Airfix Mustang Parts

I never expected to use 3D scan data verbatim. My intent was always to model clean versions of parts optimized for assembly and printing. However, I also didn’t anticipate just how useful the scans would be in unusual cases—like these P-51 Mustang engine parts, which were used with some sprue still intact.

It seems likely that these gates were added to the tooling after the molds were made, once it became clear that knit lines were weakening the parts. The small bridges midway through the sprue improved mold flow, but since they were added by hand, they have a quirky, inconsistent quality. Interestingly, they also became an easy way to distinguish part 31 from part 36—two otherwise nearly identical components.

Revopoint MINI 2 3D Scanner

I bought myself a 3D scanner which should greatly enhance my creation of digital donor kit parts. My digital library has grown to several hundred parts, and this should help with some of the more complicated, or hard to measure bits. Tank hulls are notoriously tricky to get right.

Here is my first scan of a Nitto King Tiger (1/48… or is it 1/50?). A bit soft in the smaller details, but perfect for wayfinding.

This was done without any scanning spray, so I hope to refine my workflow and get slightly better results. The circular scars on some of the flat surfaces are from where I had placed tracking markers.

1/12th X-Wing Part 3

Donors

As I mentioned in the first post, the project didn’t actually start with the fuselage. That came later; when Jason got the definitive castings for reference. Initially, the scope of the project was to model the rear donor plate and the top droid strip. Maybe some of the wing parts. Jason was going to sculpt the 1/12 body by hand or something, but he wanted a legitimate representation of the donor collages for the big model.

There are only about 50 donors needed for an X-Wing, and many of them I already had in the Falcon digital library. Then again, there are some real tricky parts – and we wanted to pay extra attention to them since they were going to be scaled up by double eventually. Anything that was modeled needed to A) look like the original part, and B) look great at a larger scale.

the digital donor catalog

Process-wise, it’s a lot of careful measuring with digital calipers and digital protractors. I have a height gauge I use as well. Sometimes printing things on paper and overlaying a part to verify angles-on-top-of-angles is the best approach. 3D printing parts is also helpful – but paper prototyping is remarkably effective.

There were a few parts that were trickier than most. The Hasegawa Sherman upper hull is featured both on the X-Wing and the Falcon. So, I wanted to model both the front half for this project, and the back half for the other. The nose of the hull has some very distinctive sculpting unique to the Hasegawa version which would become even more prominent at 2x scale.

While the Sherman is a tricky sculpt, the original part is crisp and has clear intent which makes mimicking it relatively easy. Then there are parts like the Monogram 1/32 Panzerspähwagen 232 8-Rad Transaxle. I probably spent more time on this single donor part than all the others combined (not really – but it felt like it). The original tooling is mushy, ill-defined and uses a multitude of different draft tapers (!?!), but within that lies the character of the part. I probably had a half-dozen false starts on this part before it started taking shape and feeling like the original. It was one of those where every time I measured something, I got a different result and no amount of standard deviation tracking seemed to fix it. It just never looked right.

Monogram transaxle on a makeshift jig ready to be scanned

In the end, I used a first generation Matter and Form laser scanner to capture the part and model it from there. Hobby-grade scanners aren’t great – but it did give me a consistent set of reference points in 3D space to keep track of what I was measuring, and from where. Consistency is key. It’s a deceptively organic part with a lot of surface interdependencies that if aren’t right, make the part lose its character.

just in case you’re wondering what a hobby-grade laser scanner gets you… not much on a small part.
the finished digital donor model rendering

I feel like it got pretty close in the end. There are still some bits that don’t quite resolve the same as the original. Hopefully they aren’t too noticeable.

Collages

When working digitally, we can chop and crop all the donors to size and assemble to ensure things fit. Often this is our first line of defense on error correction. I mentioned this on the Ferrari 512b engine post – the digital model assembles in the same wonky way as the original kit – which lets me know I did it right. Eventually these got printed as single part assemblies.

And of course, all the while, Jason was test printing and providing feedback as we went.

And yes, we have rear plates for Red Two, Red Three, and Red Five in CAD – which are all different.

Haynes Rebel Starfighters?

Around this time, Chris Reiff caught wind of our project. We started working with him, and a our digital donors were used in the illustrations. Jason and I even got a credit at the end of the book! If you don’t have it yet, get it – it’s a lovely edition to add to your collection!

pew pew

Lancaster

Finally got my Lancaster kits, so my docking ring end cap CAD model is complete. Also trying out Maya’s Arnold renderer to render raw styrene plastic. I usually render stuff in KeyShot, but I like playing with new toys…

Tamiya 1-12 Ferrari 312B Engine assembly

Sometimes, when modeling donor kits, I realize that the parts I’m digitizing actually make something other than a Millennium Falcon… Most of the engine parts from Ferrari 312B are used. Assembling them digitally was a cool way of cross-checking that my parts are accurate. All the little gaps and misalignments in the original plastic parts are a good test of accuracy…