That's a seriously nice looking ship, Robiwon! It looks as it was engineered for lighting -  with the level of detail illustrated in your photos, there is certainly no comparison here to the old AMT-ERTL kit gathering dust on my stash shelf. Looking forward to seeing how you progress through this build!

Glad you finally got your hands on it. She looks real nice, i'll be watching. I have nevr added lights to a kit before, but this almost begs out for it.

Got all the trench pieces installed. There are some "bare" spots that will need some greeblies added to them. Again, love the way this kit is going together. I need to order .5mm fiber optic this week. I'll start on the other super structure assemblies today and then start drilling holes. Engines will need to be drilled out as well. Here are some new pics and where she sits now.

Port side trench detail.

The inside edges of the starboard side trench. You'll have to drill thru both to run fiber.

Bare spots needing details.

And the upper and lower hulls resting together.

Robiwon, how goes your build?

I started mine last night, and after six hours got most of it built.  I noticed the lower hull pieces fit with almost no step, while the lapped joint of the uppers needed a little scraping down to get a flush fit.  Also, the superstructure sidewall inserts fit better if their backsides were sanded down.  There were also a few ejector pin marks that needed to be sanded off to get the superstructure parts to fit tightly.  Did your build see similar issues?  I think the fit overall is great though.  One pipe on one of my shield generators was broken in the box, but that's easy to fix.  I'm not lighting mine, so once the minor gaps at the beveled joints are filled, it's full speed into the paint shop

Oh and by the way, I'll be cockroaching your additional sidewall details, so please hurry so I can copy it!  

Looks good robiwon, gonna keep an eye on this build and maybe star the process of getting one for myself. Can't wait to see it lit.

Thanks guys! Yes, sanding results in a better fit, but so far she is building great. The engineering of this kit is on par with any Japanese kit IMO. I have more pics to load today. The garbage chute is all but done with a tiny scratched Slave 1! Stay tuned....

Wow, that looks sooooooooo nice compared to the old MPC kit! 

Got a lot done on the kit this weekend. I cut out the back of the spine and built a full garbage chute complete with space junk and a Slave 1. I also drilled out all the windows for the fiber optics. Started mods to the engines as well for lighting. Very productive weekend!

Space junk the Slave 1 will sit with.

Lots and lots of holes...

Looking pretty jimongous compared to the Revell snapper!

Despite the fact that I'm still grieving the loss of the Expanded Universe, this is awesome! 

How's the fit? I imagine it might be a bit finicky, what with gluing two giant slabs of plastic together 

The fit of the parts is amazing. You need to be careful when adding the side panels of the super structures so that the corners line up. I recommend adding both adjoining panels at the same time so you can adjust where they meet at the corners for a gap free fit.

robiwon

The fit of the parts is amazing. You need to be careful when adding the side panels of the super structures so that the corners line up. I recommend adding both adjoining panels at the same time so you can adjust where they meet at the corners for a gap free fit.

 

Still waiting on fiber from the Fiber Optic Store....

Took care of the hull seam, top and bottom. I used Tulip brand fabric paint. Its basically thick acrylic paint (great for light blocking small areas too!) and dries super fast. I taped so just the seam was visible. I laid down a bead of Tulip and let it set for a minute. Then I just took my finger and wiped off the excess. Doing this also ensures the paint is down in the joint. I then removed the mask and let it sit for a few more minutes. Next I took a pointed cotton swab and cleaned up the smeared excess. Until I get primer on it its hard to tell if there is any seam left, if there is its shallower than the surrounding panel lines, plus, no lost detail from putty and sanding!

I'm definitely going to have to add this to the list, and I'll definitely be following your build!

Thanks guys. I got my fiber optics in the mail yesterday. I'll start adding those real soon!

Ohhhhhhhh, looking forward to the fiber optics and the big light-up!

Clever idea on the Tulip paint, I do the same thing with Mr. Surfacer but it always used to dry up on me in the bottle. I've been using Perfect Plastic Putty for the same recently but this fabric paint looks to have it's uses too. Thanks!!! 

Fiber optic work has started. There's only about 50 in this pic, just about 400 more to go. Yay Fiber!!!!!

Wow!  Amazing stuff!  

Nice work sofar and looking forward to seeing how the fibre opticsgoin. Is that stuff expensive?

Thanks guys!

Fiber is not expensive. I bought 5 feet of 32 strand cabel (equivelent of 160 feet) for under $14

Looks awesome so far, really looking forward to seeing her all lighted up! 

Yeah Bish, fiber optic strands aren't that expensive - the problem is drilling the fifty bajillion teeny little holes to mount the stuff...... 

I totally feel for ya bro... had to drill over a million tiny holes for my Deathstar awhile back.  Took forever and I only went thru 5 bits! :)

Thnaks for the info guys, looking forward to seeing how that al comes togetehr. So if i have this right, each of those strands goes to a hole you have drilled.

Yes, each hole was drilled by hand with my Tamiya Handy Drill. I lost count after 300.

this is going to be awsome when done

Thanks rob. I have wanted tolight up a kit but never seen how its done, and this is really useful.

There's this awesome little drill with the perfect size bits (I think they are #80) that came with the AMT/Ertl Fiber Optic Kit back in the 80's... I think it also came with the Fiber Optic version of the AMT Star Destroyer... but I can't recall.  Anyway, it's what I use exclusively for my fiber work.  The fiber cable is the 64 strand cable which works perfectly.  I've been using the same drill for the past 20+ years now.  After drilling so many holes in the DS you definitely learn how to use it without breaking the bits!  But here's my process for doing fiber work AFTER painting all the parts.

1) Drill my holes.
2) Mushroom the ends of the fibers with a candle (melt the tips just a little bit to create a "mushroom" head on the end, will prevent the fibers from slipping thru the holes).
3) Thread each fiber in the holes. (remember, the mushroom is on the OUTSIDE! LOL)
4) Use Elmer's White Glue on the backsides of the parts to hold the fibers in place, allow it to dry completely before going further.
5) Bunch the ends together with tape or shrink tube in small batchs to keep them from tangling... (I prefer tape because if you aren't careful with shrink tube, the heat can damage the fibers).
6) Using Aluminum Tape attach all the ends to the LEDs and run the power. (I like Aluminum Tape because it's really sticky and no light leaking.  Some use copper tubing, others just tape the LEDs to the ends... it's up to you, how OCD you wanna get!)

Fibers are a tricky lot but they bring a model to life like nothing else will.  I look forward to seeing your progress my friend!  

I just pulled the trigger on buying this one yesterday... I hope it'll be here by my birthday in March!