# U.S.S. Constellation WIP (Star Trek TOS)



## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Hi guys and girls!

This is my take on the U.S.S. Constellation as seen in the old Star Trek Episode "The Doomsday Machine". 

It's built up from three unwanted and junked AMT 18" Enterprise kits which were produced from 1967-present day, however most of the doner kits were produced from 1986-1995. Other pieces which I didn't have are scratch built from Evergreen styrene plastic.








The engines came from my friend Jason who gave me three engines and some secondary hull parts in @ 1989. He had "Cut" off the engines from their pylons using a lighter and glued them to a saucer (which I didn't get). The whole thing was painted thickly with Glow in The Dark and aluminum paint and the unusable secondary hull parts had some X-acto knife etchings carved into them which made them useless.

I added in and scratch built most of the secondary hull parts like the new engine pylons, and 1 side of the neck. I also have 1 rear nacell cap and a slightly busted sensor dish.

A fresh saucer and all it's parts came from Barry Yoner who used a different saucer to make an 18"er into a model of the Endeavor (A ship caught between TOS and TMP). 

I still need to find or make the 6 engine intercoolers though. Anyone got some in their junk bin?










On this side of the ship I had to make the entire neck from 2 pieces of 1/4" thick sheet styrene, filed to shape. The nacell support struts were also made the same way. 

The putty on the secondary hull is used to fill the horrendous gap that occurs in the kit. 










This nacell was blown appart when the Constellation encountered the planet killer. 

I used a hair dryer to soften the plastic on the outer engine houseing and then I installed all the plastic tubes, shearing the ends of the tubes off in wierd angles. 










The opposite side of the same engine. 

Notice the dammaged intercoolers on the bottom edge of the engine housing.










A shot showing the gap difference along the seam line. I filled the gap with Tamiya Grey Putty and sanded it down after I took this picture. There are still some spots that need a second coat. 










The opposite engine. 

Here, I used a textured piece of Evergreen sheet styrene to show what would be immediatly under the skin if the starship was grazed by a photon or disruptor blast. This side lost it's 3 intercoolers.

Anyway, more work to do. just thought I'd show these WIP's for your comments.


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## John P (Sep 1, 1999)

Battle damage in fun to do, ain't it?


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Yeah...especially when the parts are semi-destroyed to begin with!


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Ok...after two months, I finally decided to destroy the saucer section. It took this long because I was aprehensive of wreaking a 100% perfect 18"er saucer, but the results look great!


























































The inner decks were made from Evergreen Sheet Styrene, heated and dammaged with a cigarette lighter.

Here's a real picture of the Constellation from the TV episode : 










Mine has more "Artistic Liscence, and I might just rename it "Excalibur" instead.


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## HabuHunter32 (Aug 22, 2009)

Looks great so far! I have the Alliance 1/1000 Doomsday conversion that I will build someday and just bought the 18in repop from amt to make the Constellation from useing the Alliance set as a guide!

Cant wait to see her finished!

BTW, that still from the episode you used is the same pic that I have on my P/C at work as my desktop bachground! Everyone at work thinks I'm nuts!


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Disaster on 2 ships today! The gold decals on the consitution decided to peel up on me, so I clear-coated them, only to have the clear coat mess up the decals.

The constellation's secondary hull and warp engines were painted with a fine coat of primer which went on perfectly...but when I painted the finish coat of light grey, the stupid thing poped out of my clip and crahed on the dirty, dusty porch....wet with paint too. The darn thing split on 2 seam lines. So now I'm waiting on paint to dry before continuing.


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Got a picture of the dammaged saucer to share with everyone! 

This part was seporate from the secondary hull, which broke, so I was able to paint it with more control. 










This is some painting practice using the top of the saucer section. Currently, the part is in grey primer with flat black battle dammage added from a spray can. The "Phaser" dammage is from a Weller soldering iron. 

Soon I will paint a nice gloss light grey over the entire saucer, decal the model, and then re-paint the batle damage with the flat black paint.


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## ark undertaker (Jul 2, 2009)

Amazing! Sorry to hear about the setback This one is really coming along nicely. 
Will this one be in your display @ the library? 

A.U.


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

I'm hoping so. 

Appart from the cracks, I think that the screwed up paint might be an advantage in some reguards. If i sand down the model, I might cut through the light grey paint and get into the primer underneath. This could add to the "Dammaged" look. 

As for the cracks, I might loose a lot pf paint trying to fix them. Hopefully, it won't be too bad.


