Vidar_710

Grill graphics for the impulse exhaust. I'm no good on a PC so I'm drawing them out by hand. Oval Template made to separate the thick and thin grill lines. The ol' Elementary school making hearts for Valintine's Day technique to get mirror opposites. Templates put in place... Ovals left in place... Tracing over the expose grid lines to thicken them up. Oval templates removed... Not bad for free hand. Exhaust ports placed to see how they look.

I have that 757 kit from Titan as well. I also have the 777-300 since I've been flying them now since last Thanksgiving. Draw was nice enough to do the graphics on the American Airlines Red, White, and Blue cheater line livery for the trip 7. I've since asked him to do the same for the 75 kit. Tracy

Yes, I used it for the windows on my 1/100 Entex 707 project seen in the Airliner section. As a Star Trek modeler, it works great on windows there as well. Tracy

I did, just haven't been back to it. I have been working on the Excelsior project when I get the chance. I'm flying the 777 international now, so I'm gone more than I'm home these days. Tracy

Nice build... I have a 737 American AstroJet, and the P-8 on the roster to build... Suggestion to the wing lights. Use Solarez UV curing resin. On my 1/100 707 build in the airliners section, you'll see what I mean. I added railroad lenses in the wing tips and at the taxi lights positions and covered them with Solarez, cured it, then ground, sanded and polished to shaped on the wings. A little Tamiya clear Red and Blue, then buffed in with 2500, and 7000 grit sanding sticks worked great. Railroad lenses glued into place. Solarez glopped on, then cured with a

Upper surface contours added, more detail to come... Still roughed out shape with material yet to be removed... The bottom exhaust surface was added. To give strength and help hold its shape, lightweight filler was used in the cavity. Red glazing putty to fill in the scratches. After sanding the filler smooth... The 1.5mm styrene half dowel was used to add the final details to the top surface. The ports were too big, and the walls were too thin so additional sheet styrene was applied to

The impulse engine exhaust ports have been roughed out in sheet styrene. I will grind them down to their final shape after the cement has cured overnight. The ports are depicting by the vertical lines on the superstructure templates shown just above the ports.

The corrected shape for the rear of the superstructure is blended in with glazing putty The superstructure master is finally fully complete after a coat of primer to check for flaws. The aft end now finished, the footprint for the scratch built impulse engine exhaust ports is now realized, and so is the dimensions of the surface under the exhaust for the size of the graphics.

Finally getting the back end on the superstructure shaped correctly. Below is a paper template for the shape of the exhaust section. The Lunar Models part is nowhere near correct. You'll see me adding sculpting material to some surfaces and you'll see where resin material needs to be removed. A styrene template is made to go alongside the resin master as a reference on where sculpting material needs to be added and original resin material needs to be removed. Like I said, not even close to accurate.

Small update working on more graphics. The first image is the basic paneling that is under the impulse engine exhaust which is still in the works for proper fit. Here the weathering details have been roughly added just to see if I can do it by hand with a pencil. Side by side with my reference source. For right now, the graphic only fits widthwise. It still needs to be shortened vertically to fit as seen on the studio model. Tracy

I agree 100%. That is the model. I hear Rod Rodenberry is trying to get it back. I'm curious if it will be refurbished or left as is. IMO It belongs in the case with the 11ft model. Tracy

I have this kit. looking forward to the build. I have a 777-300ER already ordered as well. Tracy

I discovered a repeating pattern used in the Excelsior's trench (blackened in). The deflector grid is in 15deg pie wedges, but the pattern is only 10deg wide. This causes the pattern to vary in position from one wedge to the next. Furthermore, a copy of this pattern is cut in half width-wise to fill in under it for the inner half of the trench. The plan is to draw this pattern by hand in my scale so it can be scanned and cleaned up digitally. This will allow me to make paint templates using a cutting machine like a criqut.

Probably a spy.

Calling the master's pretty much done for top surfaces. There are blue panels that are on the sides of the superstructure that come next. A lot of clean up and tweaking was needed. Some of the fine pinstriping were too big and had to be completely redone to fit properly.