Four Foot X-wing work in progress(UPDATED WITH NEW PHOTOS)

427,as a big fan of the movies you are doing great justice to the X-wing,great work,my hands are hurting just looking at them cuts lol. Keep up the great work.

John

Thanks jtrace214. I'm pulling all the stops out on this one. This will be my ultimate tribute to the ILM guys. Accuracy is a must!

The only thing other than having to replace parts that are the wrong size here and there is,finding out that I have to make TWO laser canon bodies as they're not the same all the way around. There are two distinct designs they used for the top right wing and bottom left wing - these two being the same. And - the top left wing and bottom right wing are the same design. Why they did it this way is a mystery. I'll post comparison shots when I get the other laser canon body done.

I'll let most of the photos do the talking. If you have any questions - I'll try to answer them in a timely manner. I've been busy since I got the materials I've needed for a while. This is why I haven't posted for week I'm still building as you read this.

I put the new flash supressor inside the old one for comparison. I did this after realising it was too big. The smaller one is the correct size.

The bottom half of the engine intake shroud finished.

~ Cobra Chris

The Saturn V housings with the sheet styrene glued to it. This is to make the small lip that is not very prominent on the front edge.

The horrible scribbling is to remind me which edge is to be cut for gluing.

This is the Saturn V housings together to check for straightness. I had to plane them to the correct dimensions.  I left the bottom edge oversized for a margin of error. This allowed me to get superglue on it then sand it without ruining the straight edge by removing too much material until the styrene sheet edge was finished. There's a slight edge between the bottom edge of the engine housing and the styrene sheet that overlaps it. I added the strips on the ends of the engine housings that are present on the ILM Models. I'll post a comparison photo later.

I scraped the bottom edge of the styrene to make the line straight with the PVC pipe as I cut the sheet a little off center without realising it. I then sanded it with 150 and 220 grit to make it smooth. I'll do all the little touch ups later with 320 and 600 grit to make it ultra smooth and even.

These are the first attempts at making the greeblies that go on the outside of the Saturn V housing. The one on the far right is the first one I made. The one on the far left is the properly shaped and finished version.

This photo shows the two housings with the protruding lip. This was never removed from the original models used in the seventies. This was added to the four foot model by Ira Keelar to replicate this feature of the Saturn V engine housings.  This was actually a lip added to the original Airfix Saturn V model to allow proper alignment between the two pieces of the rocket body joint.

The following photos are of greeblies that go on the outside of the engine housings. These are made from 0.05" thick sheet styrene. This is why these features look so faint on the four foot ILM model. The long spar(rib)between the two chevrons is 0.20" inch thick.

 This is stretched sprue that I made,but I didn't have enough to fit the inside of the housings in the correct diameter. I ended up not using it afterall.

These are closer shots of the greeblies that are present on the outside of the rocket housings. These have been replicated by the ILM guys for this build. I replicated them to be the same size, shape, and thickness for my build too.

The three bottom greeblies are shown for comparison with the finished versions.

~ Cobra Chris

Does anyone else know an easier way to glue copper to PVC tubing? I've been working on this for two days gluing cleaning up excess glue,gluing cleaning up, etc. I know this piping looks awfully crooked in places but it's impossible to bend it to shape then glue it without having it move. This leaves glue marks that have to be wetsanded out after it dries. The poor quality of lighting makes it look like brass but it IS copper. I got it from a Hewlett / Packard computer transformer.

This post has been updated with a more complete version - it still needs more greeblies added to finish the inside of it. The piping is done.

~ Cobra Chris

Yes,a 1/144th scale Saturn V model in this size would be nice,only this is a little bigger than that - it's more like 1/124th scale. I'm still working the laser canons,so I put the engine housings on hold,as they'll be easier to put together now that I have all the parts made for them. I need to finish making the lasers first,as they were in the making before I started with all the greeblies for the Saturn V housings. I've been making all the small parts after the big ones. This makes it simple. Make the larger parts,then make all the smaller parts to the same scale.

This is the part that I used for the details inside the intake. I used half of this when I took this picture. I took the entire thing apart for greeblies on a future project. The one in the second picture is now a cat toy. I took the wire off of it first.

Here's the latest - I hope this will make a little more sense,since I haven't really posted any photos of the laser canons.

