Neil_W's half-baked design thread

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I'm calling this one "finished", although that's probably not the right word. OR is not happy with the stability, but it's also not accounting for the ring. If I (or anyone else) ever went forward with a build of this, which is unlikely, it'd need some fine-tuning. This version is less elaborate in the fin can area than previous ones but I think it hangs together better.

I think it looks rather like a mace, for what it's worth.
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I present to you... 8 Bit Bertha:

EightBitBertha.png

Maybe kitbashable from a New Way kit. Not intended for altitude records.

And yes, the whole thing is on a proper grid.
 
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I present to you... 8 Bit Bertha:

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Maybe kitbashable from a New Way kit. Not intended for altitude records.

And yes, the whole thing is on a proper grid.

OK....A flying skyscraper with multiple staircases. Dayum! I think it's time to give the drawing board a break. Go build one of these other awesome brainstorms you came up with earlier. The reason I say this is because I run into a designers block also. Somewhat like a writers block, but in the design field. My drawings tend to get goofy-fied if I don't give it a rest now and then. Don't worry about this thread fading away to never never land, it'll be here. And we'll be waiting.
 
OK....A flying skyscraper with multiple staircases. Dayum! I think it's time to give the drawing board a break. Go build one of these other awesome brainstorms you came up with earlier. The reason I say this is because I run into a designers block also. Somewhat like a writers block, but in the design field. My drawings tend to get goofy-fied if I don't give it a rest now and then. Don't worry about this thread fading away to never never land, it'll be here. And we'll be waiting.

Well... it's an 8-bit thing, which is... a thing. Not *my* thing necessarily, but wanted to try it.

In any case, I have two builds in progress (not scratch builds), so not quite ready to start anything else at the moment. Next one I do will come from this thread; I have two in mind.
 
Well... it's an 8-bit thing, which is... a thing. Not *my* thing necessarily, but wanted to try it.

In any case, I have two builds in progress (not scratch builds), so not quite ready to start anything else at the moment. Next one I do will come from this thread; I have two in mind.
Like something out of the "PIXEL" movie, eh? Yeah, I still have that Plasma Dart swirling around the Autocad Carousel waiting for for me to print the plans off. I still have 2 on my bench also. One you know about for sure. Neither of which are getting finished quickly.
 
Inspired by an image I found of a fantasy space yacht sort of concept, was curious to see what could be done with it, if anything. I have no idea what it would take to make something like this stable (OR is unhappy with it at the moment, but I also think it's confused somehow).
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Inspired by an image I found of a fantasy space yacht sort of concept, was curious to see what could be done with it, if anything. I have no idea what it would take to make something like this stable (OR is unhappy with it at the moment, but I also think it's confused somehow).

I like it! A couple of custom curve cuts on those outer pod/ring cannons would be a nice aesthetic addition. It's simple, yet sleek.
 
Looks good. Follows the angle of the nose cone into a gravity well kind of shape. Seems like it needs a tailcone or engine bell in the back.
 
This one is rounding into shape nicely. I adjusted some things so it now could act as a SPEV of sorts for me, which increases the chances that I might build it. Specifically, I have all the parts to build this other than the balsa. The ring would be fabricated around the same form I used for the Avalon (balsa or cardstock, not sure yet). Paint job is experimental, I just want to do something in different colors than I've been using so far.

I no longer know if this is a space yacht or a fighter or something else. But I like it.


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My biggest concern on construction is having sufficient strength for anchoring the ring and the pods. Would need to thing about how to build it strong.
 

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Careful now, we all know what happened to the Avalon's ring.......
Ha, well, in this case the ring is the whole design, so no discarding it. Also, because it's a really *big* ring, there would be lots of elbow room inside to deal with painting and whatnot. Plus in this case I'd get to actually fabricate the ring, which should be fun.

Is that some Vulcan starship?
I should have posted the full link: https://snowflakehell.blogspot.com/2016/05/faster-than-light.html. It appears to be concept art illustrating a ship from a novel.
 
My biggest concern on construction is having sufficient strength for anchoring the ring and the pods. Would need to thing about how to build it strong.
Go with using plywood and use the interlocking method for ring & wing. Sorta like "Tab A in Slot B".
 
This one is rounding into shape nicely. I adjusted some things so it now could act as a SPEV of sorts for me, which increases the chances that I might build it. Specifically, I have all the parts to build this other than the balsa. The ring would be fabricated around the same form I used for the Avalon (balsa or cardstock, not sure yet). Paint job is experimental, I just want to do something in different colors than I've been using so far.

I no longer know if this is a space yacht or a fighter or something else. But I like it.


