1/12 Atomic City Mercury Friendship 7 - COMPLETE!

Thanks, Mike. The ablative pattern is virtually the same for all capsules. The retention of the retro pack on Glenn's flight really didn't impact the way the shield looks, though it may show slightly less ablation than the other capsules upon closer examination.

Phil,

So many thanks for sharing this build.  It is inspiring.

A question related to the Friendship 7 flight.  Was the pattern of ablation on the heat shield very different on this one due to the reentry with the retro pack still in place?  Or do all the Mercury ships look about the same?  Your work reproducing it is one of the highlights of the build, so it made me curious.

Thanks again for letting us see it.

Thanks everyone :)

OK.OK....you almost got me!!! Now show us your scale model of the Mercury capsule, not the real thing

Joke aside, this is truly a masterpiece, it should be in an museum exibit for some time, so people can see in the "flesh" this amazing work of art in scale, hey...you can even make a book on how you did, so people with this model kit(like me!!) have an amazing inspiration and scale work guide to super detail our models....or at least try!!!

Again SUPERB work, THANK YOU for sharring it with us.

Thanx for posting these as hi-rez pix Phil ... it's so nice to be able to zoom in to see the details you've painstakingly added.

I love this model!! The weathering of the national insignia, the chipping on the nose, the discolouration of the capsule itself, the heat shield, the toned down red  paint ... the whole thing is an incredible reproduction. I shall enjoy spending fifteen minutes, or more, looking at, poring over, each of these photos ... marvelling at your craftsmanship!

Would you mind adding a few more pix with a view of your highly detailed interior?

You've done an outstanding job here Phil!

Thanx for sharing the WIP!

Pete

Thats some good photos of the actual capsule :)

Seriously I'm at a loss for words on how good this model is built. Well done you should be proud!

Regards

Michael

The model is finally complete. Knowing me, however, I will touch up here and there as I notice things. I will continue to burnish the shingles, for example. I used graphite powder, which produced excellent results, but metallic flecks remain that need to be dusted away (not an easy thing, I discovered). Following are some quick snaps of the model. More careful photography will come later. 

I added a sooty residue to the outer window pane - something I noticed in some post flight photos. 

http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7A.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7B.jpg (one of my faves) 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7C.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7D.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7E.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7F.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7G.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7H.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7I.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7J.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7K.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7L.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7M.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7N.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7O.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7P.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7Q.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7R.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7S.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7T.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7U.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7V.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7W.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7X.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7Y.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Friendship7Z.jpg 

The base is scratchbuilt from a small lamp, with wiring and battery incorporated. 

I am pretty happy with how this came out.

Phil:

Thanks again for sharing this!... your heath shield work is unbelievable!

Congratulations and best regards

Enrique

Painting of the capsule is essentially complete. What follows is a mix of detailing and weathering, and decals in between. For me, detailing, weathering and decals blur together  

The heat shield baseline is complete. I still need to add a bunch more streaks until I am satisfied with the look. However, I am happy with how this is going so far. 

http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury139.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury140.jpg

Hey Pete. The hairspray method is a technique used to simulate paint wear and chipping. It is one I have not used before, but the results appear fantastic when employed correctly: 

http://www.network54.com/Forum/527528/message/1176229975/Whitewash

http://migjimenez.blogspot.com/2009/11/hairspray-technique-vol1.html

http://www.ghostofzeon.com/diy/detailing/hairspray_scratches.html

I used it last night and the result is PERFECT. It helped produce the effect I wanted for the heat shield, and I will use the method for the skin of the capsule. It is easy, but must be done carefully - it is possible to go overboard without much effort.

The heat shield will be done today, and painting on the capsule itself will be completed tomorrow. The end is near!

Thanx Phil! Those are the Shuttle pix I recall. I'm doing a 1/72 Shuttle cutaway ( can be seen on ARC ) and wondered how much detail can be created. You've got one helluva lot of detail in your pix ... YIKES, I've got my work cut out for me.  

And the hairspray on the Mercury ... to act as a sealer? or ... instead of Future? I'm certain I'll see what you mean when I see the pix, but I've not heard of it except as a possible sealer for homemade decals.