This is horribly scrawled with a crude drawing,so I can get an idea of scale for the greeblies that go on the side.

The raw materials in the works.

These are the greeblies for it. The one on the top right is the new version. I made the finished one on the bottom left last night. The little box on the top is disproportionate the actual ILM model. Since this is superglued together - I have to make this all over again. It took me an hour to make the first one before I realized my mistake. The little discs are supposed to be a little bit smaller,and the rivets are supposed to be smaller as well. There are supposed to be reinforcements that line up with each other,but the photos I use for reference aren't good enough to see this without supersizing them,and staring at them until I can't see straight! After seeing this compared to the real thing,I see that it needs some help. The second version of this will be better.

This is for example to show how this should look when finished. This is not the part that I will use for casting. The second one is still in the making as of this time.

Here's a comparison photo for reference. Here you can see what I'm talking about.

 This is the properly finished version that will be cast for the kit.

Here you can see that the box for this on the side is smaller,and the flange on the end (to the left of your screen) is also smaller. The one on the bottom has the more pronounced rounded over edge on the right side as it should. All the parts are now proportionate with the original ILM model. There is only one small modification that I still need to do before this is completely finished. This is the model that I want to build if I was going to pay $600.00 for a kit of this size. I want to offer professional quality,and not crap! Please compare the two with each other,and with the reference photo above.

You can see that the new version is also thicker as per the ILM model. Please forgive the fuzziness of this photo - the batteries in my crappy camera are dying,and I'm trying to use them up completely. I had just enough juice left to take this picture before it stopped working.

Very small update:

These are the outside greeblies for the laser canon body. These aren't glued yet. I've had to make a new laser canon body for the left wing,as I tried to fix a problem with the end towards the heatsink. It was too thick,and when I tried to sand it - it became out of round. I had taken paint stripper to it in the hopes of removing it a little at a time. Needless to say,it worked better than I hoped - the part is now ruined after scraping old sheet styrene,and taking off some of the PVC with it!  I had to cut a new pipe,and start from the begining again.

This,along with having to fix the brakes on my moms' car slowed my progress. They gave me the wrong part at the auto store,but that was my fault. I had to go back the next day to exchange it. This has been more trouble than it normally is to replace a master cylinder! The brakes still need bled as of this writing,but that won't stop progress for tonight. While everyone's reading this - I'll be finishing up both laser canons,body,heatsink,and all!

These photos show that it is possible to make parts identically by hand. However,I had to glue several pieces of sheet styrene together in a stairstep pattern to achieve the arc required to sand this to shape. I glued 120 grit sandpaper to the same PVC pipe that I made the laser canons from. Then,I dragged the part over the sandpaper to sand it identically as the cylinders for the canon bodies. I glued two pieces of acrylic (Persplex) together first,with the sheet styrene glued to it.

This is shown with the greebly for example. This is how it will look when finished.

This thread is amazing! I've only built X-wings in 1/72 scale, this is way out of my league! I am very impressed with your building and fabrication. This will look fantastic when its done.

Keep those updates coming!

Thank you for that compliment! That means a lot to me,as I don't usually share things like this with others.  This is a work of Himculean proportions. That's right,Himcules - 10 times the man that Hurcules was! He's what you call "muy Macho". Sorry,I couldn't help it! Shameless plug for my life as a teenage robot. This makes all the other models I've made,and built over the years look like tinker toys!

This puts all my modeling,and artistic skills to the test. It's been frustrating to say the least. I've had to shave a lot of sheet styrene off the Saturn V engine housings,and the laser canons,and start over! Such a waste of perfectly good plastic.

Thank you,guys for the compliments. All your comments,and compliments are very reassuring that I'm doing this right!

I know it's been a while since I posted,but all the insanity of figuring out what's a part,and what's a paint mark are driving me to point of agony!

Here're more photos for you all to feast your eyes on. 

These are the laser canons after two weeks of finagalling the details,and greeblies for them. I had to go back several times on different parts of these and start over to get it right,until I figured out that one of the triangular shaped panels is on the WRONG side!  Meaning that the two are identical as the ILM model was,but the outside greebly for the laser goes on the opposite side,so that these will have the same detail face up where the square hole cutout is.

