Yogi's builds - to boldy glue, where ...

[Retired_for_now]

Nice pictures J - noted. Need two brackets per facet; edges on the narrow faces and spaced inward on the wide ones. Might also shape them better.
I assume the (limited) instructions were clear enough. Were there enough pictures/diagrams (for someone without your extensive library and resources) to do the build?
Yogi

[jparenti]

I didn't have any trouble, and didn't really need much more in the way of reference other than what was with the model sheets. I'm building another now and photographing the process for a new thread. I think a build shot of the telescope shroud assembly included in the instructions would help -- that's really the only part I needed to check references for to make sure it was right.

[Retired_for_now]

The X-37 OTV fairing is finished (or as finished as it's going to get).





A coat of Krylon clear and some kind of base and it goes out the door. Probably go to the teacher who led this year's teacher workshop as a "thank you."

Previous posts cover the construction details. Making half-cylinders is challenging. Making half-conics is just dumb ... but there I go. You really can't make the full-round parts and cut them in half because of the joint - any glued up joiner strip interferes with the clean edge you need for the slip joint.

For the half-conics, I ended up gluing (very slowly, in short sections) the half frames in place for each section; after carefully determining and marking exactly where the frames needed to go so the frame ends matched the edges of the section. Half-conics were stacked using the printed top/bottom lines as the reference. Didn't end up looking crooked so call it a win. Final step was to glue the attenuator panels (lots of dots) to the inner surface.

As you can see, I glued up everything but the lower constant diameter section to display or hide the Centaur booster. At 1:48 scale the pictured assembly is just under two feet tall.

Yogi

(better pix this time, Wilfried?)

[Paper Kosmonaut]

That looks very nice, Yogi. Those half cones are awesome. I couldn't see the construction of how you add the other half of the fairing to the stack. Any chance of showing us?

[Retired_for_now]

PK, you caught me (ref: as finished as it's going to get). I built up the joints for the constant/cylindrical sections. Conic joint design is the same.







Building the joints for the conics just didn't excite me (already had the fun of figuring/trying it out). Doing it eight more times (four split conics with a joint on each side) would be work. I drew up the parts, just didn't finish that bit. Parts set is the same as for the lower sections shown above: two strips, inside/outside on both edges of one half; half-ring frames to hold the shape; edge of other fairing section slips between the strips like a tongue and groove joint.

My rationalization - this is going to a school so it can't have too many movable parts. Slipping the cylinders together is a bit fiddly (alignment of the long, thin tongue and groove; flexibility of the card at this scale); doing the same for the conics would not be something you'd want to do very often. Definitely not something for the small engineers to do.

I think it will end up displayed as shown in the top picture in the previous post (maybe together with something else, more to follow ...).

Yogi

[jparenti]

Looks pretty good to me! It demonstrates the relationship between the fairing, the Centaur, and the orbiter very well -- the cutaway-style models are always fascinating to see (and tricky to design I'm sure). And it doesn't look crooked at all.
Half-conics and half cylinders -- whew, I would've been climbing the walls in frustration trying to draw that. I have enough trouble with full conics and cylinders.

[Paper Kosmonaut]

Same here. Don't ask me to design a cone, I'll end up tearing my hair out.

So, very nice work, Yogi. The fairing is, like Joseph says, completing the look and feel of this model. It puts things in perspective. The tongue/groove joints look good and are well 'camouflaged'.

[umtutsut]

Echoing others, I'll just say it looks great, Yogi-san.

When the shroud is available, I think I'll tackle that X-37B nose section that stymied me (even with your tips)!

Les (Friendly Airplane ASylum & ex-NASA flack)

[Retired_for_now]

Should have the fairing up shortly - probably post it here first as a preview. Ultimately, pass it to ECardmodels as a freebie (display stand option to go with the X-37; kind of like the Bomarc launch rail) after I get some halfway decent instructions done.

Yogi

[Retired_for_now]

Another project(s) ... it's PaperKosmonaut's fault for setting this one off. Getting started from the top down (since the X-37 fairing is already drawn for the above display).





There's no getting around drawing cones - but drop by Lower Hudson Valley and download the cone-o-matic spreadsheet and you can make them happen.

Yogi