1/24 Apollo/Saturn V (enlarged 1/48 Greelt et al version)

[peter taft]

Oh man.... You must have half the tropical rain forest in your house This is so mighty fine it really is rising above all expectations..Onwards and upwards

[Algebraist]

Originally Posted by beckychestney

You're going to need a bigger boat...er, house! Well, at least a taller ladder!

Hi Becky

I finally remember it... "jaws". Think I need just bigger everything!

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Originally Posted by elliott

Still with you Kevin. Watching and (sometimes ) holding my breath as you meet and solve problems.

Hi Elliott

I too am holding my breath on many occasions. Fortunately, so far so good. Glad you are still enjoying the build

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Originally Posted by dwyaneward

Awesome Kevin, still following!

Thanks Dwyane for the nice compliment. Glad you are enjoying it

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Originally Posted by mbauer

Kevin,

Do you have a wall long enough that you could lay it down along?

Used to work at a hardware store, the big drill presses we sold came packed in big boxes with Styrofoam packing. I used two of these and carved the proper curve into them to cradle the rocket with.

Here is a photo:
Attachment 345704

Been thinking that with yours, if you purchased some of the building foam that has some width to it, say 2" [50.9mm], that you could carve the proper shape to cradle.

By adding a slight angle you might be able to make wall mounts that will support the monster along a wall with engines near the floor and the capsule near the ceiling. Does this make sense?

Mine didn't have all the internal support like yours does, so I needed foam with "width" so it didn't cause deformation.

The other thing about using the foam, during building you can lay the rocket horizontal, on top of a table, while in the cradle and continue working. Don't need a ladder this way.

Are you going to design it to take it apart as needed for transportation or storage?

Looking fantastic!!!

Best regards,
Mike

Hi Mike

I fully understand your idea and think it is good so am investigating if possible in my house.
I aim to make it come apart just as the 1/48 model is intended. Quite where all the separations will be I have not quite decided yet. Not sure if the interstage between stages two and three should be fixed to stage two and how (if at all) to separate the SM/CM/BPC etc. My favourite way (in my mind at the moment) is to have it come apart as per from launch pad to splash down!
Thanks for the nice comments, much appreciated.

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Originally Posted by rifleman

give that man a medal BIG WELL DONE dam fine job

Thanks for the "well done" rifleman. To be honest it is looking better than I ever imagined. Just shows what a good job the designers did.

Originally Posted by peter taft

Oh man.... You must have half the tropical rain forest in your house This is so mighty fine it really is rising above all expectations. Onwards and upwards

Yes it is quite a lot of paper/card Peter. Most of it to be sealed from sight forever. Thanks for the encouragement.

By the way, if anyone was thinking of doing this model, but thinks it would cost too much I can tell you that (in the UK at least) there is an unendless supply of free cardboard all all supermarkets. Also most of the "additional card parts" like tabs etc comes from offcuts of the printed pieces. Also there is not too much ink used except in the big black panels of the USA ring, which I would not print but instead use black card for. The stand and turntable are made from toilet/kitchen roll tubes which you (and your friends) already buy. You can also reduce cost by doing "scratch" the F-1 engines covered in batting (an idea suggested by dhanners) as per flight Saturn V.

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Dear all

Progress has continued as follows:

I added another layer of struts



Then I added the next former and its tabs to hold it to the wall of the rocket. For the last layer of struts and former I decided to glue the former first and then put the final layer of struts between the two formers. So here are the last two formers of stage one being attached to in place



And then the last layer of struts (which makes 144 in total for the model so far)



So cue the music...



So now I added the "plate" that covers the top former which the top of the LOX fuel tank will be attached to.



Time for Gunter and Wernher to enter stage one through an acess door in the forward skirt and take a look



And this is what they would see looking down into the rocket



I am glad the struts are finished for stage one.

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Dear all

As you know I started the interstage when making the forward skirt for stage one. It had reached the state as shown below.



I then started on the inside of the interstage, as shown below



However I got my calculations wrong and messed up. I needed to cut the inside face into 16 parts (8 parts for the upper half of the interstage and 8 parts for the lower half). I had to cut the parts so that the "white lines" (where the vertical struts will join to the inside face are equally spaced around the interstage. However I was out by 0.5 mm of each piece which meant that the culmative effect was half of the white lines were in the wrong place. At this scale a difference in radius of 0.3 mm means a difference in circumference of 2.0 mm). So I completed the inside of the interstage and then redid it with another inside layer, this time getting the measurements and cutting correct



There is a worry in that the visible inner layer is glued onto paper that is printed on. Only time will tell if it will hold, but fingers crossed.

So the interstage is now 6 layers thick! I put it on top of the model. I held the camera up to the ceiling (so cannot get the camera any higher) and took two pictures. Here they are



The flash does not light up to the bottom so I took one more a little closer to see if it could show to the bottom



This is probably the last time the inside of stage one will be seen before the LOX tank seals it from view forever.

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Dear all

As I said a couple of posts back I am over the moon about the build being able to progress past stage one. I recently saw a programme about the moon and a bit of it (few seconds) mentioned "the museum of the moon"

"It" is a 1/500000 scale, internally lit model of the moon and the "museum of the moon" touring the world. Here is the website https://my-moon.org/tour-dates/

So the model is 7 metres in diameter! Here are a couple of photos from the above website.





If you are in the UK you can see that it is on view in a couple of places soon. I think it is a bit of an "experience" not just it hanging in a room. Looks interesting (at least to me)

Here is a video



Just wondering if anyone has seen it?

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Dear all

So I have continued to work on the interstage. It was at this stage



I took a very risky photo to show that (much to my surprise) it can support itself (just) though cannot maintain a circular shape.



However this makes me think that when the struts and ribs are added it will be strong enough to keep its shape and support the rest of the rocket.

So the struts were made from 3 pieces of card, which were two 3 mm bits sandwiching a 1 mm bit all glued together



I then cut out the "ribs". I used "monster" for this. I used 3M super 77 to attached a sheet of the ribs to a sheet of 2 mm card.Then attached this to a cutting mat using barrier tape. I then attached more card to the cutting mat (in a place where the point of monster needed to be placed for each rib.



Here are Gunter and Wernher in the "machine shop" where all the ribs have been cut out (but not "notched" yet). Four of the ribs have been laid out to give a scale of the interstage



The final thing I have managed to do is cut out the lower parts of the ribs



Next up is all the notching of the struts and ribs before attachment to the interstage "ring"

Regards

Kevin