This is a close up of the chip detail.

Two of the stripes on the out side of these have yet to be attached. I'll post photos of this after I correct one of these to explain this better. These are just taped on for placement right now. The long chip on the left canon is too long. I'll have to scrape it off,and start over. [sigh]
 

This is a comparison shot. There are small imperfections in these that aren't visible in the photo. I'll have to rework them to my liking. These need to be perfect for me to even consider casting them.

This is the actual thickness (0.20") that this is supposed to be. I thought that these greeblies went around the ouside of the engine intakes were supposed to be 1/8" of an inch thick,but after looking at the reference photos,I see that there's a blocked (Stug) part extending past the background piece that attaches to the wing. This is where I had to cut off the excess to make the correct shape. There's also a slight ridge on the outside of the Stug fender part. I'll have to recreate all of this for it to be accurate to the original ILM model.

This is the start of the laser canon base. This measures 1/2" inch wide by 4" 1/2 inches long.

This is the master for the afterburners. The small piece beside the afterburner is what most of the guys on the RPF mistakenly call  "turkey feathers". These are actually called thruster flaps. This is what determines how much more thrust the engine will produce by how open these parts are. When the thruster flaps are open all the way it produces less thrust. When they're closer together it produces more thrust making the fighter go faster.

I was trying to show that this still needs to be rounded true. I didn't know that this was so far off until I looked at it in bright light. The sunlight washed out all the detail in this photo.

Here's a closer view of the thruster flap.

These are obviously all the parts for the intake greeblies. This serves no real life purpose. It's only ornamental. The one on the top is the original master. The one in the middle is the correctly shaped version,and the one on the bottom is the mishapened starboard side.  This one will have to be redone. The angle of declination from the top point to the top edge of the bottom rail is wrong. This is the Stug part that will be glued to this separately. I'll have to fix this before I do.

I found this out after scrawling the horrible drawing that now adorns it. I was looking as I was doodling,and noticed that the part was out of proportion to the original version. This was after I cut out the bottom piece for the top starboard (right) wing. Needless to say,I had to start over by cutting the middle piece to the size it is now. I'm glad I didn't cut both of these out at the same time! I'll transfer the shape to the new piece I'll cut for the top right wing. The styrene sheet with this tracing on it was instrumental in figuring the correct angle in relation to the original specs.

I was trying to show more detail in this shot. This was done to give you guys an idea of what still needs to go on here yet.

These are the thruster flaps traced out to be cut. I didn't want to cut these out until I could get a picture of them. The bottom parts were scrawled to check for clearance - I wanted to make sure that there was enough material on this sheet for them.

Well,here's more to look at. 

These were taken late last night. I didn't get to bed until 4:00 this morning. Believe it,or not - This took 6 hours for me to make from beginning to end.  Why so long? I had to start this over. I didn't get very far before doing so. What pisses me off is that this is still wrong! The long shaft is too small in diameter!  I need to either restart this,or I need to find some way of fixing this one. Otherwise,I won't be using this part. The other two parts came out right,but this one that ties them together is the hardest part to make. I think this was either a kitbash in itself from three,or more kits - or it was completely scratch made on the original ILM model.

Either way,I hope you all will enjoy these pictures.

This photo,and the one before it were taken while it was dark outside.  If you look closely,you can see the stretched sprue I used to bulk this up. Unfortunately, I had to fill the spaces between the rings,and sand it all smooth. I have to make some minor adjustments to the piece that looks like an elongated fire plug (to the right of the one that looks like a pirate canon) on this yet.

These are the basic parts. I cut a small V shaped groove into this with an Exacto knife. I widened it a little with an Exacto saw,then cut the final shape with the machinists' drill bit beside it. This bit is less than 1 mm in diameter.

This is laying over the edge of the table because,I didn't cut the tab that I used to handle this part with while adding the stretched sprue to it. This wasn't glued together,but laid out for example.

A closeup of the tab I made to hold this while finishing the final greeblies,and stretched sprue.

Another look in blurrivision. (I think there's something wrong with the camera - now)

A closeup of the "elbow" part.

A far away shot for a sense of scale. This is about two inches long from stem to stern (end to end).

I still have yet to glue this together at this time,until I figure out how to make this right.

