johnlove_mk_II

That's beautiful. Great work John.

The tiedown parts arrived yesterday. They're a little fuzzy, but I think when they're in place they will look great.

The patterns look great!

Hi Pete, Not yet, I kinda shelved the build for the time being ... but I have drawn some seats in 3D for possible printing. Unfortunately I'm finding that I'm kind of a project butterfly, flitting from project to project, never completing any. Oh, and thanks Brad. That’s very kind of you to say.

Thanks Josh! It's funny, just last week I was just looking a the updated design and thinking about how I'd go about finishing them. Now for an update ... I decided to really concentrate on one stage instead of bouncing around all over the place with this detail and that. I’m not getting anywhere. When I started this thing, I was going from the top down … but now, I think I’m going to focus on the S-IC stage. Structurally it’s not too difficult … at 1/72nd scale it’s a 5.5” tube. It’s just a matter of stringers and a “few” details, right? My preliminary structural design will utilize t

I am loving this Rhino thing, it’s getting easier every day. Some more of the S-II LH2 fairings. I just need to hollow out the ends and then I can start on the LOX vent and other S-II protuberances.

A little more work to the IU wire tray ...

Learning by drawing. Here are the beginnings of the S-IC hold-downs.

Thanks! I’m having a blast with this stuff and wow it’s really addictive. I can’t wait for 3D printing to get cheaper! Didn't have much time to “play" last night but I did get a chance to send a file over to Shapeways to see if the wire tray would even print and at what price. Pleasantly, it will ... and it's under $20bucks! The tray support structure is kinda out of scale due to the printer limitations, but still … I certainly couldn’t do better in styrene or brass.

Madness. (I think I have one too many.)

Oh sure, I'll make them available once I get samples and make sure they're good to go.

I mainly just read through the manual. I started off with basic shapes and joining things together … once I got comfortable with that I started branching out to rounded edges, rivets and so forth. There’s been a tool to do everything I wanted to do, it just took a whole lot of trial and even more error to get it all to work. The good thing is it’s all starting to make sense and I can throw things together relatively quickly. Also, you can import illustrator files directly into Rhino … which, for me, is a huge time saver. They keep their dimensions and you can extrude, make them a solid or

Thanks! It IS Rhino, I was buoyed by the parts Vincent was creating for the 1/32 LEM with it. For me the learning curve is a little steep, but after nailing down a few of it’s nuances, it’s coming along a little more easily. I'm kinda geeking out on the possibilities.

It had to come to this … I've dabbled a little here and there with 3D programs, but quickly got frustrated with the CAD-ness of the whole thing. (I've used Illustrator for well over 20 years … It's ingrained, and so not the same.) I'm thinking that if I'm ever going to finish this thing I'm going to have to learn how to use a 3D drawing program and get parts printed. I just have to buckle-down and learn it. After a weekend of fits, starts and pouring over the manual, here's what I've come up with. Keep in mind these are at 1/72 scale, so they may seem a little rudimentary in detail.

So after three applications I think I got the 5 mil Kapton to look reasonable. At first I was having issues with it sticking … then trying to attain scale like wrinkles and having it stick … then just slapping it down, sorta wrinkled. Now on with the 2 mil!

Hey Geno, did you clean your parts by chance? I used Bestine rubber cement thinner (heptane) to clean off the wax and I'm wondering if that makes the parts a little more brittle. Oh and Dupont came through with the 2mil Kapton samples! Johnny is a happy lad.

Kapton color/anal retentiveness So I've got actual Kapton samples from Dupont which is really cool. They're not aluminized so I've been using chrome Monokote trim to "aluminize" it. It works really well, and looks pretty convincing. With that being said there are scale "wrinkle" problems which have been a bear to try to figure out. For the 1/2 mil thickness I've gone with the yellow gold Mylar balloons as it gives a closer "scale-wrinkle" effect. The 2 mil with the Monokote looked a little too yellow … well, turns out the sample is actually 1 mil! Dang. So I'm looking for a source

Maybe we could convince Drew at Crow's Nest to scale up one of these.

It's doing a reasonable job but some smells persist. I think I need patch a few leaks here and there and that would help matters considerably. It's funny, where I have my desk, there's no real window opening to take feed the hose through. I was sitting there thinking of where I could set this thing up, maybe the spare bedroom ... then I heard the mailman sliding the mail through the mail slot. The MAIL-SLOT! It's like 4 feet from my desk. Perfect!

So this was my actually first time painting the Shapeways FUD. I used the Bestine de-waxing method. The parts went white, as expected, and actually sanded pretty well after the Bestine submersion. I then used Tamiya fine primer, then a few coats of Tamiya acrylic. Everything seems to be sticking well. Also, the blankets are going on. Lots of false starts and ripped up kapton, but I think I’ve found the right path. It’s a little more difficult to get the waves and wrinkles than you’d think.

I have a ton of stuff on my Picasa site. JSC and KSC Saturn V's, Saturn IB, various Mercury capsules, a couple LEMs, a CSM, a couple of CMs ... even a Surveyor.

It’s been a busy few weeks and now I’m looking to buckle down and get going again this week. One of the biggest problems I’ve been having is getting some airbrush time. I didn’t have a spray booth so I was spraying outside … a little bit of a bother, especial since the temperature has been close to zero for the last few weeks. So went to Home Depot and came home with the parts to cobble together a little spray booth. Total cost, around 25 bucks. Hi Gene - I may yet use the Kapton I have ... I'll just need to add the aluminized backing. I like the Idea of using the “real” stuff … th

So here’s what I think I’m going to go with for the descent stage blankets. On the left is actual Kapton (1/2, 2 and 5 mil) laid on some adhesive foil trim from Mono-coat, and on the right are the balloons and candy foil from my collection, taped to a piece of styrene. It’s a reasonably close match.

Got the balloons last night and only had a few minutes to take a look at them this morning. The two orange flavors seem almost Identical as far as color … but a really good match for the 2 mil Kapton. The gold balloons are spot on for the 1/2 mil … and as it turns out, the red is a little more orange than it looks in the pictures on the site. I think it may just work for the 5 mil Kapton. I’ll get some comparison picts tonight so you guys can see. Thats an interesting idea to paint and marker the regular foils. That’s surely something to store away in the ol’ noodle for later.

Just ordered a bunch of mylar balloons from bargainballoons.com … the shipping was more than the actual balloons, but they had a variety of colors that should work well for the descent stage. I hope. Here's the order, with a sampling of the colors … I got a whole bunch of different stuff. I think the orange, gold and "Bittersweet orange" might be spot on.