy to it. Tomorrow, I will remove it from the model, and fill in the other side of the nacelle joint with epoxy, and then back to forward progress on these guys.

On the 1st Enterprise nacelle, I had to go back in and add some more apoxie sculpt to put a few more places to allow for epoxy to glue the sides together. There is a slight warpage in the nacelle, so I want plenty of surface area to get it all straightened back out with. Apoxi takes 24 hours or so, so will go back to work on the 1st one tomorrow.

For the 2nd Enterprise nacelle I got the spot light LED aligned, BUT, looks like I am going to have a really hard time getting the saucer spot light lined up. I did not realize how important those holes locations were going to end up. I think I would have been SOL regardless though. The 8 foot model has more room to use larger LEDs on. I look forward to hopefully getting to build an 8 footer.

I have also had a few questions on my jigs that I built for these models. I took so larger photos of the jigs. The jigs that hold the secondary hull and the saucer up are pretty much locked in place. For the nacelles however, I can maneuver the nacelle in all 3 axis. Same with the Reliant, the saucer is pretty much set, but I can maneuver the nacelles are around in all three axis. What I do not have atm, is a way to glue up the roll bar on the Reliant, I will build something for that in a few months, when closer to gluing that bad boy on.

So a big step back today, but overall made good progress, and fixed a HUGE model destroying disaster.

Cheers,
James

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Update #43

First off, the wife and I got to go see William Shatner presenting Star Trek II, The Wrath of Khan. It was awesome to see that movie with a couple of thousand likeminded Trekkies, lots of applause and cheering. A really good time watching this 35 year old movie. Shatner then spoke for a little over an hour answering questions from the audience. For a guy in his mid 80s, he is still pretty darn sharp. We had a great time, and who knows how much longer he can keep doing this. I would like to have seen Nimoy before he died, but sauce with the goose.

On the model, all 4 nacelles are now glued up, the picture is of the last one getting glued, which is nice. The next two pics are of the pre and post wire clean up. I love my little hot glue gun. I used to use 5 minute epoxy to do the wire tacking, this is WAAAY faster. The light shot is of the nacelle pre glue to make sure that all of the LEDs still aim at the correct spot. It was a tremendous amount of work getting the LEDs lined up and able to close up the nacelle body. I actually over sanded some of the LEDs and had to replace them. Lots of cursing but eventually got there.

I decided to take a break from engines and started working on the Reliant hull. I sanded down all of the detail on one section and then flattened it using metal glaze car body filler stuff. This stuff is amazing, but the fumes are horrible, so not my first choice of fillers. However, used here since it was such a large area. The picture shows the area almost done with sanding. The second pic is of the cut outs in place. I glued up most of the complex panels tonight. I am debating on whether or not to add another level, wil decide tomorrow.

The last pic is off of the lacquer based AK paint I got. I am putting together a color board to see how these paints interact with the base coat and also how well they do with masking. I am comfortable with how all of the Mackenzie paint interacts, but not sure on the AK stuff. I am trying to do as much paint work as possible in lacquer. My experience is that the lacquer is a much more durable paint compared to the acrylics I use, and Vallejo is a great paint brand. The acrylic doesn’t fuse as well to the coat below as the lacquers seem to. I am also using this board to firm up the colors I will use on the aztecing for the Reliant.

Lots of time spent this weekend on the models, lots of progress.

Keep modeling!

Cheers,
James

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Update #44

I glued down the paneling on the back right corner of the Reliant. All but 1 piece were perfectly placed, that one piece, of course the super complicated assembly is off about 1 mm, which frustrates me. I will think on replacing it. Depends on what the other side ultimately looks like. Progress. The larger issue of whether or not this was the correct thing to do was solved. This was absolutely the right thing to do, plus developing some new skills in my model building tool kit.

Cheers,
James

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Update #45

Well, in a blind fit of rage I violently tore of the offending piece that was 1 mm out of true and annoyed the crap out of me every time I looked at. The PAIN. The kicker is, this is the bottom of the model and I doubt many people will get a ruler out to check on the orthogonality of the pieces. Oh well, I now have another chance to be successful! The other reason why I removed it was I could sand down the other parts of the lower hull. I removed most of the detailed sections on the bottom. I have already cut all of the pieces that will go back in. I have been sanding everything flat and getting ready for the re-assembly. The good part about this effort, I am building some skills in an area that I have been sorely lacking. Also building some confidence, not sure what I am going to do on the top. There are 4 triangles on the back of the model that are going to be replaced. Those are up next.

Part of the reason to get the main hull done is so I can figure out where the center of gravity is and drill a hole for the mounting bracket. On the Enterprise, it is already set, and there are not any options on where it can go.

The last two pictures are of my paints and masking work. This a complicated set of masks I cut on my cutter thingy. I have not done any air brushing in quite a while, so it was good to get into a rhythm of cleaning the brush, changing colors, moving masks around etc. All of the AK paints are lacquers, which is what I am trying to migrate to on all of my colors. I love my Vallejo paints, BUT, they can lift quite easily when you pull the masking off, if there is too much over spray onto the masks. I purposely over sprayed the masks with heavy coatings of the lacquer paint, and pretty much ZERO issues. Also, they were very tough, not sure what to call them, minutes after getting sprayed and blow dried. So, I am going to mix up several custom greys for all of the Reliant aztecing and other colors on the two models. Looking forward to getting that done.

So cranking away on the models, happy with the progress. The Reliant bottom is actually getting close to having all of the electronics installed, along with all of the additional Apoxie sculpt reinforcement.