This looks a hundred times better in person. For some reason the camera I'm using makes all the detail wash out even in overcast conditions. I'm really starting to hate it! You can clearly see the colour variation between the night,and day photos. I wasn't able to make this better no matter what I did to it! I had to tone down the contrast of a couple of these pics for this reason. Unfortunately,this wasn't one of them. 

Here it is - finally finished.  This is the original part along side the new correct version. For some reason,I can't stop thinking about a doll house rocking chair back when I look at either one.  

This is the other backing plate for the top right,and bottom left engines. I'll make the rest of this today.

Here's the photo I used for most of my reference. I used others for the length,and width,but they aren't very clear,or closeup. I think this is a semi truck brake assembly on a big model.  I had to guess the diameter of the second part. It's not perfect,but damn close!

This part isn't in any kit scan I've seen on any site so far. So this will have to be a scratch made part.  I remade the shaft as it may be called. This is the part that looks like an anorexic fire plug was too small. This entire part with the exception of the smaller "arm" coming out at angle is made from sheet styrene glued in layers,then sanded half round shaped with an emery board and a popsicle stick with 120,and 220 grit sandpaper (superglued to it),and finished off with 600 grit wet-or-dry sandpaper. This is what took so long to make this - that and the small sprue I glued to it wouldn't stick very well!

The smaller "arm" part is made from bent sprue with 0.20" of an inch thick sheet styrene glued to the end of it. I shaved that down with 220 grit,then glued a second piece of sheet styrene that I glued to it,and sanded a slightly larger diameter around it with 220 grit. This completes the concentric circles that are present here.

I made a small indent with a machinsts drill bit as I did before,and I fitted it to the long part until it fit perfectly. I'll make the small curvature around the discs that are glued to the "arm" with Elmers' sandable wood filler. I'll post pics of this for example when I get to it.

Forgive the blurriness - damn crappy camera!

I was trying to show measurement with this photo. The top of the ruler is mm - the bottom is inches shown for scale.

I tried to adjust the camera exposure to no avail. I had to turn the lamp on for you guys to see this better. I thought this would've helped,but obviously,the camera has other ideas today!

Here's my new cutting mat that I bought from www.myatomic.com This sure beats the glass cutting board I was using. This won't dull,or break my Exacto blades anymore! This has marks for stars,dowel sizes,angles,as well as measurements for inches,cms,and mms.
The squares are one inch each. This is twice what most other cutting mats measure. This is 12" X 18". I love the brand new smell this has too!

Here's the other side for the top right wing,and the bottom left wing assemblies. This is a little longer than the one used on the ILM model. I'm still debating whether to use this one,or make another that's more accurate to the original. I hate the one on the ILM X-wing,but I want accuracy,so there will be no complaints later! I think I might make two different versions and offer both. I like the way this one looks better.
 
 

427 Cobra wrote:

(LIBERAL SNIPPING OF ORIGINAL POST!) This,along with having to fix the brakes on my moms' car slowed my progress. They gave me the wrong part at the auto store,....... This has been more trouble than it normally is to replace a master cylinder! The brakes still need bled as of this writing but that won't stop progress for tonite!

Um, but will it STOP your mom's car????

Now joking aside-

 It's being dedicated enough to sweat the details that matters- but insane enough to attempt to scratchbuild all of the greeblies- that will seperate this build from the rest!

NO! I "fixed" the problem - so I thought. The master cylinder was bad,but so is the right rear brake fitting by the wheel! Now it's leaking,and I can't get to it right now. 

 Any way,here's a small update.

 This is the afterburner in its' final stages of completion. I have to glue the thruster flaps to the housing yet. I glued a small strip of sheet styrene to the housing in the line where the tops of the thruster flaps stop. This would make the strip your see around the circumference of the afterburner,or the equator straight with the flaps themselves in accordance with original specs.

 I glued the outer strip you see on this over the smaller one inside. This helps to take the angle out of the styrene strip,so that it's straight with the Phantom engine part when assembled.

You can't see it yet,but there is a small trench in the bottom of the main strip that the flaps go into to help align them with the trailing edge of the afterburner housing. I'll have to snap a photo of this to show everyone what I mean. It's late,as I've been working on this,and the other parts for the wings all afternoon,and into the evening. It's now 1:00 A.M. where I'm at.  I've made some progress,but not had a lot of time to take pictures - SORRY people!
 
