"Midnight Raid in Mosul" Dio & Write-up....

thanks model!! i appreciate it. yep, was already gonna do what your "talented, artistic (lol) pic showed pretty much so thanks. i noticed you put a "median" in there...got any good pics or a good explanation of what that should look like bud? also if ya got a good idea about the road (after the celluclay...never did one b4) i'd appreciate that as well. that carpet was kinda cool in that i went to some online persian rug website, saved the pic, imported the pic into word, copied and flipped the pic, then scaled down the size then printed, cut out, glued the two together and ta-da! was worried too about that sidewalk...thought at times i "over did it" so im gonna trust your statements about u liking it!!

anyway, again gentlemen, thank you for the help, the ideas, & the insults. . this isnt to humble it too much but i really dont think i could've gotten this far without you guys!! btw model, i'll wash your jeep if ya wash and wax my mustang! use some of that artistic talent you got!!

Here's a quick "Paint" picture of what I was talking about. I'm pretty sure the wife put crack in my cheerios this morning....

.... dang I got artistic talent!

D...A....M....N  D...U...D....E !!!!!!!!

That base is DEAD on!!!! And you're a F^$*^)*&$*%$ BAD A$$!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I hear-by declare the base complete! ....

.... except.... (j/k)

camo ... you have done an exceptional job on this one. You've gotten everything down. I wouldn't really worry about the bolts unless you come back to it later and it just bugs you. Just a few little styrene rod slices and you'd be G-2-G. But then there's paint and blah blah blah, so I don't blame you.

The tiles, the puddle, the angle of the pipe (that sounds a little weird!?!), the staining of the columns at the bottom, the carpets .... Man, you nailed it all! Seriously. You couldn't have done a better job if you were sitting on an Iraqi street corner with the street as your backdrop!

KUDOS Sir! Kudos.

.... now as far as the base's .... Rrrr.... base. I think that if you're going to keep it at the same angle as the one that you've got going now, I think that's good. However, consider, like you were saying, about "sanding" the street ... think about doing something like a thin celluclay street all the way out to the opposite corner of the base. That way, you could spread out a figure or two and they're not all crammed into the first floor of the structure.

Am I making sense?

However ... BEFORE you do that. Seriously, take a breather, work on something else, or you can come down here and do my yard for me so that I can work on my stuff!!!! (I like "plan B" myself...)

.... my jeep could use a washin' too.....

well guys i promised an update...here it is....i hope its finished (the building). there's your damn puddle model!! LOL. not sure if i should make it bigger but i didnt want to make it look like it was "pouring out". as far as the pipe...i like it. i realized after all of this that i didnt put any "mounting bolts" on my main sign...but...oh well...this project is starting to get to me a little....maybe b4 i do the figs i will take a couple of days off to regroup. anyway, hope you like it...and if ya dont...let me know guys...doesnt mean im gonna change anything (lol) just means if it sucks...it sucks!

i purposely put the pipe on a slight angle...

thanks guys!

too late i have her rusted in a way that "i" think looks good (enough?). hmmm....!

san fran or whatever dude but when the women came pouring out onto sixth street from the university...had myself a great big bay window looking out of the bar...was 18...ahhhh....good times!!! (yeah, you didnt catch the 18 and drinkin part!!...)

...damn yank!

Aww .. c'mon ... part (spit) ner! You go'ter-sef sum Teeeeexan in ya too! You wur station'd at Hood!!!

... but you went drinkin' in Austin too. So does that mean you're from San Francisco too!?!?! HAHHA!!!

I'll check and see if I'v got some pics with pipes in them for ya. Mean while, just google "iraq urban city" ... I'm sure there will be something there.

Well, here's the deal on that ... where ever you are, if there's water, there's going to be rust. They typically didn't paint their piping, so I think that I nice light - medium/ heavy rust layer would be fine. (yeah, I know .... I listed all three levels just for clarity! HAHA!!)

I think that if you were to paint the piping a rust-up color and then LIGHTLY have the rust stain run down the wall a bit where there are brackets connecting the pipe to the wall, I think that would look about right. Don't let the stain run the length of the wall, but rather just a little bit down from each bracket. Also, along the wall ... it may not really call for a rust stain running down the wall, as it would maybe just a water stain. Does that make sense? I think that you could either go with a lighter stain to suggest faded paint from the water or a darker stain to suggest a water leak ....

OOOOOOooooo OOOOoooo .... NOW you HAVE to make a small water puddle on the base just at the foot of the piping .... those damn things always leaked a little bit ... HA HA ... you HAVE to make a water puddle!!!! (... sorry dude ...)

I know that I wasn't too clear, but I hope that helps point you in the right direction at least a little bit. If not, just let me know and I'll try to clarify ....

I think a light coat would work fine as modelchasm pointed out it there's not much water for heavy rust? Made sense to me!

