# FS Upgrade from ParaGrafix



## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

Just got the Flying Sub upgrade from ParaGrafix via the Cultman and thought I'd post some pics to show how good it is...

Brass etch is fantastic...










The decals and back-lit sheet...yes, I know it's back to front...:drunk:










There's a bit of work in using the kit but the results are worth it and far better than my attempt at simply drilling holes for lighting.

Here's an original part with the raised detail removed...










Next the panels are hollowed out to accept the backlighting...



















Finally the brass panels are CA glued in place...



















A vast improvement over what were already well-detailed parts.


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## John P (Sep 1, 1999)

Wow.


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## gojira61 (May 21, 2008)

It is an amazing kit, decals are fantastic! Mine is sitting here waiting for me to start on it but I'm still trying to finish my Seaview first (work all the time, no life, takes me forever to build)

I've said it before and I'll say it again, the products from ParaGrafix are just outstanding!

Jim


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## AJ-1701 (May 10, 2008)

miniature sun I see you've taken out the whole panel for the pe and they look great installed too. :thumbsup: The urge to abandon my currant work is now that much stronger...:freak:

Cheers,

Alec.


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

Alec, the trick is to remove the centre of the panel to allow for lighting whilst retaining the edges of the original to align the etch to and to give the proper depth.


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

The most difficult parts to hollow out are the two oblong boxes either side of the windscreen and the front instrument panel.
By carefully drilling out the row of lights on the boxes, it's possible to open up a narrow slot leaving just the lip of the original moulded panel to attach the brass to.
I managed to cut three openings in the adjacent face to permit light to shine through the larger panel...there's just about enough room to squeeze some LEDs in from behind.
Unfortunately the pics I took of the hollowed out boxes came out too blurry.
Here I've cut out a corresponding portion of the wall where the boxes fit...










The boxes were then detailed with the etched pieces and cemented in place...I hid the joints with some thin evergreen strip...


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

The front console needs some work to accomodate the brass and allow for backlighting the screens.
The moulded screens were drilled out slightly wider than the aperture in the brass replacements to give a lip to attach the backlit screens from the rear.
I also removed the raised rim of the left- and right-hand screens to give a level surface to accept the brass.
The oblong instrument panels were given a similar treatment to those described earlier.
The hardest and most time-consuming part was drilling out the tiny console above the central screen. I used a pin vise held at an angle and then carved out the excess plastic from the back...there is now just enough room to feed in either some fibreoptics or a thin flat LED...


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## Carson Dyle (May 7, 2003)

That's going to look fantastic once you're done.

It's _almost_ enough to make me want to build another FS, this time leaving the lid removable.


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## Nova Mike (Apr 26, 2009)

Looks fantastic:thumbsup:, thanks for the progress pics, looking forward to seeing the decals applied and lit.


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## Paulbo (Sep 16, 2004)

Miniature Sun,

Thanks so much for the high praise! I'm so glad you're enjoying the etch set.

Thanks also for posting the great shots. It's fantastic to see the WIP pictures.

Fantastic job with the mods - I'm really looking forward to seeing the lighting.

Cheers,
Paul

P.S. As MS says, the backlight panels are shown from the backside. They are also visible from the front side - I assume he shot from this side because the front side is very glossy. I sealed the printed side with flat clear lacquer. (I use a special backlight film that somehow sucks the ink through from the printed side so you view it from the unprinted side.)


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

Paulbo said:


> Thanks so much for the high praise! I'm so glad you're enjoying the etch set.
> 
> 
> > It's hard to _not_ praise this set Paul as the quality is outstanding. I'm particularly impressed with the perfect fit of the brass over the existing plastic.
> ...


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## Paulbo (Sep 16, 2004)

I'm looking forward to seeing the shots, Iain.

*A quick update to my PS in the last message:* I am printing up another run of lighting overlays and realized that my supplier sent me the wrong material in my last order (or the formulation was changed - they're looking into it). For the first run, I had printed a ton of the overlays and used up the last of my old film and then moved onto the new delivery for the last sheet.

This new batch does not transfer the image through to the back (glossy) side. I have switched over and am no longer reversing the printing so I can continue to use the current film until / unless my supplier can get the correct material out to me.


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

I've just posted a new technique I've found courtesy of another site in the lighting section here...

http://www.hobbytalk.com/bbs1/showthread.php?p=2941110#post2941110


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## WEAPON X (Mar 5, 2006)

miniature sun said:


> Just got the Flying Sub upgrade from ParaGrafix via the Cultman and thought I'd post some pics to show how good it is...
> 
> Brass etch is fantastic...
> 
> ...


Great looking technique! I have to purchase a set or two!


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

I received a big bag of LED's in the post this morning so got stuck into the lighting tonight.

The first thing I tackled was the two narrow boxes either side of the windscreen. I previously hollowed out the boxes and made cut-outs for the lights to show behind the etched parts.

Next I took four rectangular LED's, two green and two yellow, and glued them edge to edge with the cathode legs of each pair back to back, so from left to right the legs go + - - + + - - + .



















The negative(cathode)legs were then pulled together and soldered...the excess leg of one pair was bent across to meet the other pair and soldered...so now I had both pairs of negative legs soldered together and all the positive legs still free. I attached a length of wire, green in this case, to the linked negatives then bent the whole assembly forwards.

Flipping the LED's over I then brought the positive legs together in a similar fashion only this time I soldered a 220 ohm resistor to the linked positives followed by a length of red wire.

Still with me???

The previous photo makes it look like ALL the legs are connected together however in the next shot you can see how they are separated by sliding a small piece of styrene between the two polarities...