Thanx again Phil!

Pete

Thanks, Pete, and happy to 2010 to you!

First coat of paint has been applied: Testors Metallizer Burnt Metal, followed by Metallizer Sealant. This color will be masked of around the window and a few of the connecting plates. 

http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury138.jpg 

Next, I will paint White, Black, then Tuscan Red for the heat shield, each layer separated by a relatively light coat of hairspray to facilitate weathering and erosion. Once the shield is done, I will apply hairspray to the body of the capsule, heavier on the recovery module. Over that will be Black enamel, then a mix of Black and a bit of Silver acrylics. I will then scrub the two layers of paint accordingly to produce a burn effect. We'll see how the plan goes...

Regarding the Shuttle flight deck, I did detail it, when I thought I would light it up and show it in "on-orbit configuration." Since visibility is next to nil, I didn't really attempt to be accurate :) Here are the pics:

http://www.philsmith.us/A.jpg

http://www.philsmith.us/B.jpg

http://www.philsmith.us/C.jpg

http://www.philsmith.us/D.jpg

Phil, that is an outstanding example of 'Out-of-the-box-thinking' cre-ay-tivity!

And the execution is gorgeous! How in the world did you ever conceive of this solution?

Your work amazes and inspires me ... ! 

I really don't wanna see this project end ... I always look forward to seeing your works-in-progress!

Happy 2010 Astrazoic!

Pete

... as an aside, I posted this on the Yahoo Group awhile back ... when you did your Shuttle, was it you who detailed the flight deck? I recall someone had and I'm hoping it was you.

If it was you, can you send me a link to those pics of the flight deck. I went to your site and didn't see a photo of it.

Thanx in advance, and thanx again for these Mercury pix!

Pete

The eroded ablative shield effect produced by the strips of tape and primer worked out well. There is substantial relief to the shield now, and, when combined with subsequent layers of paint and sanding, the rough, burned-away appearance I'm looking for should be achieved. The loosely applied masking tape also permitted paint seepage, which I was hoping for to add irregularity to the pattern. 

Plan is to paint gray first, then black, then tuscan red. Sanding will occur throughout, and a final treatment with chalks and washes should produce the final effect I'm looking for. I'm debating whether to cover the entire thing with a hexagon pattern decal, as suggested by a friend (thanks Brad!). I may give this a go, because it is easy to paint over if the effect is poor. 

http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury137.jpg 

Now, the painting begins!

Thanks, everyone!

I have started the process of building up the ablative shielding to represent, ironically, the burning off of material. This will be done by successive coats of thick primer, masked off in concentric rings until I get to the center. The center will have a few circular access panels and plugs. The idea is to show subtle relief, and frankly provide some guidance when painting the surface, which must be done to show a radial burn pattern - not an easy thing to do... 

http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury136.jpg 

If you look closely at the real thing, there are several concentric rings of material ablated away, and the rings themselves seem to have a "squarish" character to them. 

http://lh6.ggpht.com/_7gD73enqswE/SUASDKQ1O-I/AAAAAAAAEEc/WOTKkTkomA0/IMG_6313.JPG

Phil, I have also looked at the action figures. I believe the Aurora Gemini Astronaut III is also an ideal easy conversion. BTW, did you fabricate the entire interior with polystyrene? If so, how did you create the tile templates? I am thinking of using a paper stencil and breaking it into individual tiles. 

Earlier the question was posed "why the earthtones?", just my guess, but  probably a mixture of Glen's USMC roots as well as an example of "terra" as a reminder of where they started from.

Can't wait to see how your ship comes out! Good luck, and thanks for all the ideas.

Erv

Gunny - glad to hear that another 1/12 Mercury is on the way to being built.

I am looking around for options on building a 1/12 Mercury astronaut to stand next to my capsule. I had not thought of the 1/12 Astronauts in Space kit - that's a good idea. Right now, I'm looking at 6-inch posable figures to get the general dimensions right, then use Sculpy to fashion the suit. Not sure what I'll do though.

Meanwhile, painting of the capsule commences during the holiday break...

Hello everyone. Great work on "Frienship 7"!!! I'm about to start the build and the work you've done is very inspiring, to say the least. I'm off today to locate some tube & sheet styrene.

