Starship Avalon: build thread

Gary Byrum said:

WOAH! Now you're on the move. Startin' to look like a freaking starship now! I seemed to notice something about your Bondo job. Looks like you are in the know about using alcohol after you apply it? They look rather smooth in that, I'm unsure if you sanded them already. I found out that dipping my finger in some denatured alcohol and rubbing the Bondo smooth, requires less sanding and you get rid of all those "chunkies" that form when you're applying it. Did you do that also?

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I... don't remember what I did. :eyepop: I know I did not do the alcohol rub, though. I think I used a gloved finger to just draw it like a fillet, to remove as much excess as possible and minimize my subsequent sanding. Next time I will definitely try your alcohol trick.

Nytrunner said:

What worked out for removing the glassine in a controlled manner? Knife scored outline and patience?

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I practiced a couple of times on a piece of scrap tubing. I just scored the complete outline with a #11 blade (I found I needed moderate pressure to get through the layer, but not so much as to score the underlying tube). Then I stuck the blade under one of the ends so I could grab it, and then peeled the whole thing off in one shot. On my first practice run I didn't cut quite deeply enough, so it didn't come off in one piece. By the time I did the actual model last night (and yes, I was nervous), I had it down pretty well, and all three came off cleanly in one piece. If you haven't done it before, practice once or twice and you'll be fine, it's really pretty easy. Oh, and I did the scoring free-hand; working slowly I was able to do it pretty precisely (and it doesn't need to be 100% perfect anyway).

Really moving along! Must be satisfying to see the curved pieces line up as well as they do. No room for error. Good job!

Cabernut said:

Really moving along! Must be satisfying to see the curved pieces line up as well as they do. No room for error. Good job!

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Thanks, it is indeed a relief, although they're not *perfect*, and it may be a somewhat interesting process to get them attached securely. After seeing the fit, I will almost certainly apply the additional balsa bracing as discussed previously.

I would love to get primer on tomorrow but it's going to be tight... for the filler/primer, Rustoleum recommends < 85% humidity; it's going to be right around that tomorrow. I might have a shot.

Well, hey, every ambitious project has its little adventures. That's part of what makes its completion satisfying.

modeltrains said:

Well, hey, every ambitious project has its little adventures. That's part of what makes its completion satisfying.

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Indeed! I don't do a lot of builds (at least, relative to a lot of other folks around here) but I try to make each one interesting somehow or other...

Amazingly enough, this happened today:


That there is filler/primer, although it looks weirdly white in that picture. Now the build comes to a grinding halt while I wait for sanding and spraying opportunities.

The asymmetry looks really cool.

And now that I'm nearing the end of the priming phase on the Blackstar, I'm getting an idea of why you like to hand paint certain stuff.

Nytrunner said:

The asymmetry looks really cool.

And now that I'm nearing the end of the priming phase on the Blackstar, I'm getting an idea of why you like to hand paint certain stuff.

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I don't actually *like* to hand paint, but sometimes it seems to be the most straightforward way. I really hate needing to do paint before assembly, but I seem to be drawn to designs that require it. This one is gonna be fun (where by "fun", I mean the opposite of fun).

I learned something while priming.

My plan (although admittedly a little fuzzy in some areas) was to separately paint the main rocket, the helical pieces, and the rings. However, when priming the helical pieces I realized that there's actually no good way (at least nothing reasonable) to hold them in the air to paint them. Not a big deal for priming, but problematic when applying color coats. So I think, reluctantly, that I'm going to attach the helixes after I finish sanding the primer. When it comes time for final painting, I'll just have to deal with it. The good news is that we (I) could see the mostly finished assembly sooner rather than later. I admit this is very alluring.

I could still change my mind, but I have to weigh the effort to build a rig for painting these things, vs. the effort of painting with them all attached. Tough call at the moment.

The rings, on the other hand, really must be painted before assembly. I have ways in mind to deal with that. For Biohazard I hand painted the ring, but this time I shall definitely spray.

For now, though, I have to wait for the primer to cure before I start sanding. Still quite stinky. Rusto Filler/Primer, by the way, didn't mention that before.

Upgraded the helical fins in my OR model, and am toying with decor upgrades. In this image (and my new avatar) I have some additional nose decal. What say you all in the peanut gallery?


Apart from the fact that masking the green bits is going to kill me, I'm still not totally satisfied with the paint scheme. I wish I could figure out a reasonable way to get a third color in there, but I haven't come up with anything appealing yet.

It actually doesn't NEED another color Neil. You have a great pattern scheme now. I think (since I'm a peanut now) you might have to loose some of the green to make room for another color. It looks balanced.

Gary Byrum said:

It actually doesn't NEED another color Neil. You have a great pattern scheme now. I think (since I'm a peanut now) you might have to loose some of the green to make room for another color. It looks balanced.

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Feedback that tells me not to do any more work is my favorite kind!

Have to agree with Gary. If you get it to match your OpenRocket, it'll be fantastic. Very striking. Plus you'll have to cut your own work out as it is.
How'd you get the fin outlines green anyway?

neil_w said:

Feedback that tells me not to do any more work is my favorite kind!

