The
Imperial star destroyer was a real burnout project. It stole
a whole year of my social life and my body had to process
about 3.000 gallons of coffee. It was the first scratch project
I did in materials other than cardboard and paper. The challenges
were endless and I had close to no knowledge about the required
materials or techniques. Despite the seemingly hopeless task
I dove headfirst into the fire. I made the blueprints without
any clear reference material, so they are not entirely correct.
My best advice is to make enlarged photocopies from the SW
chronicles and make your drawings from those. They will give
you a pretty accurate outline of the correct shape. It is
always a good idea to draw the model in a smaller scale at
first (A3 is good) and then scale it up. The scale and form
is easier to assess if it is not too large. Find images that
show the model directly from the side you need and start there.
Be prepared to re-draw the blueprints several times, the errors
you make here will hurt you ten times as much when you start
building. Also try to build a cardboard and foam mock-up of
the model to make a 3D assessment. Then go back and adjust
your drawings.
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| Following
clues from early ILM modelshop pictures I constructed the internal
structure from plywood and steel tubes. The outer hull was made
from aluminum (I cut it with an electric jigsaw and it almost
destroyed my hearing). The aluminum hull had to be bent to shape
in order to fit on top of the plywood ribs of the inner structure.
I did this simply by scribing a shallow cut along the center
of the hull and carefully bend it over the edge of the workbench.
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| My
model is vacuum-formed from styrene sheets. (The method is
the same as described in several other projects The cut was
then sanded, filled and sanded until it was gone. The hull
was glued to the ribs with contact glue. The details on the
lower hull were made from styrene. |
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| The
upper sections and the bridge were made from acrylics and
styrene sheets. Seeing the final shape of a stardestroyer
starting to appear really boosted my efforts. I felt like
I was working in the ILM modelshop, almost expecting the foreman
to appear in the doorway any time to check on the progress.
Ah
- the detailing, this is the heavy part, detailing was painstaking
and slow - NO KITBASHING! The details on this mastodon were
made entirely from scratch. If that don’t qualify for
a long stay at the local nuthouse, then what does? I basically
cut all the details along the sides and the upper levels from
3-millimeter styrene sheets. There were times, I tell you,
that I really hated this model. |
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| This
image shows the model before assembly. |
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| At
last, when working on the engine section I learned how to
make silicone molds and resin copies (Oh God - if only I knew
this earlier...). I made prototypes of all the larger parts
and then I made RTV (Room Temperature Vulcanizing) silicone
molds from which I cast the copies I needed. Since I had no
access to a lathe, the engine prototypes were made by laminating
about 40 rings of styrene. There was a lot of sanding involved
before I was happy with the results. The engines were also
cast in resin. |
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This
image shows finishing details to the surface. |
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