![\"LED](\"http:\/\/borkedcode.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/DSC_0010-resized.jpg\")
<\/a>LED tape cut and ready, with styrene diffusers.<\/p><\/div>\n
Blue LEDs \u2013 two, one for each \u201cwarp crystal\u201d at the top of each nacelle.<\/p>\n
3mm white LEDs \u2013 four.\u00a0 Two for each nacelle, one to each side, for use in the Raytheon floodlamp effects.<\/p>\n
2mm white \u201ctower\u201d LEDs \u2013 four.\u00a0 One for each of the two spotlight ports at the front of each nacelle.<\/p>\n
2mm yellow LED \u2013 two, one for each thruster section in the fins.<\/p>\n
SMD white LEDs \u2013 two.\u00a0 One for each of the anticollision strobes on the rear roof of the nacelles.<\/p>\n
With the exception of the tapes, each of these LEDs required a resistor\u2026and since I\u2019m aiming to make this a 9-volt setup, a 470 ohm did the job.<\/p>\n
A word about resistors and LEDs \u2013 when they ship from the factory, the standard for LEDs is to have one leg shorter than the other.\u00a0 That\u2019s the \u201ccathode\u201d, or negatively charged lead.\u00a0 The positive is referred to as the \u201canode\u201d, and all LEDs are polarized this way\u2026they only work if you connect the correct leads to the correct charge.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 For bare, unwired LEDs, the resistor attaches to the cathode, the shorter arm.<\/p>\n
In my models, I use a lot of \u201cmagnet wire,\u201d which is extremely thin (36 gauge or smaller) and insulated using a laquer coating rather than a plastic sheath.\u00a0 Some of it comes colored from the factory in a variety of different shades, and although I do use those sometimes, I tend to stick with this stuff which is really really fine (thinner than a hair), and that stuff doesn\u2019t have color.\u00a0 It\u2019s just bare copper (insulated with laquer).\u00a0 It\u2019s a little fragile and sometimes can be hard to work with, but I find that it fits into the smallest little spaces and doesn\u2019t \u201cspring back\u201d like a lot of other wires can, so the pros outweigh the cons a little for me.<\/p>\n
<\/a>An LED with resistor already attached, note the winding of the magnet wire<\/p><\/div>\n
Under normal circumstances, the wires to be connected can be held together and solder applied, which then works both as an electrical connection as well as a \u201cglue\u201d \u2013 but with magnet wire, it\u2019s so thin that you just can\u2019t hold it steadily in place and convince solder to stick it properly.\u00a0 It\u2019s also so thin that it doesn\u2019t accept \u2018tinning\u2019 like regular wire or cable does.<\/p>\n
In my previous logs I\u2019ve mentioned this, but it does bear repeating, so forgive me for my redundancy.\u00a0 To get magnet wire to behave, first you have to get the laquer insulation off the ends.\u00a0 To accomplish this, the best way I have so far (and this is different from before) is to take some 600+ grit sandpaper, fold it in half, and then pull the section of wire you want to strip through the folded paper while applying gentle pressure.\u00a0 Too much and you\u2019ll just break the wire, too little and you won\u2019t pull any laquer off.\u00a0 You\u2019ll figure it out after a few tries.\u00a0 Once you\u2019ve done this a few times, you can then run a hot iron over the cleaned section to burn off any remnant laquer.<\/p>\n
I trimmed down the arms and the ends of the resistors to avoid extra-long connectors, and tinned the ends of each.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Example of the wiring harness for the LEDs – I also insulated the connections with masking fluid and black acrylic paint.<\/p><\/div>\n
Since these LEDs have lots of breathing space inside the nacelles, and since I\u2019ll be wiring them all up in parallel, I connected the resistors directly to the short arms.\u00a0 (Had I been using series circuits, I would only need one resistor for an entire string of LEDs, but I don\u2019t want one burnout or short to result in a \u201cChristmas tree outage.\u201d)\u00a0 I then connected a short (5-10cm) length of magnet wire to each, and then a longer (25cm) length of plastic-sheathed cable colored in black and white for polarity.<\/p>\n
Negative should always be black, by the way.<\/p>\n
To connect the magnet wire to the heavier leads and wires, I physically wrapped the magnet wire around the subject four or five times so that it would hold itself in place without me touching it.\u00a0 Once this was done, I could then go to town with the soldering iron and some clean solder \u2013 once the wires heat up properly, the solder\u2019s surface tension pulls amounts of it into the twined magnet wire, resulting in a really good connection and a very strong solder point, with the added benefit of remaining very thin and easy to work with.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Using a 9V battery I ran tests of the harnesses almost every time I handled them, just because I’m paranoid about breaking connections.<\/p><\/div>\n
