Apollo Era Crawler - Page 9

**spacerunner** · #81 09-21-2013, 02:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gene1772

Greetings spacerunner, that is a grid like pattern that is printed on clear plastic. That is one of the many different kinds of material that comes with the kit.

Wow, that's a nice service by Mischa. I thought, that his kit only contains the paper templates.

And the drivers cabs look great, well done! The passenger chairs are so tiny parts, one can see it in relationship to the tweezers.

Keep it up, and just stay calm, you can do it.

**gene1772** · #82 10-07-2013, 08:00 AM

Greetings All. I have just completed the JEL tubes, they represent the hydraulics that raise and lower the Crawler. These consist of one large center tube (called the guide tube) and four smaller surrounding tubes in box configuration (called the JEL Tubes) on each of the 4 corners. There are a lot of very very small parts that are used to construct these tubes so you will need tweezers and a magnifying device. The center tube construction is fairly straight forward but you have to remember to cut them to the length you will want your crawler to have when finished. To select the final height of the crawler you must cut the tube to the size before rolling and gluing. You can select a length from 0 to 10 and Cyana recommends 4 – 7, I chose 6. Once the tubes are created you can add the tube covers, these are represented by black tissue paper that MicroArts includes with the kit. I felt the instructions were a little vague here so I ended up figuring it out on my own. I cut the tissue paper a little longer than the enclosed template recommends so I could fit the ends tube covers inside the tissue paper. I put it inside because it helped make the tube keep a round shape and it also made it easier to glue to the paper. You have to work slow and careful because the tissue paper is easy to tear and then you have to start over. The 4 smaller tubes are built in a similar fashion but these have a more complicated top. The small pieces that make up the JEL tops are time consuming but simple in construction. I believe that most of these little details taken by themselves don’t mean much to the finished model but taken in their entirety they add a lot so I try to use all the enclosed pieces. I cannot stress enough that dowel rods are very important to the construction of this model. I highly recommend that you have a wide selection of the rods available. It is nearly impossible to do the tissue paper without them. I think the use of tissue paper to simulate the boots really adds a nice touch and gives a 3d effect but it you are not up for that the tubes are painted so you can do skip this step. Ok, enough rambling, the pictures show the rest of the story. On to the exhaust system. Thanks for looking.

**Wad Cutter** · #83 10-07-2013, 09:07 AM

When I see models like this that are so highly detailed and so in depth if that's the word I'm looking for it puts a hurt on my head because I know I will always be watch someone else build one. I know my limitation and this is way up and beyond my abilities. A man should always know his limitations and it's best if he lives with in those limitation and make the most of it. My 2 cents worth today. All the same is going to be a beautiful build and as a viewer I am looking forward to it. I will be watching with heavy binoculars for the ship. I have to run the film projector tonight. I wish I could build something on this level of detail. wc

**spacerunner** · #84 10-07-2013, 10:54 AM

Hello Gene,

nice progress with the JEL tubes so far. This all looks very accurate and clean, what you are building, and it is paying off, slowly and carefully to build and not to rush.

To simulate the boots by using black tissue paper was an amazing idea of Mischa because it gives a nice 3D effect after folding.

I think, it would look even better if you would fold the tissue paper stronger together and then pull them apart again like an concertina, then the boots would have more wrinkles.

Keep up the great build.

**romanmodels** · #85 10-09-2013, 01:58 PM

Good work on the jel tubes Gene

**mk310149** · #86 10-09-2013, 02:27 PM

Yes, it's really good looking!

**cyana** · #87 10-10-2013, 05:14 PM

Hello Gene,

great pleasure to watch your progress!
As for the guide- and JEL-tubes, like Manfred already mentioned, they are quite wrinkled in reality. The basic idea of the construction is that you first assemble the tissue paper cylinder as you did, then put it over the Guide tube and press top and bottom together so that it looks like here:

The final result should look like that:

.... that comes close to truth as you can see here:

best greetings and keep up your great work!
Cyana

**gene1772** · #88 11-24-2013, 03:21 PM

Greetings, it has been a while since I posted but I have not been idle, I have completed the next 3 sections on the crawler so I thought I would take a second to catch you up on my progress. After the tubes were finished the next step was the mufflers. The mufflers are fairly straight forward In construction but I did make one change, The model is designed to have one piece of paper as a former and one as the end cap trim piece. I found the former to be a little weak so I used a much thicker cardboard former as the inside piece and once dry I placed the end cap over it so it looked normal. The next step was the exhaust pipes. I don’t know about you but I have always disliked doing bends in paper pipes but in this design they are well done and the finished product came out well. Next we moved on to the Chassis steering and Cylinder Suspension section, again these supports are fairly simple and there are 8 with 2 at each corner to support the steering hydraulics cylinders. The next step is the actual cylinders themselves, I found these to be a bit troublesome to construct and I am not really sure why. They never seemed to come out as straight as I would like and I had to keep rebuilding them. I am still not really happy with the final product but if you don’t look to close I think they are passable. The two cylinders are joined with a central steering box so once you finish the cylinders you join them with a piece that runs through the box. Be careful here because there are options on this piece and you have to choose the one that reflects the height of the Jel tubes constructed in the last section. My height was 6 so I choose the 6-7 pieces and used those. Once compete, the final step was to put in the hydraulic lines, now Microarts includes very thin paper lines and being a bit of a purest I kind of wanted to stick with paper but I found the lines did not really come out as well as I would have liked. I decided to deviate from my paper only philosophy and used thick black thread as the lines. I think it made the cylinders look a little more realistic. As a final item, I wanted to make a better way to display the model as I continued construction so (using Cyan's new 3d instructions) I cut out some of the truck parts and built just enough of it to use as a stand. I think it looks good for display this way. Since it will most likely be more than a year till this is finished I wanted to do more than lay it on the shelf. That is it for now, happy holiday.