AI Desert Racer RC Vehicle part 3

Once the 3D printed main hull was completed it was time to go old school and fill in the undersides with kit-bashed detail. In the picture below is a few parts from a Wall-E truck toy, a Bruder dozer toy and a bunch of bits of old transformer toys. Mixed in is a few plastic kit parts and some garden hose fittings.

The large black rear exhausts are the bass reflex ports from a Sony mini hifi, the same one as is being used as the front of this unfinished spaceship project, Sony Spaceship Two

This was all adhered to a 3mm sheet of foamed PVC. Once all the nurnies were in place I cut the excess pvc backing away at the bottom right up to the edge of the detail.

The rear detail block is mostly made from a couple of Duplo blocks with the requisite kit part details added.

After priming with grey primer I then added a lot of pipes made from some single solid copper core insulated wire and some thicker black multi strand electrical wire. This type of wire can be bent and stay bent due to the solid core. One problem with this insulated wire is that some types of grey primer remains sticky once painted, I think due to the plasticiser in the insulating PVC sheath. I have tried dusting it with talc which removes some of the stickiness. I think it is fine if painted with water based acrylic hobby paints.

 

Just visible below is a large thick pipe/hose made from solid foamed neoprene rubber.

Nurnies were added to the top surface as well.

Finally all the detail including the pipes received a final coat of grey primer.

It was then time to add the final colours. In this case I used Montana MTN94 spray cans, a grey, two shades of  off white and an orangy-red. I am big convert to the MTN paint. It is designed as grafiti paint but is perfect for these large models. It is a matte finish not affected by the oil wash weathering process and sprays really nicely with excellent cover. It also doesn't smell so bad and is available in 200 colours.

You can see in the picture below I added a couple of headlights (a last minute addition) to the nose. I carefully drilled through the 3D print and added a couple of 12 volt "eagle-eye" cob leds. At this point hey have the lens covered in masking tape.

After the paint had cured for a week I started on the vinyl cut graphics. Using Inkscape, the free open source graphics editor, I made copies of the vague AI graphics depicted in the AI artwork. These were then cut from the appropriately coloured self adhesive vinyl on my Silhouette Portrait 3 cutting machine.

The cut graphics were weeded of the unused bits of vinyl just leaving the symbols on the backing paper. I just used a low tack masking tape as a transfer tape to apply the graphics in the right spot on the model.

A few random rectangles of vinyl were also added here and there.

Next up is the last phase of the build - weathering.

Thanks for looking.

More soon...

Jan Buragay Spaceship part 5

I made up the "wings" from 6mm foamed PVC sheet, bent using a heat gun and some scrap wood formers. The material is oversize and then trimmed back to shape once bent and cooled.

Once happy with the fit and placement I started paneling the surface with 0.5mm styrene and evergreen strips and textured sheet.

I also completed the skinning of the hull with the flat plates of 1.5mm styrene. The edges were beveled with a sanding stick so the edges meet snugly.  

When fitting plates around a protrusion or hole I always fit the hole first with an oversize plate and then trim back the edges afterwards. It is a lot easier this way than to try and locate a hole in exactly the right place on an already sized plate.  The protruding PVC conduit of the cabin side windows was dealt with in exactly this way and then the PVC sanded flush with the skin after fitting the plate.

Part of the skinning process involved adding a space for a crew door (I have yet to design and make the actual door) and roller style cargo door to each side. 

I always try to overlap styrene sheet where possible leaving it oversize and trimming and sanding back flush after drying. It results in a neater seamless join.

Finally just the bottom was left to skin.

Where the angle between plates was shallow I just bent the styrene cold for a stronger result by placing it in a vice along the bend line and gently pushing the styrene over. Styrene sheet has a side which is more glossy than the other. This glossy side is due to a thin layer of quite brittle transparent styrene. I have found if you cold bend styrene sheet away from the gloss side it can split as that brittle layer does not like to stretch. Bending it with the glossy side to the inside of the bend does not have that effect and it can be bent without stressing the surface. If you have styrene that has been exposed to sunlight for a period of time it will also become brittle and is much more likely to crack.

I added a couple of tanks made from PVC plumbing parts to each side of the top surface. This was how I decided to interpret the vague boxy shape thing on top of the ship in the concept sketch.

Thanks for looking.

More soon...