Lastly, in order to avoid shorts inside the model, I applied a latex coating to each soldered connection and painted them with an acrylic paint.\u00a0 This completed the wiring harnesses and provided their exposed wires some extra insulation against shorts.<\/p>\n
The Inner \/ Outer Grilles<\/h3>\n
After getting all the lights ready, I set them aside and started masking up the inner grilles for painting.\u00a0 These two parts are completely clear in the kit.\u00a0 The portion which is internal to the engine I left masked off initially to avoid getting it contaminated with the paint I was using on the exterior.<\/p>\n
These parts pose a rather interesting challenge \u2013 they have a series of raised ridges and \u201ctrenches\u201d between them, and the only section that is supposed to transmit light is a portion of the \u201ctrenches\u201d.\u00a0 These gaps are only about a millimeter wide, but they are about 20cm long\u2026and the lit portion is about 15cm-17cm long, gently differing at the rear to produce a \u201ccurved\u201d look to the lighting.\u00a0 See the reference photo and look at where the blue light in the engine grille is coming from to see what I mean.<\/p>\n
Originally I wanted to use some very thin plastic masking tape in 1.6mm width, but when I tried this, the edges protruded in a really unwieldy fashion.\u00a0 After a half hour of frustration working this way, I gave up on the skinny masking tape and switched to a liquid masking solution from Humbrol called \u201cMaskol\u201d.\u00a0 This is a liquid product that dries into a rubbery latex that is easy to pull off a surface.\u00a0 Brushing it directly into the trenches was not a good option, as bleed over to the tops of the grilles wouldn\u2019t come free without dragging a chunk of the mask out of the trench as well.<\/p>\n
<\/a>The grilles before painting<\/p><\/div>\n
In the end I used a 1mm syringe needle to inject the stuff into the trenches where it needed to go, and this worked out fantastically.\u00a0 (If you have any diabetic friends, or know a veterinarian or doctor, you can probably arrange to get a couple of these from them, so long as you aren\u2019t a likely candidate to be using injectable drugs.)\u00a0 However, I tried to clean the syringe using warm water, and that<\/p>\n
<\/a>After painting the grilles<\/p><\/div>\n
caused the latex to set\u2026inside the needle.\u00a0 So, scratch one good syringe needle.<\/p>\n
Once the mask was on, I sprayed the parts with Army Painter Matte Black primer, which gave me a nice clean black finish.\u00a0 Some folks go for a deep violet almost indistinguishable from black (which is more studio accurate), but looking at it from a meter away with the lighting up, I don\u2019t think there\u2019ll be anything notably different.\u00a0 I also hand-painted the grilles on the collector parts that go into the front of the engines.<\/p>\n
I have noticed since then that the grilles are a little bit transparent on the painted sections still, so I might have to go back and apply another coat of black on them if they look bad when the lights are on.<\/p>\n
Using masking tape, I then set out to mask off most of the external nacelle surfaces, leaving only the outer grilles available for view, and sprayed those up nicely too.\u00a0 A little hand-painting of the spots missed, and cleanup around the edges, and problem solved.<\/p>\n
The Fins<\/h3>\n
At the rear of each nacelle is a horizontal and a vertical fin.\u00a0 The vertical was painted in a \u2018duck egg blue\u2019 for the film, so I went ahead in advance and painted it appropriately.\u00a0 It\u2019s worth noting that duck-egg blue is a very light color that can be easily transparent if it isn\u2019t thin enough, and it needs two coats at least if you are using a regular brush.\u00a0 I think with an airbrush this would be a little different.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Horizontal fin, wired up – notice the broken magnet wire. Easy to fix, but this is why I’m always checking my lights.<\/p><\/div>\n