The whole assembly now simply pushes into the back of the oblong box...


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

Here they are lit...the only problem is the light leaks due to it being impossible to line the tiny boxes with foil. I intend to use a combination of foil and paint on the outside faces to overcome this...




























I'm quite pleased with the results so far...


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## Paulbo (Sep 16, 2004)

I hadn't thought of the tape light block system specifically when designing this sytem, so my comments may be totally wrong, but ...

Assuming you've glued the boxes to the main wall pieces, could you open up the hole to essentially exactly match the opening on the backside of the boxes? You could then (possibly) cut tape pieces to size and push them into position and then push very thin pins through the holes in the etch parts to allow light through.

As I said, I haven't tested this, but hopefully it will help.

I'm looking forward to more pictures of your build!


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## solex227 (Apr 23, 2008)

Ok Im convinced I need to get a That PE set myself Great work!!


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## GKvfx (May 30, 2008)

You should probably spray the backs of all the parts silver and then black (and heavy coats too) just to prevent light bleed in general. Even if a lightbulb isn't directly behind a part, there can be bleed *somewhere*.

Gene


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## AJ-1701 (May 10, 2008)

Looking good so far Iian. :thumbsup:



GKvfx said:


> You should probably spray the backs of all the parts silver and then black (and heavy coats too) just to prevent light bleed in general. Even if a lightbulb isn't directly behind a part, there can be bleed *somewhere*.
> 
> Gene


I have had too, on occasion resort to doing the same but on the outside as well when some blocking did go to plan which I didn't realize till after it was all sealed up. :freak: The bridge on my 1/350 enterprise is a perfect example


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

One thing that occurred to me while using this set, and please don't take it as critisism Paul, but it would be nice to have some seat belt buckles etched on the sheet to replace the molded kit ones.
It's no biggie as I can get some from a 1/32 aircraft set but I don't know whether Paul would consider revising the sheet on future runs.


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## Lou Dalmaso (Jul 13, 2004)

Paul,
If you ever do a version 2.0 of this set, might you consider making these entire boxes in brass, with the instrument panels already in place? Nothing blocks light better than metal.

a little folding, a little solder and the problem would be gone. plus the boxes would be bigger on the inside since there wouldn't be the thickness of the plastic. more room for bulbs

my two cents


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## Paulbo (Sep 16, 2004)

Lou & MS - thanks for the excellent suggestions. I can't promise there'll be a version 2.0 (new tooling costs $$, which is why I do so d**ned much test fitting ahead of time!) but I will definitely do them*. I keep a notebook of revisions I'd like to make when/if there's critical mass of changes to be made.

*I'm pretty sure I can fit them into the fret without having to increase the overall size. A size increase will cut down on the number of frets I can fit on the master so the cost would have to go up.


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## miniature sun (May 1, 2005)

I'm splitting off from this thread as I'm planning some changes with my build which is now here...

http://www.hobbytalk.com/bbs1/showthread.php?p=2949325#post2949325

However if I come across anything specific to the etch set then I'll also post it here.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

Hi Paul, are these new, if not I don't know how I could have missed them. Well, I just ordered two sets of both. I took a break from my FS build. After
I found that with some minor sanding of the bottom docking ring and triming
the tops of a few of the wall, the interior fits inside with my floor lighting....:woohoo: When I put in the lighting panels I always feared that the interior would not fit, I was so happy when it did, time for something new.
I have been working on tricking out my Star Trek Medical Tricorder, I'm not even a big fan of the show but this thing just called to me, so......
If you have the time I've been posting pictures in the S/F Modeling forum.


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## Paulbo (Sep 16, 2004)

Hi Kent,

I announced the set about 6 weeks ago and started shipping on July 31. I'm glad you stopped your build when you did so you use the etch. Your floor looks really good - I really like the color you've used for the hexagons.

I've been watching the work you've been doing on the tricorder. Quite the extensive mod! Looking good. I may have to get one of those for myself.


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## teslabe (Oct 20, 2007)

Paulbo said:


> Hi Kent,
> 
> I announced the set about 6 weeks ago and started shipping on July 31. I'm glad you stopped your build when you did so you use the etch. Your floor looks really good - I really like the color you've used for the hexagons.
> 
> I've been watching the work you've been doing on the tricorder. Quite the extensive mod! Looking good. I may have to get one of those for myself.


Thank you Paul for the complements, I'm glad the floor lighting worked as well as it did, I could not have it unevenly lite and I would never use EL panels for so many reasons, but that's just me. As for the color, it's just Kapton tape that I used to hold it all together.... If you'd like to do something like this let me know, I have extra LCD backlight units and would be happy to send some.:thumbsup:
A little off topic, as for the Tricorder, it has been a fun build and today I worked on the audio circuit for the MP4 player and added two more switches for the motor and to switch from Medical to Scientific to Geographic mod. With the MP4 player as the display it's easy to go from one animation to the other and have it look right.....:wave:


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## Paulbo (Sep 16, 2004)

A very slick alternative to EL sheet. I'll have to keep that in mind.

The MP4 player mod is one I've been playing with for my 2001 Space Pod - CVS has them for sale quite often for about $30-$40 so I wouldn't feel that bad flubbing one up. I probably won't use them for my 1:12 pod, but when Scott sends me the parts for the 1:6 unit I'll rework my interior to use them.

I'm looking forward to seeing video of the working tricorder.


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## Scott Yeager (Nov 4, 2009)

*Flying sub WOW.*

I really liked your post,I wondered what value the resistor was for those leds?Has anyone tryed the landing gear reisin kit yet to see if it will hold the weight of the model?I am working on the three man aftermarket kit of the pilots.


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