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Well then, how bout a tip to help ease up that work a bit. I had forgotten about this thing we did back in the sign shop days. We would cut white vinyl letters, applications or whatever, and spray paint them with assorted colors. Then after about 4-5 minutes, we'd weed the background away. End result was a colorful text. I just used this method on a stripe I'm applying to my Custom Alpha.

You have some fine lines in the fin can area that you might be able to use this on. Providing you have some white vinyl stripes. Sure would be easier to apply colored vinyl than to mask off those areas. OH....the reason you weed before the paint gets totally dry is because it'll have rough edges when you take the stripe off the backing.

Nytrunner said:

How'd you get the fin outlines green anyway?

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Decals. The current version is a bit careless and messy in a few places, but more than good enough to see what it's (theoretically) going to look like. I've attached the OR file here if you want to look into it. It's a hoot.

View attachment avalon24_closed_mm.ork

neil_w said:

Decals. The current version is a bit careless and messy in a few places, but more than good enough to see what it's (theoretically) going to look like. I've attached the OR file here if you want to look into it. It's a hoot.

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Decals...Is this functionality from the new OR version?

As of today, decals haven't changed from 15.03. There have been discussions about tweaking decals in the upcoming version though.

Nytrunner said:

Decals...Is this functionality from the new OR version?

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OR calls them "Textures" in the Appearance tab.

I've used textures, and uploaded image files, but have always struggled getting fins to work out well.

Did you get tat effect just by making a black square with green edges?

Nytrunner said:

I've used textures, and uploaded image files, but have always struggled getting fins to work out well.

Did you get tat effect just by making a black square with green edges?

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First look at the file I attached, and then head over to my OpenRocket decals tutorial to get the process.

Wow, this looks really great!. Your original inspiration was the space station from the movie, where it has lots of windows. Not sure how you could work some kind of panel lines or little square dots to give that impression, using decals maybe. But on those helix fins, you could consider putting some form of decals in the same green color to represent or suggest multiple decks of windows, like on the side of a cruise ship. Maybe some thin panel or deck lines even, black on the green or green on the black. Just going back to the original images from the movie set, a little subtle touch here and there should do the trick to make the illusion complete. Extra points if you put a big bay dome window for the swimming pool with J-Law swimming in it.

GlenP said:

Wow, this looks really great!. Your original inspiration was the space station from the movie, where it has lots of windows. Not sure how you could work some kind of panel lines or little square dots to give that impression, using decals maybe. But on those helix fins, you could consider putting some form of decals in the same green color to represent or suggest multiple decks of windows, like on the side of a cruise ship. Maybe some thin panel or deck lines even, black on the green or green on the black. Just going back to the original images from the movie set, a little subtle touch here and there should do the trick to make the illusion complete.

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I've been very indecisive whether at this point I still want to try to tie back to the ship in the movie or just accept that this is something different. Windows are really the main thing. As far as I can tell, the ship in the movie had windows on the sides and the insides of the helixes (which were a lot thicker than on mine.) Either would be challenging to do my model, and I have no idea exactly what it would look like (can't make that happen in OR), which makes me extra-nervous.

I could certainly switch things up and put the windows on the outside of the helixes, I suppose.

As far as panel lines go, I am completely clueless. I don't know where they need to go to look good, and applying them on this particular model will be extra difficult, so I'm not going to try.

So I might just freeze it where it is, fully aware of the potential lost opportunity. As it is, the current paint job is going to be brutally difficult to execute.

Extra points if you put a big bay dome window for the swimming pool with J-Law swimming in it.

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Since I haven't actually seen the movie yet (!), I have no idea where that is or what it looks like (the swimming pool, that is). Details?

Discrete parts are sanded:

In a momentary fit of pointless ambition, I had filled the cavernous spirals on the inside of the rings. They're not as good as the outside, but still pretty good.

I'll cut the ring piece into its constituent parts soon; it was just easier to prime one piece rather than two separate ones.

Next up is the nose assembly.

neil_w said:

In a momentary fit of pointless ambition,

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I like that. The chances of anyone seeing or commenting on those spirals is remote, but YOU WILL KNOW THEY ARE THERE.

neil_w said:

Since I haven't actually seen the movie yet (!), I have no idea where that is or what it looks like (the swimming pool, that is). Details?

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Roll the clip:

[video=youtube;ATlwHzJKssQ]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATlwHzJKssQ[/video]

Your latest ork has been transferred to my "Fiddle" file with Gary_byrum's Time warp. Lets see what I can do while stuck in airports this weekend .

Nytrunner said:

Your latest ork has been transferred to my "Fiddle" file with Gary_byrum's Time warp. Lets see what I can do while stuck in airports this weekend .

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OMG! You still have that?

Well this was about as much fun as I'd imagined.

Not perfect, but progress. This weekend I'll attack the main part of the rocket.

neil_w said:

Well this was about as much fun as I'd imagined.
View attachment 316030
Not perfect, but progress. This weekend I'll attack the main part of the rocket.

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I remember having issues getting those ribs squared with the step-down part.

Gary Byrum said:

OMG! You still have that?

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My documents folder is kind of a black hole for things I find of interest. The fiddle folder is a particularly sketchy back alley of the rocket stuff neighborhood.

neil_w said:

Well this was about as much fun as I'd imagined.
View attachment 316030
Not perfect, but progress. This weekend I'll attack the main part of the rocket.

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You are far more dedicated to sounding down primer coats than I am.