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Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: June 27th, 2017, 4:34 am
by Batfly
Wow, lol at that! I'm really glad this thread has helped you. Make sure you give yourself a huge heaping of credit. Your pack looks amazing!
The race is on then huh? I'm shooting to have this done by Halloween at the latest. Got a lot going on right now.
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125
Posted: August 23rd, 2017, 10:43 am
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125
Posted: August 28th, 2017, 11:19 am
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125
Posted: August 28th, 2017, 1:13 pm
by Batfly
Ok, on to Saturday, August 26th's progress.
I started by removing the masking tape around the power cell as I was afraid it didn't work. But it totally did! I was impressed. Look at it! The glorious cleanliness! Now I need to study reference shots to see if these surfaces need to be radius blended together, covering up this greatness hahaha.
When I first started attaching greebles, I stripped the hole on the ion arm cap for the house barb. To remedy this I poured glue into the hole. Then I inserted the barb fitting, clamped it down, and set aside to cure.
I grabbed the synchronous generator and cleaned up all its expoxie gap filler. Came out nice.
Cleaned up a few spots on the crack gen and gun mount. Most notably where the two join together.
Drilled some holes to clamp down the little chamfered shelf that sits under the hga. Does that little shelf thing even have a name?
I used the red plexiglass that I'll be using for the cyclotron widows as a leveling surface, pressed the little shelf in place, and transferred the hole locations, BUT only on one side. The adjoining gun mount surface is slightly off level.
I widened the holes for the screws to go through and drilled the first holes on the shelf on the one side I transferred them to. Then I screwed that side down.
With that side secured in place I used the plexiglass leveling surface again, pressed the shelf up to it while pushing the gun mount up to the shelf and transferred the last two holes on that side. Then I drilled them out.
Applied a liberal amount of glue and screwed it into place. For those with a keen eye, yes, I messed up the first outer hole on the second side and had to redo with another hole. I didn't use masking tape on the show side as I'll just be covering it with epoxy to blend the sides together.
I wanted those curved details on the crack gen around the tube/hose area that makes it look less blocky. I mixed up some apoxie sculpt for this. I rolled short, thick tubes to put in the places to be worked. Then I took a scrap flat piece of styrene that fit on top as a level guide. I wetted both the styrene and my finger tip and pushed the expoxie into place. By wetted, I mean I just spit on them from time to time. Sounds gross but works perfect! Lol. I didn't worry to much about getting it perfect. I actually put more material than I intend to be there as I'll be abraising it down with joint killing scratchy paper.
Blended the surfaces on the opposite side where the hose goes in. Used my pinky finger instead of index on this side for a smaller radius. Just made expoxie worms and squished them down. Spit on my finger a bunch as I smoothed it all out and made it even. Minimal clean up will be needed it looks like.
By this time the glue on the chamfered shelf was cured a bit so I did the same there. Squished expoxie worms with a spitty finger.
That was all for Saturday's progress. Now that I'm caught up on posts, I can relax and start working on it today! Stay tuned fellow busters!
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: August 30th, 2017, 2:12 am
by Venkman's Swagger
The win is strong with this one!
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: August 30th, 2017, 8:18 am
by Batfly
Thanks VS! I should be posting Monday's work sometime today.
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: August 30th, 2017, 8:43 am
by TK5759
My god....this pack is beautiful. It's 11 pages of custom built styrene deliciousness.
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: August 30th, 2017, 8:45 am
by Batfly
Too kind TK! 31 pages according to tapatalk on the phone. Browsing on a computer is much nicer as, like you said, its only 11 pages so far. Lol. Yeah, I can't believe the log length and timeframe of this build lol.
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 2nd, 2017, 9:12 am
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 2nd, 2017, 9:48 am
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 2nd, 2017, 10:49 am
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 4th, 2017, 11:24 am
by Batfly
Saturday, didn't get much done as we had a lot of errands we ran and then plans in the evening. But I at least wanted to get something done. I want to work on it each day of this 4 day weekend.
Started by scraping out the glue where the cosmetic spacer meets the synchronous plating. Then I cut some scrap styrene, gooped it up with glue, and clamped it in place. Sound do nicely.
My booster tube welds, as good as I think they came out, have been bugging me for months. Every time I look at reference photos, the screen used tubes ARE welded, but heavily grinded down.
Got out my scratchy sponge and scraped my boosters to look like the reference. I like it much better this way!
That's all I got done on Saturday.
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 4th, 2017, 11:56 am
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 4th, 2017, 12:03 pm
by hooker
Looking great! You are on the home stretch....
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 6th, 2017, 7:05 am
by OCP_Model-001
You not finished this yet?
J/k, lovely work lad.
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 6th, 2017, 11:51 am
by Batfly
Lol, I know, right?! Thanks.
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 6th, 2017, 4:10 pm
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 6th, 2017, 4:57 pm
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 7th, 2017, 3:13 pm
by Batfly
Wednesday, September 6th, a day of corrections.
I started by unscrewing the booster tube. I realigned it to my original markings and taped it in place. I made sure to put some tape on the sides to prevent wobbling/rolling this time. I looked from the back, and sure enough you can see it went askew. The holes don't line up. Must have moved when I transferred the hole markings yesterday.
So, this time I drilled all new holes while the tube was still taped to the ega. I took my time and held it firmly while hand drilling.
I tapped the tube, widened the screw holes, and screwed the tube down.
Now that's what I'm talking! Lines up near perfect. Look at that matching angle joint. Put the frame on to check it, couldn't be happier! Still debating whether to take the effort to weather a curve into the back of the booster frame or not. Who knows. Not critical.