Cheers,
James

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Update #46

So, I am having problems cutting out the complex grill piece, that I did not have problems the first time around. A little frustrated on that count, but I continue to work with the cutter to get some more cut out. On another note, I got the base plating back onto the center section of the Reliant. Looks great, but is shows the lack of symmetry of the part coming out of the mold. I would have not noticed if it were not for the perfectly symmetrical parts I put back down on the model. I am super happy with the parts that have gone down. Excited to keep adding the upper level plates on.

I sanded down the triangles next to the Reliant shuttle bays. FYSA, there will be fully built shuttle bats on both sides of the Reliant.

I am also working on cutting out new corner details. I will end up replacing all of the detail on the bottom hull section. I am still working on figuring out how to get the sensor band detail better. Still looking at doing full photo etch banding for all three bands. Oh, I also order more AK paint and have started the second color board. I will be mixing the paint colors that will go onto the R and E, and testing them on the color boards.

Also have been working the design of the base. I think it is going to look pretty darn awesome!

Cheers,
James
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Update #47

I got the greebling completed on the center section of the Reliant bottom hull. I also got all of the panel pieces done. I am going to glue them down tomorrow. Very long day and I do not want to screw it up again. The little grill pieces took me about 4 hours to cut out 2 that were good enough to use on the model. I do not know why the cutter had such a hard time cutting them out today, VERY frustrating. I think I am going to go give it one more shot. At least I have 1 really good one and 1 decent one.

I was also trying to get the corner detail cut out today and had no success. I am thinking I will try and do a PE part for that, unless I can overcome my Silhouette cutter trauma.

I had to redo the triangle detail that is next to the shuttle bays due to a drill disaster. So, almost ready to drill some holes in the new batch of parts. Then will get the greebling back onto to them, repair the lower hull and glue them on. I am closing in to only having the sensor band and panel lines left to correct/repair/improve/rescribe on the bottom hull. Then, electronics and Apoxie sculpt. Looking forward to finding the center of gravity for the Reliant and drill a 1 inch hole into the hull. I hope I do not have a heart attack!

I also included a pic of the original detail, and of the 1078 air bubbles that are now removed due to the recent effort.

Cheers,
James

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Update #48

A lot of time for not a lot of progress. I finished restoring and removing air bubble holes in the bottom of the Reliant. Took me several days to get the fins reinstalled. I tore out my first attempt much happier with the second attempt. I used the metal glaze to get the areas much closer to flat. There was a dip in the middle of both areas of the fin portion. Took a couple of applications and sanding to get it close to flat, while it is not perfect, much better than what I started with. I also went in a replaced all of the side detail on the area I have no idea on what to call. What you do not see in the pictures is that I have done two passes of clean up on all of the other detail on the bottom on the Reliant. I am going to do one more visible inspection on it before I install the RCS thruster resin, then tape the sides up and prime the bottom. I want the bottom primed and in great shape before I install all of the electronics, all in pursuit of finding the center of gravity on the model.

Cheers,
James
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Update #49

Bee bopping along on the ships. Got the first coat of primer down on the bottom hull of the Reliant. Woohoo, I have not gone back and started cleaning up all of the nibs and defects yet. Took a large chunk of the can of primer, LOL. Two shots of the bottom hull rear wall detail I replaced off of the original casting. One shot of the taping up to make sure I do not get primer on the back sides of the windows that would be frustrating. You can sort of see in the lower hull shot the tape I used to mask off all of the windows and the sensor band. I am still not sure how/what I am going to do on this. The resin that this model is cast out of is SUPER hard, and putting panel lines back in is very difficult and tough on my hands/wrists/old age. Hopefully I do not put the sensor bands back in by hand, I do not know though. That would be a multiday very sad process. The next pick is of the panel lines on the top and bottom Enterprise saucer section have been deepened and all of the problems have their first filling with filler. The last is the complete color chart for the AK paints. I LOVE the AK lacquer paints. I find it very interesting how the colors are different between the board and my monitor. I wonder where the slight color variations are coming from, my camera, video card, cheap TV monitor? Cranking right along.

The AK paint is fantastic, I strongly suggest folk go take a look at it. The paint is lacquer based, so pretty much air brush. However, I have not tried using a brush to see what it would look like. Also, the paint, for the most part, comes out super flat. There is no need for an over coat to flatten out the color. Love this stuff, and look forward to custom mixing all of the colors needed to finish out these models.

Cheers,
James

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Update #50

Sand, putty, paint, sand putty, paint. At least there was good improvement between the efforts on the above pictures. On a side note, about to head out on vacation, woohoo, so no updates for a while!

Cheers,
James
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Update #51

Sand, putty, paint, sand putty, paint. Working on the REALLY long joints on the top of the Enterprise nacelles. The Es nacelles did not go together as well as the Reliant ones. The E nacelles were not warped, but the alignment left some to be desired. Since the Reliant was the second attempt at the nacelles, the fitment is much better. I have finished sanded the primer on the bottom of the Reliant and she is now ready for her white base coats. I need to put down the white before I put in the electronics. The idea being that I will not have to mask off as much in the future. Who knows if this is worth the effort. I am also almost finished with the bottom portion of the Enterprise saucer section. The plan is also to prime and white base coat it, then install the electronics. I took a picture of where I did an earlier lighting test to make sure they looked good. The main take away is that the primer coverd/filled in the detail on the side of the saucer, so I am still thinking of how to get the detail back on there. I have not done any photo etch work in a while, but that will need to happen to see if I can photo etch my way out of this issue. So the vacation was nice, and it was also nice to take a week off of the model. Still moving along at a good steady pace. I need to be completed in 11 months or so. Looking forward to that day and then onto the next projects!!!

Cheers
James


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