Times Visited
U.S.S. Enterprise 1701-D
Part 1
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Kevin came to me through E-mail and wanted me to build this kit for him. After seeing my other work, I guess he was impressed. So, I agreed and having received the model, I must say this looks like it'll be a project and a half, but let's see what we can do with it, shall we? First off, I've decided to do as much as possible with as little as possible. Let's take a look at everything that comes in this kit! |
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That's alot of pieces. One thing I really hate about AMT/ERTL kits are how many pieces end up falling off the sprue before you even open the bag. Alot in this one. (Side Note to Kevin: Everything is here, but several of the prongs off one of the clear blue-tinted trenches were broken off. No biggy! Will highlight them for ya in the instructions before I send it back!) So... I gathered my research, and am now ready to start. First off, we need to dig 4 grooves in wings to accommodate a wire that is suppose to supply power for the nacelles. This is a major pain, because the plastic is very thin to begin with, and with all the raised detail, sanding it smooth will be even more of a pain... but, taking my time, and not rushing things, I took a good hour on each of the 2 trenches on one side of the hull to show you what I mean: |
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I used a Tester's Hobby knife with the tip slightly broken off to dig the tenches. I used the back side of the knife blade to scrape the narrow trenches gently. Now, the instructions say that I'm suppose to use the wire that came with the kit, however, because after winding the strands together, this may be too big for the groove (and I don't want to putty everything over too much). So, what I did was I took the supplied wire and separated the strands, then took 3 strands and twisted them together, it fit just right, as shown below. |
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From this, I inserted the wires into all four slots. I puttied the other side and sanded it smooth so that you cannot tell there is a wire there, and then attempted to match the color of the plastic with little success, as you can see in the photo below. So, I have decided after studying some of the photos in my research I decided to use a camouflage gray. |
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After this, I painted the entire inside surface of each part with flat black, so that the light will not show through the plastic once all the interior lighting is in place. Now mind you, I did all this by brush because I didn't want to have to scrape away the paint for the gluing later on (I'm a bit lazy!) |
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On the next page, I go into the lighting of the saucer section and how to keep it lit when it's disconnected from the main battle hull. |
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