More progress to get done tomorrow/today,so I need to get to bed. I'll post more pics when I can get around to them. Stay tuned.

 Now,I'm not going to leave you hanging people! I changed my mind. Here's a shot of the inside trench. I thought of making this while watching the original "Little Women" movie from 1949. I took this photo in front of my monitor.

More slow progress. It's hard to scribe straight lines on a circular surface. I've been working on this a little at a time. I'm slowly chipping away at multiple parts at the same time. I'm not ready to share the progress with the other parts I've done yet,as they're still in the subassembly stage.

This makes my arm look fat,but it isn't. It's the angle I took this shot at. I was trying to show the detail at this angle because the afterburner being a cylinder shape,keeps rolling over.

I hope this is visible enough to see all the scribe lines at this angle.

This is the other side. There are a lot of lines like this on these that I have to supersize the reference photos to see. I still have yet to put all the little greeblies on outside of the band. The thruster flaps will come last.

More Greeblies,and scribe lines. The following pictures are a 360* view of this from all sides. This was made to resemble the same features as the original ILM model. Now I can put the thruster flaps on it.

This tiny piece on the top left running up to the lip is made up of four pieces that I glued very carefully,then applied. I glued the stretched sprue that makes up the length. I cut into it,then I glued a tiny piece of styrene to the empty space. then I glued another piece on top of it with a tiny drop of superglue to take up the space between the two for the solid triangle shaped part that was missing.

 I sanded it all smooth with 600 grit wet-or-dry sandpaper. This completes the part.

All these greeblies were handmade from sprue and the same sheet styrene that I covered the rest of this with. The scribe lines took longer than these to make.  This was made from styrene sheet that I scraped with an Exacto blade to this shape. I then glued stretched sprue to this to make the tiny bands on each end. Then I glued a tiny square on the junction between the main strip,and the piece itself. I drilled into the top with a 0.15" of an inch drill bit to make a small depression in it.

I still need to clean up a couple of places where there are still a few burs from scraping,but nothing that 600 grit can't handle.

 A view of this with the thruster flaps. These are all meticulously cut by hand to be identical to each other. This is what took me so long to get to this point. I'll finish the Saturn V engine housings next,then move on to the laser canons. I've been jumping around from one part to another to break up the monotony.

Closeup of the tabs that make up the ends of the thruster flaps.  I wish these would've stayed straight with each other from top to bottom when I took this photo.

A clearer view of the details that went into this part.

This is another 360* view of this in its' almost finished form. I filled this to remove the undercuts beneath the thruster flaps. I couldn't glue these down without making them deformed versions of themselves. This allows me to have them flat,and keep their original shape,and appearance.

 This still has a little bit of woodfiller here,and there,but I'll clean the rest of this up when it dries. This will keep most of the filler under the thruster flaps without washing it all out.

I'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story.

 This is it with the excess filler removed. I had to fill in a few spaces that weren't completely filled in all the way. This is finished.

 I'm getting a little colour washout with the camera between the two materials. One side of the thruster flaps is slightly yellowed,but the other side isn't. This is from the lighting flashing back at the camera. The PVC is slightly yellow in colouration,so it makes the flaps look yellow on the side with the most light exposure.  This filler can be cleaned up without having to worry about staining,as it's waterbased.

This is the cylinder that I originally used for the laser canon. I put the styrene over it,but it was too thick on the end toward the heatsink. So,I had to remove it the hard way,and start over. I covered this with stripper to remove the styrene,and superglue. This ruined the surface of the PVC tube,so I had to sand it with 32 grit,150 grit,and finally 220 grit to make this straight,and smooth again.

I glued three layers of 0.20" inch thick sheet styrene to this before discovering that I needed to make this a lot thicker than it was in order to make this exactly the same as the ILM model,and for this to be in the proper scale. I glued two sheets of 0.40" thick sheet styrene to this,but the first sheet cracked in several places,as the diameter was too small,and tight for the plastic to adhere easily. This has slowed my progress on this part of the build.

