Lighting up Gundams... anyone have any experience?

[Skull Leader]

I don't do much Sci-fi modeling any more, but I'm holding on to a 1/100 Version of my favorite Gundam to build eventually (the "Double X" Gundam from "Gundam X"). The kit itself isn't so great (one of the 1/100 so-called "High Grade" kits that came out of the 1990s)so I'm looking for ways I could spruce it up. Since there are parts of the Double X that glowed when it employed it's satellite cannon system, I thought it would be cool to do some LED lighting on the lunar collectors in the chest and maybe set some up to throw light on the gold solar batteries on the arms, legs and wings... does anyone have any experience running wires/LEDs through gundam kits here?

Here's the kit I'm building!

any ideas? The Chest section would be easy enough... anything else I'm not so sure.

[Mr. Engineer]

Hi, Skull Leader, the 1/100 scale looks do-able and if I am not mistaken, the overall height should be about 11 inches and so, the Solar panels are quite big.

As I have not seen the model myself, here is my theory.

Assuming the Solar panel is made of two pieces; one is the outer white piece and the other, could be a yellow clear part or a chromed gold part. So, my theory is, to get a lot of SMD yellow LEDs such as the 0805 and fix them on the inner edges of the white part. Then use the golden part as a template and cut out the shape from a clear yellow plastic sheet. Since the 'hole' pattern is similar to that of a typical mesh, you need to get some and paste it onto the clear yellow plastic sheet. How you line up the SMD LEDs also affect the final outcome of the lighting effect.

Too close and you need a lot of LEDs which means more power consumption. Too far and you have dark spots. Another alternative would be to use EL sheets (electroluminescent), its not blindingly bright but it just glows.