Federation Commander

Cedar Falls is beautifully painted! Amazing detail on a small ship!

Thanks. Self-made decals saved the day.

Excellent as always. I particularly like the APT.

A new treasure, unearthed today in the depths of my Dad's garage:


Probably 1984-vintage. Bought from my old FLGS (Heritage Books), where I first discovered war-gaming.

I haven't seen this mini in a decade or more. I knew it was around. I'm glad I finally found it.

This is the old Fed fleet carrier. It no longer exists in the game systems (except as a "Stellar Shadows" ship in SFB). I've always loved the sculpt of the mini; one of Richard Kerr's best works..

Looks like Christmas in July! Well almost.

Indeed. I also found my old "original edition" Megahex counters, so now I have counters for things like the Fed DD and Tug. Happy-dance time.

That was lucky

Minis-Build-Blog:I'm still plugging away at various projects (finishing oCA master, starting F-5W and HF5 masters, etc.).

Sometimes I need to put away projects that can be stressful like that (they need to be as perfect as I can make them) and just enjoy a little zen-time by filing and sanding on some new acquisitions:


I've found very little relaxes me more than prepping minis like this. It's all the parts of sculpting that I enjoy most, without any of the "performance anxiety". It's just me, some X-acto blades, some jewler's-files, some sanding sticks, and a pile of unpacked raw minis.

A few days later of poking at them and I get a nice pile of prepped minis, ready to prime and then (someday) paint and detail.

Several of the minis will get some addional work in brass-sheet. One of the wings on the Vulture is pretty thin and will inevitably get bent, so I'll "pad" it up with a brass doubler. It's already been cross-hatched to accept the glue from that.

I also bought and prepared Klingon and Gorn tug pods. The Klingon pod was filed down to just its basic shape (and cross-hatched to accept some greenstuff depression-filling), including removing the "tow-pad" from the top and the "carrier hatch" from the front. Both of these (and an extra Kzinti pod I already have in my "bits box") will be the basis for some custom-molding experiments later on.

I want to make my own "empire-specific" freighters, so I'm making these "bucks" to take a mold from and then cast multiple copies in resin - assuming it all works. Then I can kit-bash engines and control modules to fit.

While I was at it, I took the opportunity to strip the primer off my two existing Romulan War Eagles and give them a better prep-job than they had received before (since I was already prepping two new ones).

All four were heavily sanded and polished to mostly eliminate the "step-pattern" on their upper surfaces (most likely from being stereolithography "grown" from a computer model with too big of step-size). The remaining surface issues will be taken care of with some Squadron putty and additional polishing. Then, I get to add the phasers back...

This pile of minis represents my final "major" purchase.

I've pretty well fleshed-out all the empire's fleets that I am interested in (Fed, Klingon, Romulan, Kzinti, Gorn, Orion). I also made sure I have a few token ships from the other empires (Tholians, Hydrans, Lyrans). The others will need to wait a few years, or until I develop more interest.

At this point I can just pick up new things as they are released, like the drone/plasma/fighter/shuttle minis. Drool....

There's also a painted Fed HDW in there that I am "scrapping".

I'm doing so much pinning and greenstuff work right now for other projects, it seemed a good time to pull off the HDW engine module and replace it with a scratch-built one that is more to my liking. The old one came off pretty clean, so it shouldn't affect the mini's paint job once all is said and done. The new one will be made using a pair of spare DW engines from kitbash packs, pinned together with brass rod, and then a new connecting structure built around the rods in greenstuff (possibly with brass sheet plating).

Did a bit more in the last couple of days.

Hope you post a picture of that HDW when it's finished, 'dood.

Wolverin61 -
Will do.

Minis-Build-Blog:
I also started a potential master for the F-5W today:


The first step was to take a "stock" SL2400 F-5 mini and get it cleaned up with jeweler's files and sandpaper (no different than if I was going to prime and paint it for gameplay).

Once the mini was cleaned-up, I proceeded to ruin it . This involved clipping off the outside edges of the command-boom "top hat", then filing, filing, filing, some more filing, and some sanding to remove all traces of the bridge dome and "top hat", leaving just the boom. No changes were made to the aft hull (yet).

Minis-Build-Blog: Plugged away some at the F-5W today.

1. Picking up from the day before, the F-5 hull with the "top hat" removed had its engines clipped off, leaving some of the "flat" center portion of the rear hull intact. The "stump" of the wings on the aft hull was filed, and filed, and filed... until flat and straight.

Another "donor" F-5 mini was cannibalized by clipping off the boom at it's base (maybe this boom will go on something else someday, so off to the "bits box" with it).

2. The new donor hull was then roughly cut in two, using clippers. Messy, messy cut, but this will mostly get filed off anyways, so no sense in wasting energy with the razor saw on this.

3. The newly liberated engine engines/wings were clipped some more, and yet more filing ensued. Once done, both wings have clean inboard edges. A good portion of flat center hull was retained (which is what will "widen" the new minis rear hull).

4. The day's progress. Center hull and boom ready for drilling, as are both wings.

The wings had their redundant disruptor mounts removed via clipping and some careful chisel work with a small X-acto blade, then a whole lot of filing with a the flat side of a half-round jeweler's file. The disruptors are on the engines on the F-5W, so these aren't needed.

There will probably be some more filing to get the edges as true as I can make them and assure tight fits for pinning and gluing.
They should all hit the drill-press tonight.

Minis-Build-Blog:
Learning from my experience on the oCA master, this time I built a quick-n-dirty jig to hold the F-5W aft-hull steady (and perpendicular) while I drill holes through it to accept brass pins.



This was designed by trial and error, so it took most all of the time I had available last night, so that is the progress, other than cross-hatching the mating surfaces on the "wings". It's all ready to drill tonight though.

Wow. You put some serious engineering effort into these. Awesome work!

Can't wait to see the next step.

Thanks.

If they were just for the gaming table, I could back way off on the retentiveness and just "get 'er done".

The rigors and heat of the mold-making process really require things to get beefed-up and limit material choices quite a bit. I also really want the master to look as good as I can make it, going into the process, as the process inevitably degrades things a bit (they flatten out, twist some, surfaces get "orange peel" texture, etc.).

I've heard horror stories of masters coming apart in the mold and I don't want to be the guy that SVC has to send a master back to for rework. The F-5W is a ship near and dear for me, so I really want a new mini for it and want it to look "kick %&&" - that goes for the oCA too.