The styrene was straight when I took it out of the box,but slightly bent from being rolled from the distrbutor. The second layer was a lot easier to glue to this.  There was a small gap that I had to close,but it took a lot to get it sealed with styrene pieces,and superglue. It took rubber bands,and a piece of sheet styrene wrapped around this to keep it tight against the tube until the glue dried. I had to sand this again to smooth it. Now I need to shape the top edge taper,then glue the greeblies to it. I bought the aluminum tubing,and brass rod for this today. I hope to finish this tonight. If not all,at least most of this tonight,as I have to make two identical sides.

I originally scored this sheet (this tube is laying on) to make it easier to glue to the tube,but the score lines made flat shapes all the way around the outside of the tube,making it impossible to not have an octangonal surface to sand out.

These photos show that this was a mess,even when I resurfaced this with new sheet styrene. The plastic sticking out is what I used to fill the gap between the two ends of the sheet covering this tube. There's a smudge where a piece of styrene was glued to this.

Rough sanding marks indicate where I smooth this out,but it still needs finessing.

I had to insert more styrene into the end of this to close a tiny gap. It pays to measure your tubing - I wish this came out better than it did! I measured once,but I cut twice thinking it was a straight cut on both sides. Oh,well....  Remember kids....measure twice,cut ONCE!

The styrene pieces didn't go deep enough,so I had to reglue more to this to make it soild all the way around. I'm glad that this is only the master - I'd hate to make four of these individually! I scrawled a horrible drawing on this to get the scale for the greeblies that go on it. This will all be sanded off once these are made - superglue doesn't stick to graphite.

I tried to make small rings out of sheet styrene,but trying to drill holes,then cut close to the hole while holding this part with needlenose pliers in one hand while holding an emery board in the other hand to sand it to shape - is like skiing,and doing your taxes at the same time!

You can barely see the first attempt at doing this on the tiny acrylic rod with the styrene piece to the right of the styrene strip with all the holes drilled in it. I broke down after only five minutes of this monotony! This is why I decided that it would take less time for me to go to the hardware store,and buy the correct size aluminum tubing for this! I took this picture afterwards to show the difference between the two. The first one from aluminum rod is to the right of the styrene failure (straight down from the Exaco blade).

This is a closeup,so you can see what I'm talking about.

The materials I use for the job.

The finished parts waiting for the next step in construction.

OK. Here's the latest.  I haven't much more progress to show,as I've had to bend all the copper wire by hand. This stuff is very rigid. It's also coated with enamel,so I'll have to strip this coating off before I can solder these parts to each other. This will make a solid joint. I've also had to put a slight radius into all the metal,as it's very delicate,and I don't want to twist,or distort these parts. I have to very careful while doing this,so that these parts will be true once cast.

It's been even worse,as I have to straighten out the copper wire from being rolled onto the computer components I took it from - I drew this multiple times in between my thumb,and a 3/8" (1 cm) drill bit to smooth out the kinks. I further straighten the wire with a pair of needlenose pliers. This takes most of my time while making these pieces. That,and rebending the wire to copy the contours of each part to identical specifications. After making a master part - I have to go back,and change the bend in some of these parts,so that they are perfectly identical in shape.

The mess that is my work table.

Freshly minted piano frames. The one on the far left is the original. The solder joint from the original connection was too far into the part. I hate to waste anything,so this will be straightened,and reused for something else. Needless to say,I had to make a new one. This isn't too much trouble other that duplicating this shape by HAND.  The small bend at the bottom was made by wrapping it around a 3/32" inch drill bit. Each one of these took about fifteen minutes to make - there's a lot of bending in each of these,including the cylinder radius.

Freshly cut new aluminum rods.  The ends of these will have to be soldered shut,so they can be cast without tearing the mould while being removed. Silicone will fill every tiny crevice,and hole,so I have to master every part of this model accordingly.

A closer look at the latest brass cooling line I made. These took about a half hour to make altogether. Remember - these are all handmade with no bending device,other than a pair of needlenose pliers.

Thanks for all the great how-to and photos. I really enjoy these kind of threads. A tip on straighting copper wire is to twist it. Place one end in a bench mounted vise and clamp a pair of vice grips on the other end. Pull the wire taunt and twist it at least 360 degrees. I used to do this with thin wire rigging for WWI biplanes.