1/350 polar lights model questions

[XanderL]

Today is the day that I’ve decided to start the 1/350 model. A few questions before I start:
1.) what order should I light, glue, sand, and paint the sub assemblies in? I was thinking nacelles and bridge then saucer then neck and then secondary hull.

2.) what glue should I use to glue the lighting strips to the model? Would regular hot glue work?

3.) how long can I leave the painted parts unsealed? I have a trip coming up in July, and don’t want my paint to get ruined being exposed to the air for a week. Are there any consequences of waiting long periods before putting on another coat of paint? Will the paint color change if I leave it exposed to air for a week? Is this the same with leaving the model unpainted with primer out? I’m just worried that I will be in the middle of painting a sub assembly and have to leave for my trip and then come back to a ruined coat of primer or paint.

4.) I have heard that painting the inside of the model will help keep light from bleeding out through cracks, what color of paint should I use when painting the inside, would black or white be better?

 

[aridas sofia]

Ugh! TOS Aztec! Boo! What did we used to yell 10 or 15 years ago? Canon violation!

I know lots of people like the paneled look on the TOS ship, but it never works for me. It's a matter of taste, though. Go for it, if that's your thing.

To the OP, If you're committed to hanging it from the ceiling, make sure your mechanism is pretty robust. The kit is a lot heavier than, say, the 1:1000 ships and thumbtacks and fishing line probably won't do the trick. I'd hate to see your hard work and monetary investment end up as broken pieces on the floor.

--Alex

I think of aztecing as the unfinished, unpainted, TMP Enterprise being rushed out the door to deal with the Vger crisis. The fact it was adopted for all subsequent iterations of Trek ships puts the kibosh on my old head canon, but it persists - for me. That leads me to a Captain April Enterprise that would be all pearly and azteced before getting its service gray thermocoat at commissioning, and a TMP ship that upon finishing its shakedown would get a TOS gray paint job before entering service.

 

[valkyrie013]

1. Depends on the part, lets take a nacelle, theres probably a seem going along the whole top and bottom.

A. For that the asembly would be, paint the interior Black or Silver, (spray can) nice thick coat to light block. do this to all interior parts.
B. Now next you can paint the parts first, put lights in, seal, sand, then repaint the seams. This works if masking/painting will be a pain afterwards. Or Put lights in, ( Hot glue is fine, super glue okay mostly, some PVA or white glue would be okay. If you have alighting kit, it has instructions.) glue and seal, sand, then paint.
C. Make sure you test your electronics before you seal it up, breaking it after will be a complete pain.
D. Takes years for paint to turn, a week is nothing, I have many models with no clear/top coat on them, and there fine.

 

[Forbin]

After you spray the inside of the parts black or silver to light-block, I recommend then spraying a coat of white. If the interior is black it will absorb all the light; if the interior is silver it will reflect the lights as points of brightness; if the interior is white, however, it will diffuse the light like the whole inside is glowing, and give you an even glow for the windows.

 

[tesral]

I think of aztecing as the unfinished, unpainted, TMP Enterprise being rushed out the door to deal with a crisis. The fact it was adopted for all subsequent iterations of Trek ships puts the kibosh on my old head canon, but it persists - for me. That leads me to a Captain April Enterprise that would be all pearly and azteced before getting its service gray thermocoat at commissioning, and a TMP ship that upon finishing its shakedown would get a TOS gray paint job before entering service.

ILM disease. I understand it can be cured wit ha good coat of paint.

 

[XanderL]

Another update: almost everything is all painted on the 1/350 scale model. On a related note, I think I messed up when I was mixing my paint for the production hull gray. I tried to recreate it with the recipe I have (12 parts white, 2 parts lemon yellow, 2 parts ultramarine blue, and one part process magenta) but, somehow, Messed up the recipe in just the right way where I recreated the pilot hull gray. Will hopefully post another update when I get to putting decals on.

On a side note: does anyone have a color chip of Valspar sea foam storm? (Number 5002-1c)
https://www.valspar.com/en/colors/browse-colors/lowes/gray/seafoam-storm-5002-1c

 

[StarCruiser]

No - but, if you hum a few bars...

I guess you are not in the USA? If you are, there's almost certainly a Lowe's somewhere near you (almost as invasive as Walmart). Most of them have samples or color chips (since you spelled "color" 'Merican style, I suspect you are here).

 

[XanderL]

I am in the US. I checked the lows website and they don’t carry it online. I will try to go to one next week. If that falls through, I found I custom paint matching service that can match the color of it.

any one know if Gary Kurr would be willing to sell a paint chip of the production hull color?

 

[XanderL]

Update: everything is repainted and decals are on.
Everything is weird up but when I plug it in, only the engine motor spins, all lights do not light up. I have double checked and everything is plugged in correctly including the leds. Any advice or ideas as to why this is?

 

[StarCruiser]

I do hope you tested the lights/motors at multiple points during assembly..?

It's really hard to fix an issue like this once the model is assembled. It's very likely that something may have come loose - though there could also be a bad component somewhere in the mix.

Otherwise, make sure you are using the recommended power source - voltage/current rating does matter with LEDs, motors are more forgiving.

 

[XanderL]

So uhh, found out what the issue was. But before that, no I did not test anything before I put the lights onto each part, I like to live on the edge. I didn’t glue parts together but it turns out the issue was not with the wiring. For whatever reason, the 12v power was coming out of the black wire of wire b (the wire that goes from the barrel pin to the main board). So a simple switching the wires around and it lit up. I can’t believe I didn’t think of that possibility. The signs were there: no LED lit up (led cannot light up if the current is reversed), but the motor spun (motors can spin if the current is reversed)

unfortunately during this process, some of the decals scratched off even though I sealed all of the parts after putting on the decals, so I have to free hand some of the scratched off bits.

 

[publiusr]

There may be help on the way. There is a tiny working television for Batman 66 action figures. The ultimate solution as I see it, is to have the nacelle cap itself be a screen of some kind with a gif hard wired into it and maybe lights behind for back-up.

 

[XanderL]

There may be help on the way. There is a tiny working television for Batman 66 action figures. The ultimate solution as I see it, is to have the nacelle cap itself be a screen of some kind with a gif hard wired into it and maybe lights behind for back-up.

Luckily I solved the issue, but that would be cool