Another photo dump of the last ten days or so progress on my Build Something Contest 2025 entry. My LAF project thread is getting much more regular updates (new photos every other day or so at this point) if you want to follow along!
As of the last blog post the nose had been skinned but not much else. Since then I’ve tried several designs for the wings, disliked every single one of them, built and detailed the removable roof for the cargo bay, and started doing detail panels on the nose.
Check the captions of the photos below for more details.
Engine/wing mockup in cardstock. This is the second, smaller, angular wing.Second wing in place, with the first bigger slab-like wing on the cutting mat. Still not happy with either design, so I left the wings alone to do other stuff for a bit!One of the wing mockups taped in place alongside the open cargo bay.The underside, showing the three landing gear bays and the un-skinned belly.Primer! I’m going to be painting the cargo bay before gluing the rear bulkhead & ramp in place, so it got primed.Rear ramp deployed, couple of 28mm figures hanging out for scale.Wider view of the rear bulkhead & ramp with the whole shuttle propped up to about the height it’ll sit on it’s landing gear.The ceiling of the cargo bay all detailed.Roof! The start of the removable roof of the cargo bay.The top of the roof, with the docking port/escape hatch detailed. It’s recessed into the roof.The roof in place, looking foward toward the nose of the shuttle.Detail panels in 0.5mm styrene being installed. When installing across a bend like this, much easier to glue one side down, let the solvent glue cure, then do the other side across the bend!Second detail panel installation, side view.
The belly skin will be installed today, and then I’ll be able to carry the detail panels aft from the nose, down the belly, and around the landing gear bays.
I’ve also (finally) started building the actual landing gear, because I need to set the height of that before I can make some detailing decisions for the underside of the beast.
Then it’ll be back to the engine & wing subassemblies, where I have a third wing planoform I want to try out that I think will work better than attempts 1 and 2!
Decided to go with the nose next instead of the wings and engines, and as predicted in my last post, it required a lot of mockup work, in two stages.
First, I did an internal frame to establish the basic proportions of the nose and give me a nice solid frame to hang the skin from.
I redid parts of the skin mockup three times, including scrapping round three for part of the sides and going back to round two’s ideas. The advantage of all of the fiddling with cardstock and masking tape, of course, is that I knew what I was doing (mostly) when I switched to 1mm sheet styrene and started the real thing.
I also cut back the outer (top/bottom) corners of the sides where they extended forward, and that was the right call, it made integrating the nose and sides easier.
The hammerhead nose was a spur of the moment idea while planning the first mockup piece and I really like how it’s come together; the hammerhead let me play with the angles and bulk of the nose area more than a more straightforward taper would have.
Mockup for the nose frame.Nose frame finished in 1mm styrene. I wound up cutting most of the long thin brace on the outer side off, but all the internal bracing gave me a nice solid, trouble-free start to doing the skin.Finished nose frame. The whole beast is just under 11 inches long, nose to back end, which is perfect.Closeup of the top left with skin mockups in progress.Nose skin mockup in progress, figuring out what to do between the hammerheads and the start of the body/sides.The underside of the nose, mockups in progress.Finally cutting styrene! The big panel behind the hammerheads has a twist to it, so it got anchored down with elastic bands and left for the plastic cement to cure for a bit.Styrene skin in place, sanding and puttying cleanup started. There is going to be a LOT of sanding.Current state of the nose, with putty smeared around a lot of the seams and sanding in progress.
I really like how the whole thing is shaping up, it has a good bulky angular look to it. There’s going to be a round of detail panels over this initial skin, after the endless sanding and puttying is done – some of the seams didn’t come out quite as well fitted as I’d like, so there’s going to be some remediation before detailing can start!
Still to do, in rough order of size/complexity of the subassembly: the engine pods and wings; the roof for the cargo bay; landing gear and landing gear bay doors; skin on the belly.
I’m away this coming long weekend and have some things to get organized before we go away for the long weekend, and as mentioned, the next while is likely to be mostly sanding, so it might be ten days or so before there’s another blog-worthy update to this project!
My Build Something Contest 2025 thread on LAF is here; the rest of the contest has some very cool entries – there’s another couple of shuttles or dropships, some neat magical walking constructs, and a bunch of other cool concepts among the other contestants! Entries just closed on February 8th so everyone who’s in for this year is in!
