Moon Bug part 5

I believe I have finished up the construction phase of the Moon Bug project with the completion of the Cabin interior.

I made a central console out of a 1/35 scale tank hull front and part of the casing of an old radio control transmitter, the bit that the telescopic aerial was mounted in. 

The interior has 4 LEDs wired up inside, two white in the centre and two red on the outer edges. They are wired up to the 12 volt supply with a suitable resistor on the positive side and held in place with blobs of hot glue.

A piece of opal perspex is added to the front as a screen and light diffuser along with a surround of 0.5 styrene. Various tiny kit parts complete the detailing.

The seats have had arm rests and control panels added with a rudimentary joystick.

Detailing of the side tanks has also been completed. These will be adhered to the chassis once painted.

Once the interior is painted I can glue the cabin side bowls in position. They may need some further detailing but I will wait and see after the primer has gone on.

Actually, looking at the photo above, it occurs to me that the front window struts on the interior could do with some detailing as well.

Thanks for looking.

More soon...

Moon Bug part 4

I have been building a rear door and finishing up the external detailing on the Moon Bug project as well as starting the interior of the cabin.

Rear Door.

Right side.

Left side.

The picture above shows the louvre arrangement of the roof over the rear door.

I also added a second smaller grey blister to each side. 

These blisters are made from plastic measuring spoons with the handle sawed off. The nub of the handle was then sanded back to the contour matching the oval shape.

Some detailing has been added to the underneath of the hull front where it meets the chassis. I also added a few bits of detail underneath along the sides to fill in some gaps that could be seen through the chassis. I have some small tanks (not shown) made from PVC pipe end caps which will be affixed to the chassis after they are painted.

The cabin interior still needs some control consoles to be made up with some backlit screens and some arm rests for the seats.

The Bruder figures seem happy with their new seats. The padding for the seats is made up from half round ABS strips.

 

Through the door in the middle and down two steps is a back wall that will look like a transverse corridor to the interior of the vehicle. The back wall has been detailed with a recessed section. There is some 12 volt strip lighting in this corridor which hopefully will be brighter than the cabin interior which I plan to light just from the as yet unmade console screens.

I have also made some detailed inserts for the cockpit sides with kit parts mostly from the Tamiya 88mm Flak kit.. 

I am a bit concerned that perhaps the detail is a little too fine scaled for the vehicle and looks out of place compared to the rather chunky detailing elsewhere.

I will reserve judgement for now and wait till some primer goes on to see if some alternative inserts need making.

This model is getting close to completion of the build phase with a bit of piping to do, the cabin sides to think about and the consoles to sort out.

 

 Thanks for looking.

More soon...