My 1:25 DAWN spacecraft mod

[kirch66]

Originally Posted by Retired_for_now

When you're ready for a real head-scratcher, try these:
world maps with constant-scale natural boundaries - cut 'n' fold items on the right side of the page.

Build out nicely and they are actually not that difficult (if taken slowly and carefully).

Yogi

OMG! LOL! I found two like this on the Planetary Society's website that were Mars' moons Phobos and Deimos. I have them but haven't tried to build them yet. They look interesting. Looks like you'd have to glue a tiny bit, let it dry, then glue more on the seam then let it dry, then again, working your way around each seam. At least that's my first impression of what I'd try.

[Retired_for_now]

Shawn, where did you source the planets from? I've done several things with planets and small bodies but have always used the fold up versions - which are obviously only "round-ish."

Yogi

[Retired_for_now]

We have several threads/comments on building the irregular small bodies. One is here: Phobos
Yogi

[kirch66]

Yogi, I used this website to figure the scale for a standard 12-inch classroom globe (the Sun being the initial factor on this page - to get a 12 inch globe make the Sun=1310.85 inches).

Then I used the scales for the other planets and found Dylite foam balls that were as close to the scaled sizes as I could find.

Then I found rectangular surface texture maps of the planets (you can find them all over the web and at NASA - Search "planet texture maps"). Try here.

I then found a Perl script that will make GORE petal images from regular texture files. It's called "make_gores.pl" I found the script text here. Just copy the text on this webpage into a text editor (i.e. Notepad) and save it with the .PL file extension.

Then you can run the perl script with any Perl emulator program. I use Strawberry Perl. The instructions are in the ReadMe file and are really easy. You use command lines to tell it what image to convert and what name the final image will have. Then you just run it. It's that easy.

You get a GORE image that you can then cut out and glue to the surface of the Dylite or classroom Globe. They look great and are nice and sturdy.

I even found a website that had satellite-type images of the earth from almost every epoch through Earth's history (here). That's where I got the Earth texture map (if I remember correctly).

Doing this would be perfect for teachers to do for visual aids without having to spend hundreds of dollars on those non-scaled globes. They have great detail but they aren't to scale with each other so it isn't a good teaching aid IMO. heck I even figured you could use those inflatable exercise balls to represent Uranus and Neptune at this scale. So you can get pretty much the whole solar system in the classroom to scale. Only Jupupiter and Saturn would have to be outside. And then you could draw in chalk on the basketball court those diameters and hold the other models near them for demonstration purposes.

Hope this helps some. And I apologize for getting off track for this thread.

I will be posting some more photos of my new version DAWN spacecraft soon.

[kirch66]

Well I made a push and finished all of the other panels yesterday. Here are a coupld of photos of the finished product. Now all I have to do is make the new solar array and then it's done. I can post the mods doc (PDF) then. Hope you all like it.

[kirch66]

I printed the solar arrays on photo paper as was suggested to make them shiny. Hope this looks ok.

Next up....my version of the Mars Global Surveyor 1:25 scale.

[Paper Kosmonaut]

Good job! The PVA's came out very well if you ask me. Nice and shiny. How do you prevent them from sagging?

[rightbasicbuilding]

Hi Yogi,
Dawn hung around Vesta until August, which beought the sun around to illuminate the heretofore hidden North pole, so an excellent shape model and map will eventually be forthcoming.
And a foldable map.
But, the Dawn team and the international organization that oversees things like names of features and location of prime meridian, are in a dispute.
(More hereSpring arrives to Vesta's north pole, as Dawn departs, plus a request for citizen scientists | The Planetary Society)

So when that gets resolved, I'll produce the foldable map.

Don't hold your breath.

[kirch66]

Originally Posted by Paper Kosmonaut

Good job! The PVA's came out very well if you ask me. Nice and shiny. How do you prevent them from sagging?

To help prevent sagging, I use thin corrogated cardboard, not solid thick card stock, or regular thickness corrogated cardboard. This helps to make it strong but light.

And I also use the thicker bamboo skewers embedded inside about 1/2 to 2/3 the length of the array panels. Bamboo skewers have fibers running the length of the stick that seem to give more weight support than regular wooden dowels. You can find the skewers in any grocery store. They have some give but usually hold their shape if you don't have a wide unsupported amount holding up too much weight. I flattened them on this model by shaving both sides of the skewer with a knife so they don't show through much once I glue the back panel onto the cardboard. Shaving them doesn't really effect their weight carring ability since the tiny fibers all act like individual supports instead of a wooden dowel's larger wood grain. I also try not to have too much exposed, unsupported skewer running through the model.

I think the seceret is just to not make the arrays too heavy. Otherwise you'd have to use a stronger, more rigid stick material (i.e. metal or plastic).

[kirch66]

Originally Posted by Paper Kosmonaut

Good job! The PVA's came out very well if you ask me. Nice and shiny. How do you prevent them from sagging?

Thank you by the way!