What Santa Does 5-Days Before His Yearly Travels

[mbauer]

Originally Posted by Knife

I sure hope Earnest is on your team. He has experience in saving Christmas just in the nick of time.

"You might be a paper modeler . . . If you think the ability to build models 24 hours a day is the only legitimate use of crack cocain."

Watched that one with my kids when they were young! Great movie, loved it! Was great listening to the kids laugh! Still can here them. Both are in their 30's now!

Thanks for bringing back a great memory!!

Mike

[mbauer]

Legs assembly are next.

Once again big time consumer are the ruffles. Boots look hard but are actually fairly easy: Once again great part fit! Glue time will be needed though.

Photo 27 Left Boot/Leg completed! Notice didn’t even cut out the right side yet! Look how hard the right boot looks! Real easy to make though, same for the buttocks part.


Photo 28 Additional view with body parts in the background.


Photo 29 Legs are now attached to each other, once again real easy construction. Buttocks formed and ready to attach.

ALMOST Done!! No more forming any parts for Santa!


Photo 30 Inside view looking into leg assemblies, This is a rear view…Yes, I really said that!


Photo 31 Buttocks attached, only 1 step left at this point, attaching lower legs to body!


Photo 32 Additional side view of Butt/Leg assemblies.


Final step photos next, attaching Upper body to legs!

Best regards,
Mike

[mbauer]

Attaching Upper Body to Leg assembly = Final step!!!


Photo 33 Done!!!!!


Photo 34 Problem area = Happened when performing the very last of the last glue attachment operations. Can you believe it?

Rushed the step after the attaching the Buttocks. Glue seam was still wet and split wide open when gluing bottom assembly to the body! Very last part of gluing!

Not noticeable unless looking at the angle shown.

Also shown is Santa’s outside sitting stool.

Hey! What’s that in his mitt?


Photo 35 Notice the 3-glue tabs used to attach lower legs to body? This is the bottom view of completed Santa! Also showing off build mistake "white" glue seam. Oh, well one mistake deserves another.....


Lots more photos of completed Santa as more of project gets done.

Next post deals with foamboard base and trim.

Best regards,
Mike

[mbauer]

Wood Trim to Foam-Board.

Had to problem solve this one. No way to clamp without using special tools that I don’t have.

My answer was to cut up some rubber-bands and then tie together. Easy to loop around foam causing bands to pull the wood tight to foam for easy gluing!

Photo 36 Wood trim clamped and glue curing. Notice you can see the 5/8” diameter hole for the tree location front right of foam.


Wanna see what my rendition of the Santa Ornament launching a rocket looks like? Redstone Liberty Bell launch is next!

Best regards,
Mike

[mbauer]

Mercury Redstone Liberty Bell Rocket Launch

Rocket is a downsized stomp rocket I make.

This little project took several hours to create. At first thought it would be easy to use a short piece of 1/8” aluminum fuel tubing left over from my Pulsejet powered paper airplane project.

That just didn’t give the look I wanted. Found these “Fuzzy” sticks shown in the photos below last summer, decided to give them a chance.

Tried to use them by twisting several together. Rocket kept leaning over, looked like a wet spaghetti noodle. Problem solved finally as an answer popped into my head.

Used a bamboo skewer, super gluing Fuzzy Sticks to the outside. They kept coming loose as I added more sticks. Problem fixed by getting 4 Fuzzy sticks to at least stay in place, although not perfectly, and wrapping with some white sewing thread. As you can see problem solved!

Lower smoke rendition was attached the same way!

How to do the Red Exhaust Flames from Redstone?

Bent one the red fuzzy sticks back and forth until created the shape shown. Stuck in hole bottom of missile, used super glue to attach and then used thread/superglue to insert into top of smoke trail.

Glued the whole assembly to a small model rocket launcher pad, that I drew Friday night when did the all nighter.

Photo 37 Santa with thumb on launch button.


Photo 38 Redstone Liberty Bell, Fuzzy sticks, Santa with launch controller, flame and smoke trail.


Photo 39 Side View of assembly on leaving launch pad.


Photo 40 Additional View looking down.


Photo 41-Clear view of Santa’s sitting stool.


What do you think, does the rocket look ok?

Best regards,
Mike

[Seascape]

Rocket looks great. Like the look of those Fuzzy sticks.

Fred

[sjsquirrel]

Fantastic work so far Mike. Very inspiring. I don't have the patience and resolve for big diorama projects like this so it's always amazing to watch someone tackle a project like this. It makes me think that just maybe, some day, I might try something like it.

Steve

[elliott]

Any further updates? Was really enjoying following along.

[mbauer]

Well I finished it. Lots of stuff happened since the last post. Here are a few photos of the finished Diorama.

It is very late at night and I have to go to work tomorrow. Just a few photos of the lit up Diorama, I'll post more build photos after I downsize them for the forum.

Need more baseboard room to show everything....Tree is 4ft tall!









Mike

[mbauer]

Originally Posted by sjsquirrel

Fantastic work so far Mike. Very inspiring. I don't have the patience and resolve for big diorama projects like this so it's always amazing to watch someone tackle a project like this. It makes me think that just maybe, some day, I might try something like it.

Steve

Hi Steve,

This is only the second diorama I've tried, sure is allot harder than what I thought it would be.

Next year, I plan to up-grade and change a few things but keep the basic items. Add a few more and make it way bigger.

Thank you for your interest in it!

Best regards,
Mike