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## Mitchellmania (Feb 14, 2002)

Looking great , but shouldn't this be in Sci Fi Modeling?


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

NO! 

Actually, I only attend one BB, and that's this one.


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## Mitchellmania (Feb 14, 2002)

I didn't mean to sound gruff, There's a Science Fiction Modeling threads here on Hobby Talk. Scroll down the list a couple and it's there. This board if for figure models.:wave:


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

It's ok Mitchellmania. When I first signed up for this board, it use to be the Polar Lights thread. In fact, I still have that in my bookmarks. 

Over that time, I made a lot of friends here. It's these friends I'm showing my models to. 

I know it doesn't fit in "the formula" of the boards, but this is where I want to be.


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## MartinHatfield (Apr 11, 2004)

Mitchellmania said:


> I didn't mean to sound gruff, There's a Science Fiction Modeling threads here on Hobby Talk. Scroll down the list a couple and it's there. This board if for figure models.:wave:


No, this board is for any kind of model building. That is why it carries the title of "The Modeling Forum".

If a topic needs to be in another forum, then the moderators will move it. That is why the lyrics topic is still going strong right where it is.


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Guys have posted all kinds of things here, actually. I've even seen model car collections.


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Here's the Constellation with a little paint on it. 

I decided to paint the remaining Warp Nacelle with a Metallic Blue instead of the usual Orange or Transperant Red to show what the engine might look like with no power to it. 

After I set the decals, I will add in the Flat Black dammage paint to the model.


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## ark undertaker (Jul 2, 2009)

Most impressive! Could these techniques be used to do the Enterprise-B from the Generations 
movie after it is damaged by the Nexus?

A.U.


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Sure! Why not? You just have to do some planning for your cuts vs the film version.


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## kdaracal (Jan 24, 2009)

Back when I was a teen, I did a wrecked AMT TOS and used Life cereal as inner detail girders, and what-not. It "toasts" nicely with a lighter and looks pretty good. Smells like cinnamon rolls cooking, too!!


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Changed the ship name to Excalibur. Look forward to pics comming soon!


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## MadCap Romanian (Oct 29, 2005)

Here's the new saucer pics!









When I decaled the saucer, I decided to change the ship name and numbers from CONSTELLATION (NCC-1017) to EXCALIBUR (NCC-1705) because in the Star Trek episode The Ultimate Computer, Desilu Studios reused the CONSTELLATION model kit, but filmed it so far away that audienes wouldn't see that it was the 1017. 

Therefore, the dammage on EXCALIBUR shouldn't be the same as CONSTELLATION, at least in theory. 

Because of this, the damage is more speculative on EXCALIBUR than definate on CONSTELLATION, strictly from a TV watcher's point of view. (The CONSTELLATION had a lot of close-up views and is well doccumented photographically. 

In the near future, I will re-examine my reference photos of CONSTELLATION and make an entirely new kit to represent the dammage that ship underwent after her encounter with The Doomsday Machine.

For now, here is the saucer after the decals and flat black paint. (Decals were scanned in from the Cut-Away Enterprise kit and numbers 2,3,4,5,6,8 &9 were hand drawn from edited 0's in the earily 2000's. In the furute, I will use a proper font.) 










Here's the ship with some Testor's Steel Enamel paint added with a drybrush. 










Here's the underside of the saucer. The grey paint is different under here simply because I ran out of Tremclad Light Grey and I couldn't find a replacement at 3 hardware stores. 

I ended up using Krylon Light Grey which is more of a yellowish-concrete grey. 

After this, I found 3 cans of Tremclad in a hardware store in High River, so I bought 2 cans. 

The windows on this ship are all painted black to show that the ship is dead and all power is gone. 










Here's the side view of underneath the saucer. Note the Phaser damage and how it cuts through the registry.

On the opposite side, the photon torpedo blast damage through the saucer accidently lined up with the "0" in 1705. That wasn't intentional.










A side view of the saucer top. Note the grid lines and the yellow/red square. I pinstriped the square using Artist's One Shot paint.

Also, all the big square lights that cover the saucer top are painted black to show that the light panel has no power to it. On a working starship, these panels should be white.










A close-up of the bridge and saucer. Note the command center under the dome. This is an actual top view technical picture of the bridge that has been photo reduced to fit in the tiny opening under the dome.

Now, onto the body!


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## Dinosaur Steve (Dec 7, 2009)

Here is a large scale Doomsday Machine toy I made that though not to scale of your ship would look cool say at a distance 

































Steve


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