[Guy Schlicter]

Hi Folks, Well I have a Model mistake happen to me today and rather than give up I am going to try to cover it up as best I can. On Round 2s Second edition U.S.S. Enterprise the Warp Drive Nacelle is slightly warped. I assembled it with Testor Tube Cement and after I cemented the nacelle together I refinforced it on the inside with Testor Liquid Cement and in the area where its warped I thought I had a snug fit and I didn't and the the glue slightly ran out on the surface. Of course I panicked but I scrapped away where the glue ran out on the surface and got it to where the glue isn't visible but you can see in the light in the area where I scrapped but the glue isn't visible. At one time I would have thrown a model away for this reason but I corrected it to a point where it isn't noticeable unless you look for it and at least I can accept that I make errors. I don't plan to paint the kit over because I like the color its molded in. Have you made mistakes such as this and still kept a kit even though it may not be your best. Any good help would really be appreciated, Thanks Guy Schlicter.

 

[Model Man]

The notion of throwing a kit in the trash for a glue smear is... unnerving. Even if it couldn't be fixed, it could be scraped for pieces.

Anyone who checks in on my threads probably has a good grasp on where I stand on such things: Continue and do better on the next model. Each build is a learning experience for the next, mistakes and all.

 

[MadCap Romanian]

All the time, but I never throw away a kit. Glue marks, such as you describe, aren't that bad if you're going to paint over a kit. If something like that happens to me, I usually will wait a few days for the glue to dry and then sand out the glue marks using a range of sandpapers from 320-1500.

If I get glue on glass parts, that's a different story. I'll use a gamit of sandpapers from 320-12000 and then some wax as a final stap. Hopefully the glue didn't affect the part so much that it permanetly "fogged" the clear part.

But if you do get to thowing away kits, instead of this, please mail them to my home address!

 

[Model Man]

But if you do get to thowing away kits, instead of this, please mail them to my home address!

Or better yet, mine!

 

[MadCap Romanian]

DIBS! - I called it first!

Guy, I'm thinking you have a lot of disposible income to trash a kit over something so minor. Would you like to invest in my hobby store instead

 

[cozmo]

Have you made mistakes such as this and still kept a kit even though it may not be your best.

I don't think I have a kit that doesn't have a mistake such as you describe.


If I tossed out every model I didn't think was perfect, I would have a non-existent collection. But they please me and that is what is important.

 

[SJF]

Yes, like the others, I've also had my share of glue smudges on a kit. Sandpaper is your friend here, Guy.

Sean

 

[WarpCore Breach]

Modeling mistakes happen, I get glue smears all the time in spite of efforts otherwise.

I once had a bad liquid glue spill that softened a horizontal stabilizer for a 737 model; I put it away. When I "re-found" the kit again a year or so later, the glue had by that time completely evaporated away, leaving the stabilizer in good shape- minus the big fingerprint left behind in the softened plastic when I pulled it out of the glue puddle it was in.

So, it's fixed now... putty, etc and you can't tell it went through its problem!

Put the kit away if you must until you can get back to it. We are always learning on every kit we do! LOL!

 

[GKvfx]

Just this weekend, I was getting thhiiisss close to finishing up a Tsukuda terror Dog from "Ghostbusters". I had animated the head a bit, lit up the eyes, and was generally pleased with the progress of the paintjob. I was showing it off to Carson and his son who stopped by the Geekatorium, when his son said in that, oh so innocent voice only a child could have - "Cool, but how come only one of the eyes lights up?"

Yup there was a short. Or a bad LED. Something. Doesn't matter what, because the whole point of the model was to have the frikkin' eyes light up! And there are no access hatches. No parts that could get pried off to get inside.

There was only one thing left to do.....................................

..................lobotomy.

Gene

 

[MadCap Romanian]

OHHHHH that SUX!

I've had to butcher a few models like that too at points. Hopefully you can get it back together without too much problem.

 

[modelgeek]

I got a boo boo for ya ..I dipped a canopy of a fighter plane in lacquer thinner thinking it was Future.... Totally messed that up big time!!! The rest of the kit is still in the box wating for me to do something with it...Jeff

 

[kdaracal]

Pod Floor Warpage

I'm currently working on a lighted LiS Pod and I'm determined to have a "floor", despite the hack-job needed to install the VooDoo FX light kit.

After making the necessary floor cuts, I elevated the floor area where the pilot would stand and created a little, short "step" to make room for the light kit, and still have a plausable floor. I painted the whole assembly dark brown, which blends the two levels nicely. Scaled out to 1:1, the step would be about 5" tall.