The horizontal fin will house a thruster lamp, so after positioning the LEDs in the right spots, I then glued them in place.\u00a0 I sealed up the fins and puttied the cracks (which were rather pronounced), and after sanding re-whited the fins.\u00a0 One of them needed a little more sanding after the white was reapplied, and a little more putty to fill in the gaps.\u00a0 Just to be sure, once this was done I re-masked the thruster section and did a second black light-block on the remainder before reapplying white.\u00a0 I also drilled a 3mm hole in the section of the nacelle where the fin would mount, so the wiring would have an escape route.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Black Seal. No animals were harmed in the making of this product. I hope.<\/p><\/div>\n
Note that when handling these parts with magnet wire attached, you do have to be very careful not to bend or pull the wires quickly \u2013 always be gentle.\u00a0 I made one error (happy to say it was easily recoverable, see image above), and snapped the wire off the resistor.\u00a0 Really easy to do if you aren\u2019t paying a little attention to it.<\/p>\n
Once these were done, I wanted to make sure that no light leakage from the thruster made it into the main body of the engine (because when the warp lights are off, those interior grilles are still clear and need to avoid having bleed-through).\u00a0 I also wanted to practice with a new product I\u2019m using on this model \u2013 \u201cBlack Seal\u201d.\u00a0 It\u2019s a silicon gel that hardens up into a stiff material, completely black in color, so it makes a great gap-filler for spaces that need to block light.\u00a0 I pushed a little of this into the fin so as to get zero light bleed from the yellow thruster light.<\/p>\n
<\/a>A few dabs of Black Seal on a toothpick fit right in.<\/p><\/div>\n
Working with Black Seal, it is almost inevitable that you will get some on your hands, and as a result you will probably leave a smear on the model exterior parts.\u00a0 Don\u2019t panic.\u00a0 This stuff wipes right off with a paper towel, and even after it cures it is just silicon \u2013 it should rub right off.\u00a0 I had more than my share of black smears on my engines here before this was done, and they all came off without a hitch.<\/p>\n
The Warp Strips and Crystal<\/h3>\n
At the nose end of each nacelle, on the top, there is a circular clear part that is supposed to<\/p>\n
<\/a>LED glued onto the warp crystal – using an under-prop and ‘helping hands’ to hold it while it dries.<\/p><\/div>\n
glow blue when the warp drive is engaged.\u00a0 After I retrieved each of these parts, I drilled into them with a 2mm drill bit from the bottom, and glued the blue LED to each one.\u00a0 Once the glue was dry, I hit the outside of them each with some silver paint, and then black to prevent leakage.\u00a0 These LEDs were then connected to the same leads as the LED tape, since they\u2019ll all power on simultaneously.<\/p>\n
The strips each got a lead, and I cut some clear styrene sheet to act as a diffusion cover, which was sprayed with dull coat to give it a frosted appearance.\u00a0 Once I fix the strips in place, I\u2019ll cover them with this to further avoid \u2018hot spots\u2019 showing from the outside.<\/p>\n
In addition, it\u2019s worth pointing out that the external grille has a small window at the front which is intended to light up along with the warp drive.\u00a0 To help direct some of the right light to it, I cut a couple of styrene strips and painted them silver to act as a mirror effect from the blue strips, then mounted them ahead of the windows with a severe angle to direct light out the little windows.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Exterior grille light window with styrene reflectors in place.<\/p><\/div>\n
Forward Floodlights<\/h3>\n
Each of the forward floods is going to receive a tower LED, and unfortunately the sections that will receive these LEDs are only light-blocked from the interior\u2026which means that the tower sections may cause some bleed-through of their light if I\u2019m not careful.\u00a0 To avoid this, I painted each tower black all over except the emitter end.<\/p>\n
<\/a>“Tower” style LEDs, painted silver and then black over the entire surface except for the light-emitting top of the tower.<\/p><\/div>\n
Anticollision Strobes<\/h3>\n![\"Each](\"http:\/\/borkedcode.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/DSC_0030a-resized-169x300.jpg\")
<\/a>Each of the four halves has a round port that will accept the plastic part, but we’re putting an SMD in here, so it needed to be enlarged a little to fit.<\/p><\/div>\n
The section at the rear of the engine for the anticollision strobes are very small ports designed for a clear part to be added here.\u00a0 This port is smaller than the SMD lighting that I\u2019ll be using to provide the electrical effects, so each one had to be widened out a bit to fit.\u00a0 Once they were opened up, I fitted the SMDs to the interior half of the nacelles and glued them in place using canopy glue.<\/p>\n
