Preview of coming attractions....

[dhanners]

Having finished a Saturn V in 1/288th scale, I decided it needed a shuttle in the same scale. I've finished the ET and RSRMs, and next week I'll launch (pun intended) into the Orbiter.

I'm building Columbia on STS-1 using Alfonso's excellent shuttle stack model. I printed out his 1/144th-scale model at 50 percent, giving me 1/288th. So far, shrinking the model hasn't posed any problems.

I plumbed the ET and scratchbuilt the Orbiter Attachment Fittings. I drybrushed the tank's body with white paint to lighten it up a tad and replicate the rough and patchy appearance of the spray-on foam.

The RSRMs (in the days of STS-1, they were just called SRBs) had joint detail added to them with thin strips of white and black card. I added the systems tunnel down the side. The aft skirts were also detailed.

I built the ET and RSRMs first because I figured if I did Columbia first and was satisfied with it, I'd be tempted to stop there. So now I HAVE to build Columbia so the ET/RSRMs won't look naked....

I must say I'm rather enjoying 1/288th scale. My eyes haven't given out yet.

[Helmut Z]

great, i love it. so must mine look too...but in 1:100......

[Texman]

That's going to be a winner

[beckychestney]

Wowsers! That's a difficult enough model at twice that size!

[eagleclaw4935]

Very impressive work for the scale size. You must have a surgeons hand.

[spacerunner]

Cool Stack, David, it looks awesome.

[dhanners]

Originally Posted by spacerunner

Cool Stack, David, it looks awesome.

Thanks, all. And Manfred, inspired by your massive undertaking, my project for next autumn may be to build Alfonso's MLP and Crawler Transporter in 1/288th....

[SAustin16]

David, THAT is excellent...I love the white ET. I believe they saved 600 pounds not painting it for later missions. Wonderful work as always.

Bravo from Texas

[dhanners]

Originally Posted by SAustin16

David, THAT is excellent...I love the white ET. I believe they saved 600 pounds not painting it for later missions. Wonderful work as always.

Bravo from Texas

Thanks! I'll have to admit that my memory was hazy and I just recalled STS-1's ET as "white." It was the days before the Internet and good photos could be hard to come by. When I first saw Alfonso's STS-1 ET, I thought it wasn't white enough but when I did some research online -- and found good photos -- I saw Alfonso's work was spot-on, as always. The guy knows his stuff.

Still, in the interest of "scale color," I felt the need to tone the ET down a bit in 1/288th so that is why I drybrushed it white.

I've been studying Alfonso's Columbia model and trying to figure what tweaks I'll have to make in shrinking it to the smaller scale. My concerns about the AXM model have been the nose structure and the wing leading edges. Alfonso made the best of a tough situation from a paper engineering standpoint, but I still don't like that the seam falls right on the wing leading edge.

None of my concerns are insurmountable, though. Figuring this stuff out is part of the challenge and enjoyment of cardmodeling, and it is always a pleasure working with one of Alfonso's great models. He has contributed a lot to the genre.

[Paper Kosmonaut]

Great job you're doing there, David. The thing with Alfonso's models is that they are very easily reduced and /or enlarged in scale without getting bad. I did this very one back in... whoa. 2011. Seven years ago. back then I made it in 1/400 and it still was extremely doable. Including the crawler. I dont thing I am able to do it again, my eyes have been getting worse. Might give it one more try though.

The thing I have always tried to mitigate the most on Alfonso's shuttle was the cockpit area. Especially in this scale (and with the thicker paper I used to work with) this area kind of stands out with its seam. I now mostly use 160 gram paper instead of 200. The leading edge seams are able to be well camouflaged, if you take some time to curl them carefully - and use a little egde colouring too. After glueing, I used the length of a 5mm knitting needle to gently move over and against the leading edge until it got rounder and rounder.

Just for reference, a couple of pictures of my 1/400 STS-1 and close ups of the wings.