ship of riddles strikes back

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MF_Cockpit-FullScale_12.126

 

It’s long been known that the Falcon is a ship of mystery – especially if you’re trying to reconcile interior set elements with exterior proportions. I haven’t run into too many head-scratchers yet on my project, but I have now. I’ve started roughing-out the rest of the cockpit and access corridor.

The amount of hallway behind the cockpit, but before the bend, just doesn’t fit. I could just arbitrarily extend the length of the hall way to fit the set proportion, but then it would make the bird look really odd from the exterior.

Not only do the lengths not fit, but the corridor tubes and the cockpit diameters are eccentric. The corridor doesn’t even fit in the exterior tube diameter unless the cockpit is scaled really tiny compared to the exterior. I’ve seen this as a solution in the Full Scale Falcon plans (at least as of the latest 3D walk-through) and the Falcon Haynes Manual.

I’m considering a few things; shortening the first ring of padding between the cockpit and first structural bulkhead ring, and adding a ramp or stairs down to the cockpit floor which are at very different levels when the access corridor is scaled down enough to be concentric with the cockpit…

I could also just ignore the whole issue and close the cockpit door – but I’ve always imagined that my model would allow a peek down the corridor.

MF_Cockpit-FullScale_12.127

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nav seats, done (sort of…)

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Nav Seat

Hey all – so after much fussing here’s where I’m at with the Nav seats. I think I’m pretty much done and the files have been uploaded to grabCad. There is still a bit of work to be done to get them to a printable state, but that will happen in due time. All the major elements are there and the exterior surfaces are represented as accurately as I think I’m going to get – so I’ll call it done for now.

 

I might do some more renderings, but since my goal is to print these, I probably won’t spend the time texturing and weathering them. Never say never though…

even more nav comm

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I still have some more work to do on the parts that aren’t part of the Martin Baker frame (ahem, Tupperware lid), but I think I’m about as close to the MB Mk4 frame as I’m gonna get without one sitting in front of me.

The catapult tube and top cap have been updated. All the fiddly lever and linkage bits on the sides have been updated. The drogue gun has been resized to be more accurate. Most of the underlaying structure has been adjusted. I’ve recanted on my thoughts about the rubber banding on the seat pads – what I show seems to fit better against photo reference – a 1-inch band coupled with a 1/2″ tube binding the seat frame.

Here is a 4k high res image of the chair so far…

Millenium Falcon Nav Comm Seats

… and I’ve had a few people ask for orthographic projections of my seat in progress.

My daughter refers to the edge pattern on the the seat pads as the “Butterfly”; it’s an artifact of the modeling technique I use to create soft pillowed forms, not unlike the natural surfacing techniques I’ve done on watches for Nike.

more nav comm seat

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Been reworking the Nav Comm seats based on some new dimensions I got from forum members. I think it’s getting pretty close. There are some little lever and push rod things on the rear seat frame that aren’t quite right yet, but getting there.

console

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I have most of the console proportions roughed-in and some of the buttons and switches starting to populate the dash. Still plenty to do, but with each major chunk I add, I have new insight as to the proportions of the other bits…

pilot seats

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Where to begin on these? These particular parts of the cockpit might be even trickier than the Nav-Comm seats. There is almost always someone in them and are typically in shadow. But after countless hours on the internet and consulting some car aficionado friends, I’m pretty sure they are seats out of a mid-70’s Porsche 930 (911 Turbo). But not stock seats of course.

Corbeau is a maker of aftermarket seats for Porsches and made seats in this era and their construction techniques and proportions seem to be very close to what we see in the Falcon. Did they offer them in tan suede with a vinyl back? Probably, but not positive.

So what’s this give me? It establishes a footprint for the seat – they still sell seat mounting brackets for 70’s Porsches. It also gives me a pretty good idea of what the envelope was that the original seat fit into – height, width depth – as aftermarket seats are still available – although changes to seat belt laws and such have changed the designs of modern seats.

nav-comm seats

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The Nav-Comm seats seen directly behind Han and Chewie, are based on Martin-Baker Mk IV ejection seats. Specifically the weight reduced variant found in the English RAF’s Sea Venom FAW.22 – the MB 4AV1-2. It seems to be very rare.

Here’s my current CAD model of the seat. It’s a work in progress since everytime I add something new, I realize how much is wrong with what I’ve build. I think I’ve rebuilt that head-piece about a dozen times.

On the upper left is the ejection seat’s Time Release Mechanism and on the upper right is the Drogue Gun – both of which remained in tact on the Falcon’s seats.

I’m pretty sure the seat back and seat pan pads are from folding chairs and the ribbed sections are 1″ foam rubber (weather stripping) laid in pattern. I think there is also a bit of pipe insulation used around the ejection seat frame. and then there is a lay-up of 1/4″ milky white plexiglas strapped to the back that covers-up most of the catapult tube.