Wrapped some shark foreskin paper around the ppd and wrecked my elbow correcting its mounting point. The ppd was previously leaning a little forward and to the right. Now it's all good. This also helped wear a slightly visible line that determines where it'll actually meet up with the ppd wall. I made two screw holes along this line.
I taped it how I want it to be. For some reason I don't like the straight forward look. So I went with more of a Egon's pack placement. I widened the screw holes and tapped the ppd while holding it on to the ega.
It looks great and idealized on the front, the side however has a gap and some unevenness. I'll tape some wax paper to the ppd, fill in the gap with expoxie, and wear it down flush and smooth after it cures and I remove the ppd.
That's it for Wednesday! Might get some work done tonight, might not. About to take a nap. Waking up at 4am with 5 hours of sleep the last 3 days after going to bed supper late during the 4 day weekend has me jet lagged something fierce!
Stay tuned either way.
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 7th, 2017, 8:17 pm
by Hammer
I just went back and got caught up on your posts. This is an amazing build. Keep up the good work!
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 8th, 2017, 6:10 am
by Batfly
Thanks Hammer! The end is in sight, but there's still so much left to do!
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 8th, 2017, 8:56 am
by Venkman's Swagger
Shark foreskin!!! Hahahaha brilliant. Excellent updates yet again. You got mad skills bro
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 8th, 2017, 2:59 pm
by Batfly
Haha thanks. Yeah, it's a fun challenge to come up with ever new ways of not saying whay I won't say anymore in this thread. [emoji14]
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 8th, 2017, 3:19 pm
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 10th, 2017, 10:08 am
by Batfly
Just a quick little blurb and some venting. Fixed the images in the first few posts that were from photobucket. Downloaded the images from the bucket and re uploaded through tapatalk. Luckily, I started using tapatalk early in this log. I don't like how much it compresses the image making them a little blurry, but at least they are there and visible.
Vent: F' YOU Photobucket! You were free for so long and now you want $60/month just so my old pics show up in my old forum posts? That's dirty! If they had said "any pics from now on will cost to host on third party sites, but old uploads are grandfathered in" would be sensible. But this? It's wrecking vast amounts of informational posts all over the net! SHAME ON YOU PHOTOBUCKET! SHAME! SHAME! SHAME! /vent
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 12th, 2017, 10:10 am
by Batfly
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 13th, 2017, 1:56 am
by gbrob
Wow....
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 13th, 2017, 8:26 pm
by GBDRE760
Thats so amazing! How much was all of the styrene?
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 13th, 2017, 8:57 pm
by Batfly
Thanks for the comments. If I remember correctly, and this was 2 years ago, I spent $60 on two 24"x48" sheets.
Re: Batfly's Scratch/First Pack Build All 0.125" Styrene
Posted: September 14th, 2017, 4:55 pm
by Batfly
Alright, almost forgot to update on Tuesday, September 12th's progress. Let's jump into it.
Firstly, I "unscrewed" the clipboard barb fitting from the ion arm cap. I think it was too early in the curing process as the threads came out with it. I guess 15 hours isn't enough and I ended up screwing it by unscrewing it too early. So I repeated what I did Monday and clamped it down again. I'll give it the full 24 hours this time. 4th times the charm?
I went on to clean up the front surface of the curved edge under the power cell. Filed it down with a jewellers flat file. Came out nice.
I unscrewed and removed the ppd. The wax paper worked great. I grabbed my flat miniature concrete block and wore away the top and side until they were flush. Placed the ppd back on but didn't tighten it down as the epoxie wasn't finished curing. Just resting there it looks a ton better already.
I wanted to get the cyclotron step ring permanently attached to the cyclotron. I held up some aluminum tape to the cyclotron and ripped it off at the length of the circumference. I folded a crease into it using the edge of the desk as a ruler. Then I cut reliefs into it about every inch. I made sure to then fold it all the way and crease it as far as it'd go with the back of my thumbnail. This was so I could rip the waxed backing off only the non cut portion. I affixed it to the upper side if the cyclotron.
I peeled off the backing from the relief tabs about 3 at a time. Using the same scissors, I pressed the tabs into the corner first then smoothed them out. Lather rinse repeat three tabs at a time. Once I got them all pressed down I unscrewed the key screw on the bottom of the n filter and removed the cyclotron. The taping works twofold. One, to keep the ring in place, and two, to keep glue from seeping through.
Speaking of which, I flipped this taped duo over and poured a generous amount of weld-on in there. Set it aside to cure.
I grabbed the bumper and saw some low spots. So I leveled it out.
Feeling that I've had enough practice squishing worms by now, I decided to go for it and implement the nice curved transitions from the side ribs to the flat center of the bumper. I started by cleaning and roughing in some texture for the epoxie to grip. Then I went to town.
Originally I was going to use epoxie to fill in gaps on the bottom of the shell to make it last flat on the motherboard. Then I noticed it rocked. Which meant there was a common low point. This was right around the power cell on one side and the gun mount on the other. So I spent a good 45 minutes grinding it down, setting it down, checking where it rocked, and repeating. It sits damn near perfectly flush now with just a few gaps that are small and easily filled. Super glad it worked out this way! It's practically finishing itself now. (Psssh, keep telling yourself that. Riiiiiight.)
Lastly, I went around and cleaned up the transitional nooks and crannies from all the epoxie worms I flattened.
And that's it for now! I have yet to remove the aluminum tape on the cyclotron to see if the clipboard barb threading worked. Till next update, stay frosty.
Oh oh oh, almost forgot! I haven't been exactly too thrilled with how my styrene bellows is turning out and have been contemplating getting a metal one. The price and 5 day lead time was putting me off. This morning I saw in an email from AJ that they were IN STOCK. So I pulled the trigger and it actually shipped already! Woo! Metal shock mount on the way! Exclamation mark!