Mocking up the sides with light card. I didn’t get a photo but there’s three pieces under each of the big side panels to give strength.Mockup stage showing the in-progress underside of the shuttle.Local supervisor hard at work.Styrene sides cut and installed, with the angular extensions at the back.Designing the initial panel of the rear bulkhead.Never enough clamps. Or clothes pins in this case. Adding bulk to the underside of the extension on top of the rear bulkhead.Rear bulkhead and ramp complete and detailed, outside view.Rear bulkhead and ramp, inside view.Rear bulkhead and ramp dry fitted to the body. I won’t be gluing the subassembly in until quite late to make painting the interior easier.Rear subassembly dry fitted, outside view. There will be small panels in each lower corner to cover the groove the ramp hinge pin rides in, and detail panels on the insides of the fuselage extensions.
Very pleased with progress so far. Up next will be either the engine/wing subassemblies on either side, or the nose, depending on my mood. Both are going to require more cardstock mockups, especially figuring out how the nose is going to join up to the front of the current body assembly…
It’s Build Something Competition on the Lead Adventure Forums again and once again I’m running them, so have been a bit behind on my own entry (unlike Brian, who is racing ahead with construction).
This year’s theme is Vessel or Conveyance, so most are doing movable things like shuttles. Although we have law firms, we do have two alcohol-related entries – my distillery and Tarnegol’s brewed. May the best booze win!
Inspiration and initial thoughts
to start, I did a bunch of Googling to find good images. There’s actually a whole 3D printable stl for a distillery by MiniatureLand on MyMiniFactory, so that was a good place to look for inspiration:
Distilling itself is a product of alchemy, which are basically the same art with different outcomes. And historically, people did a lot of a alchemy, but strangely really only started distilling drinkable alcohol in large quantities in the early Renaissance, right as European alchemists started building on what the Arabic scholars had done. That does mean we get lots of great art about alchemy:
Il laboratorio dell’alchimista by Giovanni StradanoThe Alchemist by David Teniers the YoungerThe Alchymist, In Search of the Philosopher’s Stone, Discovers Phosphorus, and prays for the successful Conclusion of his operation, as was the custom of the Ancient Chymical Astrologers, by Joseph Wright of Derby
And of distilling itself, it really flourished in Renaissance Italy, which happens to be what I’m based on fantasy city on, so happy times. There are lots pieces of art of the key part of distilling: the still (the vessel from the competition theme):
Planning the building
With all those inspiration pieces done, I start the process of figuring out how big I wanted to make the building. I really want to tie it into my planned sewer/basements I’m doing for my city, so that fixes one part of the building: one edge must be 3″ tall for the basement, with the building on top.
With that set, I drew up some simple plans, ultimately deciding on a 6″x9″ building, with big double doors in the long end. The base of the building will be 3D printed, with foam building on top.
Base of the building including the basement.
And thus ends today’s post – with an initial base printing. Onward to actual construction tomorrow
As mentioned last post, I’m in the Lead Adventure Forum’s Build Something Contest 2025. I’ve entered a few over the decades, finished my entries in even fewer, and ever gotten out of the first round of voting, so we shall see, but it’s always a great contest to watch even if you aren’t participating.
Photos to date below – today (Sat 1 Feb) I got the floor and three main walls of the cargo bay built and assembled. Engines and landing gear next, then figuring out how the actual skin of the shuttle is going to cover all this stuff!
One of the classic sources of kitbashing/scratchbuilding detail parts – a 1/72 MBT, in this case a Tamiya LeClerc. Also at the top of the photo, half-round pearls from the dollar store, because you can never have enough dome shapes for sci-fi building!Also from the dollar store, an entire baggie of googly eyes. Some of these might well wind up as actual eyes in silly places, but a bunch of them are just going to be interesting shapes for kitbashing.Cargo bay floor. LeClerc track pieces for detail.The assembled cargo bay. The side walls need at least one more round of detailing!Cargo bay, showing the other side wall.Wider workbench shot.
The main thing now is going to be maintaining momentum and not getting bogged down in overthinking this damn thing. Onward!