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My biggest concern on construction is having sufficient strength for anchoring the ring and the pods. Would need to thing about how to build it strong.
BTW here's the image that got me started on this one:
186icholf7galjpg.JPG
I dub thee "Alcubierre"
 
I dub thee "Alcubierre"

A perfectly apropos name, to be sure (I can say that now that I looked it up :facepalm:). But kind of ungainly. I wonder if there's a way to riff on the name to come up with something that flows a bit better. Will consider.

In the meantime, I nabbed a surprisingly clean sheet of 1/16" balsa from Michael's today and am going to take a whack at fabricating the ring. Whether or not I go ahead with the build, it'll be fun to bend the balsa and see if I can do it. It's a much steeper bend than the helical pieces on Avalon, so I'm not really sure it's going to work (I got a lighter piece of balsa than last time, but still).
 
... I nabbed a surprisingly clean sheet of 1/16" balsa from Michael's today and am going to take a whack at fabricating the ring...

I believe that is the faint sound of a build starting.

You know it, I know it, it's going to happen.
 
I believe that is the faint sound of a build starting.
I wish I could argue. :)

This design is not finished by any means, but the ring is the ring is the ring, so I can monkey with that now and worry about the rest later. I really am unsure if I'll be able to get the wood to bend to my will here, but we'll see.
 
I wish I could argue. :)

This design is not finished by any means, but the ring is the ring is the ring, so I can monkey with that now and worry about the rest later. I really am unsure if I'll be able to get the wood to bend to my will here, but we'll see.


I've heard of using 3-4 strips of 1/32 wood to make nice bends. The laminate gets nice and stiff, retains some pliancy. May work with thick cardboard?
 
Well, golly.
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I gave it quick bath in Windex and went to it. I had to work the wood progressively, probably would have snapped it if I tried to bend it all the way around on the first try. Eventually got there without any drama.

Cut this piece a bit too short unfortunately so it may not get used, but serves well as a test.
 
Initial results seem to be that the single strip will not quite hold that tight of a shape. Once the outer piece is glued around it, though, it should be solid. I have a second piece in progress now, this time cut to the correct length. Balsa bending is fun.

As for the design, I'm not sure about the dorsal and ventral fins. As currently constituted, they don't touch the ring (which I think looks kind of cool) but will make painting and decaling interesting, since they're pretty near each other. Also they might not even be needed for stability (hard to know exactly with that giant ring around the whole works).

Probably need to generate a few variations and figure out exactly what I'm trying for here.
 
If you hold it upside down, and put candles in the tubes, kind of looks like Lumiére. Really cool. How do you feel about adding some cardstock fillets along the body to wing joints, similar to the old Centuri SR-71 kit?
https://www.spacemodeling.org/jimz/centuri/cen5349.pdf

I like those boat tails, you can roll them yourself with cardstock and the payloadbay.com transition tool.
 
Purdy. Rusto 2X makes a satin Magenta that almost matches that perfectly.
Yeah, that's a likely candidate. It's a little more purple than what I used up there; I'll probably update the model to use a more exact version of that color. Not committed to sticking with it, but it looks pretty nice and very different from all my other stuff, so that's good. Probably use silver for the grey bits.

How do you feel about adding some cardstock fillets along the body to wing joints, similar to the old Centuri SR-71 kit?
https://www.spacemodeling.org/jimz/centuri/cen5349.pdf
This model has already drifted towards the SR-71 in appearance, why not keep going? Well, the reason would be that I'm not sure if I'd know how to do that successfully. Figuring out the shape of the piece would be an adventure; I'm particularly uncertain about how to handle the long leading edge of the main fins.

It would definitely look good, but I dunno.

I like those boat tails, you can roll them yourself with cardstock and the payloadbay.com transition tool.
Yes, they will be rolled cardstock. The one in the main BT will be wrapped around the inner MM, almost exactly like the rear end of the Avalon. As for the engine pods... actually I'm not sure what to do in the back there. Stick a BT5 core in there (the pods are BT20) for support? Plug the back? What do folks normally do in the back of non-functional engine pods?
 
I really like this one!!
Thanks. I wish I had a clue of what to do with the decor (beyond what's there now). I dunno if this is a starship, a space yacht, a fighter, or what exactly. I will consider any and all suggestions on how to approach this.

In the meantime, the second piece of wood has encircled the first, and the two are now glued together (I hope) and drying.
IMG_6233.jpg

This turned out to be somewhat trickier than I had expected. Getting the wood to bend around the form turned out to be easy enough using the Windex treatment, but the wood won't hold that tight of a curve, and so it wants to come springing off. Only the gluing of the second piece will hold the thing together. And, getting both pieces of wood to stay in flush contact all the way around the ring was... well, nigh impossible. I did the best I could and attempted to load some TBII into the small but noticeable gaps between the two pieces of wood here and there. By the time I get back to work on Monday it should be all dry, so we'll see if (a) it actually is round, and (b) is solidly glued together. It'd a definite maybe at this point.
 
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