Has anyone thought of using the 1968 Revell "Astronaut in Space" 1/12 scale model for the astronaut? I am thinking about tearing him apart and either posing him either standing (as on the cover of right stuff) or placing him in the capsule. I want to glue fine silver foil onto his suit and add all the garnish with styrene. If anyone has done this, advice would be greatly appreciated.

Once again, great build! I'm going to try & replicate it. (Try)

Cheers,

Gunny

Hay Phil

I uploaded some more photos on my flicker website. These are of the recovery. It's all black and white.  (The Colour film is very dark and it is hard to define any details)

Your model is very very good sometimes I can imagine it's the real thing! Do you plan to make part of the deck of the Noa for your model as well?

Regards

Mike

Thanks, Mike.

No parachutes - this will be a depiction of Friendship 7 as it might have appeared on Noa (the ship that picked it up). It will have substantial distress on the skin, and the remnants of the chutes (cables and straps that remain with the vehicle. There is also a safing pin in the seat which I added last night as well.

That is some good work there. I've never thought of using brass wire before is it an easy material to bend and shape? Do you then solder the parts together? Are you going to make the parachutes? now theres a challenge!

Regards

Mike

Integration of recovery module with main body is complete. I also manufactured the UHF antenna using brass wire and soldered the joints. This was affixed to the recovery module, along with the actuators. 

http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury133.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury134.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury135.jpg

Astronaut Buck -

I airbrushed most of the components, then added paint chips with a brush. The silver areas were painted using a Tamiya Silver Leaf rattlecan. Tamiya's rattlecans are very good, so sometimes I use them.

Craig -

Thanks very much for the kind words. The wire harnesses are created by twisting about five very thin wires together, then plugging them into a bent piece of solder that has been drilled out a bit. It's pretty easy once I figured out how to make these things. I got the wire in a local hardware store under a section for fishing supplies - a bunch of different gauge colored wires on spools.

Beyond words as always.  Quick question: are you air brushing these components or using a manual brush?

Hi Phil,

You’re probably getting tired of hearing this but… Man, holly smokes, what outstanding work you’re doing on that Mercury capsule!!   I have a couple of those kits and between the pictures you’re posting of yours and all the reference info listed, there’s strong inspiration to work on one sometime soon. It won’t be done to the level you’re doing, that’s truly a work of art, but I can see a number of areas from your example that will improve the look of the basic kit. You did confirm one thing for me, and that is the idea of adding interior lighting.

One question for you: Your wiring harnesses look really good, particularly the bundled wire or wire pairs with the protective insulation/sheathing. How did you replicate that?    

I just started a 1/96 Saturn V build that I’m doing old-school (out of the box more or less) but I think the Mercury capsule is next. 

Anyway, thanks for posting this incredibly detailed and interesting build. Very impressive.

 Craig Lovell

Thanks, Mike - I'll take a look!

Almost finished with the recovery module. All components and walls have been painted, and now all that remains are the UHF antenna, recovery beacon, straps, and some assorted detailing. 

http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury125.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury126.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury127.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury128.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury129.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury130.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury131.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury132.jpg

Hay I put up some more photo stills for you if you want to take a look. A couple of the retropack and exterior etc. Just look on my Flickr site.

Regards

Mike

Finally finished the bulk of construction to the recovery module. What remains are the addition of wire harnesses and cables, parachute straps, assorted components (mostly imagined, since I can't really make out whats inside), and other details. Last night, I did a rough estimate on how many rivets I added to this section and came up with around 1,200! 

I'm very happy with the result, but readers must note that this (and frankly the rest of the model) is about 75 percent accurate, insofar as one can measure such things. In other words, I am aiming for accuracy up to a point - I'm more concerned with aesthetics, I suppose. 

http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury119.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury120.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury121.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury122.jpg 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury123.jpg 

The "cruciform" piece slides into the recovery module, which makes it easy to add components and wires. The rivets are cool, but notice their different heights - that kinda sucks. 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury124.jpg 

Assorted components: 
http://www.philsmith.us/Mercury118.jpg