Starship Modeler Discussion Forums

You didn’t file down into the diode itself, did you? There’s no exposed metal? (Go ahead and laugh, I managed to do that once.)

Kylwell wrote: ↑Sat Oct 05, 2019 5:43 pm I use a #1 student grade sable brush.

Wood brush, metal... uh... collar(?), Kylwell? Should I look for anything special like that?

I just lost a brush trying to use it to apply Plastruct cement. The bristles were synthetic but the stock wasn’t, and...

Can anybody recommend a fine brush (like a detail brush) that might work? Just looking on Amazon & such hasn’t been fruitful. Thanks!

In a lot of cases, those kinds of accent light strings have resistors wired to each LED. If so, as long as you use only the rated voltage (e.g., 2x AA) and wire them in parallel, (so the wires on each LED are touching both leads from the battery pack) then you don’t need any more resistors. If you w...

Thanks, all, for the advice!
Jeff

Hello— I’ve had a lot of trouble with dust when airbrushing. It’s mainly lint, fibers 1-3 mm long. I can’t tell if they were on the models first, or were pulled in by my booth’s exhaust fan. Are there any tricks for reducing dust? I’ve tried using canned air on the models with limited success. I’m w...

I found a sparkless boat fan (bilge fan, IIRC), it’s worked perfectly for me. It was even built into a tube section.

Nice work!

I used them on a SpaceShip2/White Knight combo I did a few years back, so the little rocket plane could be separated from the carrier. Drilled holes, dropped magnets in, used Aves to seal in place. By having the magnets separated a mm or two, you greatly reduce the force. Am using them on a lighted ...

Here are a few pictures of the liquid electrical tape holding in my LED and securing all my fiber optics. The other benefit is the liquid tape blocks out all the light from the fiber optic holes so only the pin point light is shown. https://s18.postimg.org/f4te6x811/IMG_0174.jpg https://s18.postimg...

Hello--I've got a Star Destroyer I need to light, it's the Kenner electronic SD which was based on the AMT model. I'll be trying fiber optics for the first time. But, I don't have any intuition on what size(s) to use. 1 mm? 0.5 mm? And should I try to bundle the strands myself or look for pre-bundle...

A "white" LED consists of very closely spaced red, blue, and green components That's true of white light from an RGB LED, but a white only LED is actually just a blue LED shining on a yellow phosphor coating which produces the white light when excited. Different phosphors are used to get ...

You'll need about 5V or more to get a white LED to light. It's a physics thing. The voltage drop across an LED depends on the wavelength (which determines the color). Red LEDs will usually light at ~1.9 V or so. Blue ones need about 3V or more; greens are in between. But, since you also have to have...

Both seem like good bits of advice, thanks!

Hi all, I was using my airbrush yesterday. While spraying a bottle of cleaner through it, I noticed a lot of bubbles coming out around the screw-on bit that protects the needle and nozzle, just forward of the cup. I reset it, and same thing happened. Any ideas? It looked pretty clean, no obvious gun...

Hello all- I've never lit a model with fibers before, but need to learn. Is there a good "fiber optics for dummies" reference out there? My bing-fu has failed me this morning, and there's no sticky here. AFAIK, the order of business is this: 1. Design the circuit (I can do that) 2. Drill m...

Hello all, I realized I never said how the story turned out! The little model had been left to soak. After it came out, the smell was basically gone. I let it sit for a week or so, still no smell. I sprayed it with Rustoleum semi-gloss black (it was an X-15), and crossed my fingers and waited. The p...

Photoguy-- I followed your advice, and have perfect decals! Thanks! The solution was to just start making lots of layers in Photoshop, pasting and resizing as I went. Need many copies of one decal? Push ALT while using the "Move" tool and you get a copy you can move. No weird gradient issu...

It could be a couple of things, all of which revolve around how the printer is building the dark blue/black blend. It is using Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black ink to create the fade, and that is not simple. Also, transferring the color info from Photoshop into Word MAY be changing the working color...

Hi all, I'm printing some decals on MicroMark white inkjet decal film, using my HP OfficeJet 6500 printer. The decals shade from bright white, to dark blue, to dark black. While the images look fine on the computer screen, when they print out on my printer, as the color is transitioning from dark bl...

Marco, your old oily kit must be violating conservation of mass at least! I soaked the thing overnight, and the odor is basically gone. I will let it sit a couple of weeks and see what happens. If it seems good, I'll prime and wait a while before finishing. I'd take a mold and cast my own copy, exce...

Hi all, I've got a small resin model (just a few inches long) that's got a very bad petroleum smell. After handling it, my hands smell like I spilled raw gasoline on them. I'm soaking the thing in Simple Green now to try to clean off any mold release. My plan was to prime with Rustoleum Painter's To...

Wug wrote:Hi jgoldader,

What diameter? For small diameters a punch and die set is best.

Ah--good question. Sorry I wasn' specific enough.

I have a punch set for small diameters, but I'm usually cutting circles ranging from 1 cm to about 6 cm in diameter (call it 1/2 inch to 2.5 inches).

Jeff

Howdy-- What do you do to cut out circles, or washer shapes, from styrene sheet? I've really tired of cutting my circle template with X-acto knives, and of scribing endlessly without getting through the sheet. Is there some sort of cutter that could handle up to 40-mil styrene? 20-mil would be okay,...

Howdy,
I used the Testors solutions yesterday on some old Revell and Polar Lights decals, and it worked as it should. So the problem is NOT the chemicals themselves. I'll lean towards the Krylon I used. Thanks for the help, folks!

Jeff

The Testors decal chemicals are generally very effective but you never know what might happen. Might have been an issue with the Krylon clear? Could you tell which chemical killed the decals-- was it the Sol or the Set? Maybe diluting the chemicals with a little water would lessen their strength an...

Gah! I had my first run-in with Testors inkjet decal paper tonight. I made the decals a couple of days ago. The paper took the inks very well. I sprayed with Krylon Clear UV Matte. Tonight, I tried applying the decals, and discovered that the Testors decal film doesn't like the Testors decal set or ...

Depends how big they are and how you plan to mask them. Can you post a pic? 3 mm, diameter, I would probably stick a little disc of blue tape on top. I'll be using Future as the first topcoat, probably followed by some matte coat after decaling (Krylon UV Matte? Would that eat through the Future?) ...

Hi all,

I'm about to start with the topcoats on my first lighted model. There are LEDs protruding through the surface. Is it normal to just coat the LEDs as well, or do you usually mask them off?

Thanks!
Jeff

Windex breaks down acrylic bonds. If you pour it over a model, paints will disappear @ differing rates. My guess is that it attacks different pigment formulas differently. Sounds reasonable to me! So, when mixing paints, would it be reasonable to mix just the paints and Future, adding anything else...