Revell '65 Mustang Fastback

[Greg Kimsey]

Ok, I am going to attempt another car. My last two have ended badly and unfinished. I hope to somewhat follow the dude from A4 Garage on youtube.

This guys has skills I don't fully understand, and I will not set myself up for failure by trying to reach his level, but will do my best to be close to his results using his videos as a guide.

I started with the engine bay.

I cut the battery off to set up making tha battery apron. I have a disassenbled 65 Mustang Coupe in my garage to help with referencing and measurements.

I used Tamiya polyester putty (aka Bondo) to fill in the gaps.

It looks like I lost a bolthead on the tray support. I haven't finished sanding yet. I plan on using my Blender skills to create some of the parts that A4 scratchbuilds. I have made the battery, radiator, and horns and will show them in the next post.

 

[Greg Kimsey]

Here are the pieces I made in Blender:

They are printing right now.

 

[Greg Kimsey]

Next phase, door and trunk removal. I used the back of an Xacto knife for the entire process on this one. Many times I use a little razor saw along with the knife. There were minimal slips this time that should be quite easy to fix

 

[moon puppy]

Typical for the time, radiator way to small for the engine. How many times did we sit on the side of the road in my Mom's '67 Caprice wagon because the radiator was too small for that 327 to cool down. Oddly it was always the same place on hwy 378.

Mad skills you have Greg, this is what I meant on the call, you don't need no stinkin' files!

 

[Greg Kimsey]

Very kind to say Pup! I do OK on hard surfaced things, and love doing it.

 

[Heavens Eagle]

OK, what did you do to get the texture on the radiator core Greg? I get the assemblies for the "parts", but have not seen anything where someone explains how to get the texturing on the solid object so it can print out.
As to the mods Greg, the more care you take with accuracy on the scratch stuff, the better it turns out.

I spent all day today and yesterday working on pneumatic connectors, mounting the connectors, making two little flip valves that go on the back side of the carriage, then getting the plumbing just right. I am getting quite good at this point in splicing plastic rod together with pins. Hopefully I can get the whole unit assembled up this next week for some "before paint" photos which will show all the white plastic. Whew! It has been rather tedious, but damn it is looking good!

 

[Greg Kimsey]

OK, what did you do to get the texture on the radiator core Greg? I get the assemblies for the "parts", but have not seen anything where someone explains how to get the texturing on the solid object so it can print out.
As to the mods Greg, the more care you take with accuracy on the scratch stuff, the better it turns out.

I spent all day today and yesterday working on pneumatic connectors, mounting the connectors, making two little flip valves that go on the back side of the carriage, then getting the plumbing just right. I am getting quite good at this point in splicing plastic rod together with pins. Hopefully I can get the whole unit assembled up this next week for some "before paint" photos which will show all the white plastic. Whew! It has been rather tedious, but damn it is looking good!

Your gun is looking utterly amazing Paul! It doesn't seem to matter how much care I take, scratchbuilding is a labor of frustration. I prefer Blender!

As to the surface detail, in this case I simply made an object in Blender that looked like mesh, then duplicated it to 7 layers and offset each one so you cannot see through it, but it looks like radiator coils somewhat. You can see the layers here shown offset, but when viewed straight on (2nd image) it looks more solid. I joined these layers to the main radiator object so that it is all one object for printing.

Normally, for organic surfaces, I use a Displacement Modifier then insert textures from Polyhaven.com to create whatever texture I need. I add the texture image I want in the displacement window and adjust the sliders for the depth and details I want. I find this method easier than using nodes which are extremely complicated to learn and understand. The node modifiers are more for image rendering with color and shading and minute textures. Modifiers are fine for 3D printing which is what I care about.

I will try to walk you through the process of making a mesh "mesh".
1: Select a "plane" from the dropdown mesh menu

2: The plane mesh

3: In edit screen, subdivide the plane into sections. I chose 50 slices

4: Switch to object screen and add a "wireframe" modifier. Adjust the size of the wire as desired.

5: Size the mesh to fit the frame. This is still a single layer of the mesh material.

6: Duplicate the mesh to however many layers you need. It may be hard to see, but I made 5 layers here

7: Misalign the layers to mimick a solid-ish core. This image is a straight on view, showing how I moved the second layer into position (the orange squares)

8: Join the wireframe layers with the frame mesh. It is easiest to use a boolean modifier to do this, shoosing the "plane" in the object field.

From a head-on view, the radiator appears to be solid

I promise, there are probably easier ways to do this, or even more realistic looking ways to do this, but this seems to be easiest for me. I am sure that it was as clear as mud...

edit: An adendum to the blender method using modifiers. The wireframe modifiers in this case only appear in the "Object" mode window. (That's not always the case. Subsurf modifiers will appear and can be adjusted in edit mode. You just kind of have to "know") While in "Edit" mode, the wireframes disappear and all you can edit is the main mesh itself. The modifier adjustments must be made in "Object" mode. Something that can be frustrating at times. I have tried to add certain modifier while in edit mode in the past and was pulling my hair out because nothing was happening and I was sure it should be. Then I switched to "object" mode and "POOF!", there they were.

 

[Greg Kimsey]

For Paul: the difference between object mode and edit mode.

I will try to show how changing a mesh in edit mode can affect how it looks in object mode.
So, I have created a plane. Going into Edit mode I subdivided the plane into 50 parts

Now, in Object mode, I selected Wireframe in the dropdown menu

and adjusted the wireframe amount to suit:

Now, while in Edit mode the plane still looks the same as in the first image. However, we can edit the plane mesh while in edit mode. Let's extrude along one edge: While in Edit mode, the extrusion looks like stretched rectangles.

Now, back in Object mode, the wireframe will reflect this extrusion as a wireframe:

Back in edit mode, let's add cuts to the portion we extruded:

Back in Object mode, we can see the results:

Let's go further. Let's extrude another edge upward and give it some cuts:

Now, back in Object mode, viola, and upward wiremesh:

Let's play with the mesh in edit mode and see what heppens:

Meanwhile, back in Object mode:

So, playing with mods is a non destructive way of manipulating a mesh. The actual object (the one in edit mode), is not a wireframe, so if we remove the modifier, we still have the actual plane without destroying it. Once we apply the modifier using the dropdown menu, the actual object is altered.

So that if we go back into edit mode, the wiremesh is visible, and we can alter that, but the alteration is part of the actual object and the modifications can be more minute, such as moving a single point, or moving multiple point to create the object we desire:

Modifiers are extremely useful in making broad sweeps of change to an object. Let's to an array for instance:
I have created a small wireframe grid, and want to make a windmill pattern with it. Using this one mesh, and adding an Axis controlling object as a controller for the mesh let's see what we can do: In the modifier dropdown menu let's choose Array.

Set the number to 11 and offset to whatever separates the meshes: So from one mesh, I now have 11 identical meshes.

Ok, let's add the controller: Under the object dropdown menu go to "Empty" and choose "Plain axis". Rename it from "Empty" to "Axis" or whatever name you want to give it. ie: controller, rotator, etc

Check the Object" box (In blue) in the Array modifier tab (In red) of the Plane then with the dropper select "Axis" (in green) or whatever you named it). Now, that Axis controls our wireframe. Select the axis object and rotate it on the Z axis to make a circle. Rotate along other axis to shift the wireframe mesh to more of a blade angle. Viola, and windmill!!

I will try to clarify anything confusing!! If that is possible...