In doing so, I warped the floor, and now the inner hull walls don't fit, which in turn causes the outer hull not to line up. I think it's ruined, but I will try to make it good. I have lots of money in this one: TSDS decal/vinyl kit, light kit, Paragraphics photo-etch kit.

I'm going to make it work or have a nervous break down. Or both.

 

[Guy Schlicter]

Hi Folks, Just an update I had some Testor Acryl Light Blue paint and a fine tipped brush that I used and I touched up those areas where the glue smeared on the surface. The glue just slightly came out of the gap and I touched up the entire area. It wouldn't have been a big deal at all if I painted over the model completley which I didn't. I am building this kit as I did 30 years ago where I just enjoyed building them right out of the box and doing some detail painting and I'm satisfied. That's another thing that Round 2 have brought back for me, easy classic A.M.T. Star Trek kit builds the way I built them those years ago and I love it!

 

[kdaracal]

Glad to hear the happy ending!!

 

[RossW]

Gene's situation reminds me of my Wonderfest 2008 debacle: for my Iron Man contest entry, I had drilled out the solid resin chest light and added an LED light box. I ran the wires through carefully drilled tunnels down to his foot where it went into the base to hook up with the battery. I used solid copper wiring thinking that would provide better conductivity but the down side is that you wiggle it a bit and it breaks. Which it did, right where it came out of his foot. I only discovered this the night before the contest opened, so I had to borrow a soldering gun from my friend Kirk Schermerhorn and dig out his foot to find the broken wire and re-solder it. Which worked fine, until I screwed him back to the base and it broke again! I didn't finish fixing the darn thing until a few hours before the contest opened ...

 

[Trekkriffic]

Not sure if this qualifies as a screwup but... I had a scare about 5 years ago when I was finishing up my 18" AMT TOS Enterprise. I'd built 2 "warp engines" for the nacelles using clear red resin domes I bought off the internet (hollowed out with a dremel router bit), yellow blinking LED's, some gears from a Tootsie Pop toy, and an HO scale train motor to drive the "turbine blades". When completed they spun at a nice rate similar to the way they appeared on TV. Here are a couple of pics:

Anyway, I'd just finished the final coat of paint on the Enterprise and was admiring all the work that went into this ship when I decided to turn on the warp engines one more time before turning in for bed when... WTF... the port engine wouldn't turn !??? The starboard engine was spinning merrily along but the port engine just sat there and blinked at me. I was sure there was a short somewhere in the wiring or a wire had come loose. Needless to say, I was extremely upset, it would have been a major pain to have to open up the ship to fix the wiring after over 12 months of work (off and on) ! Arrrrrrrrgh !!! Luckily, before doing that, I had the presence of mind to insert some fresh batteries into the battery box and, sure enough, the engine started rotating again. The problem I determined was the amperage the train motors draw is so great that when the batteries start to run low the first thing affected is the port warp engine. If the juice gets low enough neither engine turns. The lights however keep working because they draw much less current by comparison than the motors. So,after my inital panic, the crisis was solved and my sanity restored.

 

[MadCap Romanian]

That's a really awesome looking warp engine set-up. I'm curious as to how it works.

 

[Kit]

I agree. Those engines look ingenious, and practical to make. I've been thinking about how to do that if they ever do really make a 1/350 E. This looks like a clever approach.

 

[Trekkriffic]

That's a really awesome looking warp engine set-up. I'm curious as to how it works.

You'd need to get ahold of some very small spur and worm gears. I found mine inside one of those tootsie pop toys- the ones with a battery operated gear box; push the button and it drives a shaft where the tootsie roll pop sticks out the top and spins. It also had a little worker man in a yellow hard hat whose arm went up and down with a hammer during rotation. I don't even see these toys around anymore. I got mine at Bed, Bath, and Beyond (part of the Beyond I guess) and ended up buying 3 of them to get enough worm gears. I needed 3 levels of gears to slow the speed of the train motor down enough to approximate the spin rate of the warp engines as seen on TV.

 

[John P]

Finished up a Luft '46 jet this week. When I photographed it, I noticed a tiny smear of canopy glue under the left canopy sill. No problem, says I! I'll just slap a piece of masking tape over tha canopy and hit the smear with a shot of Micro Flat to blend it with the rest of the finish!

And then when I took the masking tape off, a corner of it touched the unit badge decal and ripped part of it off. :freak:

The next half hour was spent carefully peeling the decal off the masking tape, reapplying it with future, then carefully reconstructing the part I could get off the tape with a 000 brush.