For all of these lighting harnesses, Once the lights are fixed in their places, I\u2019ll then glue the wiring in place in several places using CA and hot glue, bringing the leads all to the connector site where the nacelles mount on their pylons.\u00a0 I also use a bit of masking tape at the ends of their leads to keep the appropriate leads together and to give me a place to label them so I\u2019ll know which is which.<\/p>\n
![\"Close-up](\"http:\/\/borkedcode.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/DSC_0032-resized-169x300.jpg\")
<\/a>Close-up of the SMD mounted in place.<\/p><\/div>\n
![\"SMD](\"http:\/\/borkedcode.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/DSC_0034-resized-169x300.jpg\")
<\/a>SMD mounted – note masking tape holding the wiring steady to avoid accidentally pulling the chip free.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Lastly, for all of these lights, I secured the wiring inside the nacelles with masking tape until I glue them in place (which I\u2019ll show in the next installment). \u00a0Additionally, I used masking tape to secure the positive and negative leads for each light harness separately, and labeled each one so they wouldn\u2019t get confused.\u00a0 Once this thing is sealed up, if I get those wires confused, the only way to check them is to do a process-of-elimination test with each one to see what lights up with what wires.\u00a0 Don\u2019t want that hassle, so on go the names.<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"http:\/\/borkedcode.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/DSC_0035-resized-169x300.jpg\")
<\/a>The proverbial ‘ounce of prevention’ here.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
USS Enterprise – Build Log Part 10<\/a> :\u00a0USS Enterprise – Build Log Part\u00a08<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Build Log – Part 9 All righty!\u00a0 More work on the engine nacelles \u2013 and their internal wiring. First off I want to sing the praises of that Vallejo surface primer again \u2013 it\u2019s been really excellent to work with.\u00a0 … Continue reading
<\/a>Each of the four halves has a round port that will accept the plastic part, but we’re putting an SMD in here, so it needed to be enlarged a little to fit.<\/p><\/div>\n
The section at the rear of the engine for the anticollision strobes are very small ports designed for a clear part to be added here.\u00a0 This port is smaller than the SMD lighting that I\u2019ll be using to provide the electrical effects, so each one had to be widened out a bit to fit.\u00a0 Once they were opened up, I fitted the SMDs to the interior half of the nacelles and glued them in place using canopy glue.<\/p>\n
For all of these lighting harnesses, Once the lights are fixed in their places, I\u2019ll then glue the wiring in place in several places using CA and hot glue, bringing the leads all to the connector site where the nacelles mount on their pylons.\u00a0 I also use a bit of masking tape at the ends of their leads to keep the appropriate leads together and to give me a place to label them so I\u2019ll know which is which.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Close-up of the SMD mounted in place.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/a>SMD mounted – note masking tape holding the wiring steady to avoid accidentally pulling the chip free.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Lastly, for all of these lights, I secured the wiring inside the nacelles with masking tape until I glue them in place (which I\u2019ll show in the next installment). \u00a0Additionally, I used masking tape to secure the positive and negative leads for each light harness separately, and labeled each one so they wouldn\u2019t get confused.\u00a0 Once this thing is sealed up, if I get those wires confused, the only way to check them is to do a process-of-elimination test with each one to see what lights up with what wires.\u00a0 Don\u2019t want that hassle, so on go the names.<\/p>\n
<\/a>The proverbial ‘ounce of prevention’ here.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
USS Enterprise – Build Log Part 10<\/a> :\u00a0USS Enterprise – Build Log Part\u00a08<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Build Log – Part 9 All righty!\u00a0 More work on the engine nacelles \u2013 and their internal wiring. First off I want to sing the praises of that Vallejo surface primer again \u2013 it\u2019s been really excellent to work with.\u00a0 … Continue reading