I'm sure it looks alright, I usually have a tendancy to overweather (mainly just beacuse its fun!) so doing it in small steps and then coming back later to check it out is a good way to stay objective about the amount of weathering involved.

Sounds good though- can't wait to see the building finished up!

Awesome ... thanks brother!!

If he could provide a parts list and a schematic, that would be great too!

I found a blinking LED on the RS website ... I'm going to run over there and pick up a few, wire them up and see how fast they flash. The guy said it was about 1x / sec .... we'll see.

That'd be great if you could email your dad. I've read stuff all over the internet about using 555 timer chips or 4060 binary chips ... again, all stuff that I know POOP about.

Basically, this is what I need ... I need to have four different LEDs, flash at different times, with a flash rate of about 1 - 1.5 sec. If this can be done with one timing chip awesome. If I have to build four different boards ... well, I guess it'll get the job done.

Right now, if the blinking LED from RS works, I guess I'm just going to build 4 different boards. I don't know. Just shoot me a PM if he's able to help me out. Thanks a million!!!

So, check this out ... VERY simple to do it seems like. Just wondering if it's a little too slow flashing ... if the light stays on too long???

http://hackaday.com/2008/06/18/high-power-led-blinking-circuit/

Thanks man! .... That glimmer of hope was meant to distract me from noticing the shotgun aimed at my foot right!?!

HAHA!!!

I'm still scouring the internet looking for something that can help me understand .....

WOW!?! What a statement for all time .... I might just change my signature line to the above ...

.... W .... O ..... W .... ! ...... ? ..... ! .....

Anyway, I might just take a trip down to radio shack and see how much I can play stump-the-chump with the guy/ gal there. Who knows maybe they can answer my question. This might be a write-up in itself!!!

Thanks again camo ....

psst ... you got any engineering buddies??? .... you're still in that "learning group" thingy we call college!!!

I just took a couple of other figures that I have and taped some of the LED lights that I have to their heads ... yeah, it looked funny ... and I think that the fast blinking lights are going to be a distraction. I think I need to slow the the blink down to at least 1x flash/ 1.5 secs to possibly 2 secs. However, I have no idea how to build this one up. I've placed a thread on the sci-fi forum, but no bites.

I've found a few pages online, but I'm all confused about the parts I need, what does what, and how to control the timing. A lot of what I'm finding are instructions to build fast blinking bike lights ... again .... confused.

If I can't this figured out, I'm not sure what I'm going to do with this one. I'm almost convinced that the flashing strobes would be the kicker for this dio ... but I'm stumped.

I need serious help with this one. If anyone has an engineering friend .... well, just pm me.

... and no, psst. I don't think that "scaled down" strobe flashing is really going to work on this one. Nice try though!!!

yeah yeah yeah.

Alright, spring break is in a week, I'm going to go home, finish up the two 1/16 scale Marines (yeah- they're both Verlinden)- take some pictures of my giant WW2 Arnhem dio (Panzer 4; Kubblewagen; and a dozen British and German figures all over the place- graveyard, bombed out brick streets... it's kinda a mess of pink foam at the moment...)

and then I'm going to come back to school with a few kits so I can update you guys on my stuff as well haha

My work still doesnt stand up to much, but I like to pretend I know what I'm talking about

Hey- I got it- it's scale right? 1/12th figures and uh ... that means uhh carry the 3 and yeah that translates to faster blinking the smaller they are right?

It's all about the look- if you hadn't told me the real one blinks about 1.5 times a second I never would have known- but this is your think- I'd say, set a few of them up, turn off the lights and  just see how it looks. If it looks like a few SF guys thathad a massive short in their IR system and their indicator lights are going berzerk- find some way to make them blink slower. If it's not a bad look, I say go for it. Would I be able to tell the difference between one blink per second and 3-4? Yeah, but would I be primarily paying attention to that? No not really. I don't know- in my oppinion, if it's so crazy it distracts from the scene it's a no go. If you think it'll work, I think it'd be an acceptable short cut.

hahaha but again! Until I manage to make an update on my stuff haha you and camo do whatever you want

You don't think that the 3-4 flashes/ sec is too fast? Did I forget to mention that there's going to be a strobe on each figure? ... so 4x total!?! You don't think that's going to be too much flashing going on??? Honestly, I'm a little concerned about it. BUT, b/c yo're not, I'll give it a shot and see what it looks like.

Just so that we're clear .... the "midnight raid in mosul" title is taken!

Maybe you should put the "nuts" back in and title it, "nuttin' here... next house"! HAHHA!!!

 well, i will take your advice i think and leave it for tomorrow. or later tonight?! yeah, i've given up on the fruits & "nuts" thing. i'll get this thing all done and then be brain dead on the title!!! gonna make a few molds myself...just not at that stage yet.

 the l.e.d. blink should be fine. i had a few of those and not only are they bright but they blink for what your doing fast enough. that's my . good luck with the rest of the molds and all that electrical stuff!! better u than me!!