Nemo's Nautilus

What a great job you are doing!

Hull sections are coming together and final connections are being made on the board.

Thanks for the update, Swanny!

This is so cool, it makes my teeth chatter 

Great Job Swanny

So now I'm grinding away some plastic to open up the bridge for detailing.

Also have my light issue resolved. I used the kit light to make a mold, trimmed a 1.8mm white LED to fit inside the mold and filled it with clear resin. Now I can paint the light shell and wire it up for a fully functional spot light.

I love the work you are doing to her. Looks fantastic......Cheers mark

Today I'm fixing the bridge and bringing it up to the same general scale as the salon. Basically I removed the fore and aft bulkheads and added about 5mm of ribbed sheet stock to lower the floor. I also had to add some sidewalls to block the view into the hull. There were two small slots left open in the front which will hide under other structures and here is where the red LEDs get placed to light the bridge. The LEDs come with a bubble lens which aims the light, this is not good for this small space so I ground them off to provide a more dispersed lighting effect. To see the red I had to drop the ambient light for the camera, my hand is not as steady as it used to be so the image gets a little fuzzy - yes I was too lazy to break out a small tripod.

I also have the new search light installed in the upped hull section.

Good looking job, Swanny. 

ya ever notice how the tripod is always right there, in the way ....until you need it?

Oh well it's back to work for me...

This gonna be so cool

The bridge is ready for installation

Remember, this thing is only about 1.5 inches across and will be viewed through a strange little mosaic of clear panes.

Swanny

So now I'm grinding away some plastic to open up the bridge for detailing.

Also have my light issue resolved. I used the kit light to make a mold, trimmed a 1.8mm white LED to fit inside the mold and filled it with clear resin. Now I can paint the light shell and wire it up for a fully functional spot light.

Beautiful work Swanny!

Cheers, Aaron

Hey !

Waaaa,Waaaa Waaa , I can't see that well anymore .Can I have that ? Awesome Swanny !  Tanker - Builder

Super awesome build

Just ordered the kit. Is the lighting available as a kit,or are you doing that from scratch

I bought one of these kits, but I just wanted the Squid!  I do plan on using the Nautilus parts on the ship.  Started a couple of days ago-

i46.photobucket.com/.../IMG_2381_zpsf1d0aac0.jpg

i46.photobucket.com/.../IMG_2385_zps4112497b.jpg

This the idea behind the madness- If you look at the elephants eye you'll see that I already borrowed some Nautilus parts

cs.finescale.com/.../155787.aspx

Steve

OMG Steve, I do see the Nautilus parts in your elephant! I never noticed that before. BTW, I really love that build.

Raualduke, at this time I do not believe there is an aftermarket lighting kit for this. I'm just knocking some stuff together to make mine from the spare electronics box.

The hull is ready to close up and the rat's nest will be hidden forever.

I used 130 degree white LEDs in a framework to suspend them a bit above the ceiling mesh to get a nice gentle interior glow. The two main power leads are fed through the hull right where it will make contact with a squid arm. I'll hide them inside the arm structure as they run out to the battery. Whole thing is powered by a single 9 volt battery.

Get Kraken (pun intended) on this Swanny! I am just dying to see it all done.

Thanks swanny,I'll be watching to see how you route the power supply and on/off switch.possibly thru one of the tentacles?

When I bought this kit I had no intention of building it- just butchering it!  Weird, weird way of thinking, and hard, since this is such a nice kit.  

I'll leave that in your capable hands!  Really a nice build Swanny, can't wait to see it finished

Steve

Whoops ,you already explained,I should pay more attention

Spent the last couple hours working on PE details. With the wife working through the holiday weekend I get lots of modeling time - woo hoo!

Haven't received the kit yet,but I got a good head start thanks to the instructions archive on your site.thank you for that

This is a great looking steam-punk conceptualization of Nautilus even though it isn't the Disney version (although the novel describes the sub as electrically power so I guess technically it is electro-punk). Very nice design!

Sadly a company like Disney deals in mass merchandise licensing so they aren't likely to license a product that can't be sold in six or seven digit volumes. Back in the heyday of the model hobby in the 50's when every little boy was building models, a Nautilus might have been economically feasible. I would guess Disney would need a six figure upfront license fee before even getting into the recurring fee per unit produced.

I'm ready to start masking windows and mixing paint but first here are some shots all lit up.

Here she is in a well lit area with all her lights on.

And in a dark room

and somewhere in between

Note the red glow from the bridge viewing ports? I like that. Now the bridge ports and the side lens ports and the upper vent grill on the aft hull are not glued in place yet. The bridge ports will be stuffed with tissue then tacked in place with white glue. All the other ports will be painted off the model then attached later. When the lenses are installed in the side lighting ports it should cut down some of the intensity of that light.

Looks great!

Dang! That is one cool piece of work. And it isn't finished?