ByYourCommand.net

Alright all you tin cans, here is the start of my 2007 Revell Raider build. I decided to go ahead and light the engines to take advantage of the new parts this kit had to offer.

Let the carnage begin!


Okay, so I'm a Cylon - AND I HAVE A PLAN
My first (and hopefully working) electric circuit plan.


Well plans are made to fall apart . When I went Radio Shack (to impatient to order the stuff online to save a few dollars) they didn't have the correct resistors in stock. I needed 39 Ohm resisters. I found they had 10 Ohm ones so I bought them - hoping that I could wire them in sequence to get 40 Ohms in the end for each light. I looked it up and turns out you can - so cool. At this point "1 Ohm less" per light is something I was starting to care less about. SO - This photo has the gray wires as positive coming into the circuit, then going to the fraking four resistors in place of one per light, the orange wire goes off to the LED.


I found a neat little PC board that could be snapped in half, so I got that for ALL of my resistors. Here is the bottom of one of them. I guess that the need for 16 resistors in place of 4 was sort of a blessing for my learning. I had much more to solder - with my new soldering gun .


Enter the lower hull. You can see the build taking shape.
(YES, for the eagle-eye Cylons out there I have something like 8 colors of wires going. I salvaged them from a clunky Knight Rider light bar that I'm dissecting off-and-on to see how its circuit was designed. All the colors made it a easier for this first wiring project to keep everything going where it should.)


Oh my... what a messy work area. BUT invention, my dear friends, is 93% perspiration, 6% electricity, 4% evaporation, and 2% butterscotch ripple. (Willy Wonka quote LOL.)
P.S. Did you eagle-eyes notice the white Cylon Helmet project at the top right?


IT'S ALIVE! *forgive me, having a Frankenstein moment*
Powered up and glowing Seems like everything is working, nothing exploded... that's good. The AAA batteries are just for testing. I plan on using button cell batteries in the final setup (per THE PLAN).


Both PC boards on the lower hull. Trying to figure out how everything is going to fit inside.


Close up of the starboard side electronics.
OKAY - I'm know it is laughably over-complex, and it could be more compact. But when I close up the hull no one will know.


Now, I need an on off switch. So here it is, to the lower left of it is the hole I cut for it to mount through.
(Note the failed mounting hole above the switch. Turned out the details on the outside of the hull were in the way for the switch to fit right. That's why the Imperious Leader gave us Centurions model putty.)


Whee - having too much fun with my new colored electrical tape and solder. Guess what color of tape I used and win $5 (JUST KIDDING).


Everything tapped up now - ready to start gluing in the boards. If you guessed green for the tape, pat yourself on your Cylon backpack. (Green for the Cylon Empire logo color. )


Testing the lights in the engine assembly. (This photo no flash)


(This photo with flash)


At this point I decided that I'd use the AAA batteries - the button cells were way expensive at the store. This sheet styrene is for my Cylon Helmet... to put on the inside of the mohawk and help hold the two halves together. I decided to use a section of it to make a brace for the AAA's to hang from the upper hull.


*Evil Laughter* THE DREMEL!
The hull will be glued shut and puttied. I need to open up the hole under the canopy to allow access to the AAA pack. The Canopy will be 'loosely' installed in my final model for the day the batteries finally give out.


Cutting complete. Now the AAA pack can be taken in/out with ease. The brace to hang it from flopped... I settled for it just sitting in the center of the ship, that will be good enough. Button cells would be ideal, but the cost of that and everything else - it winds up costing more than the Raider itself, so I am staying with AAAs.


See you next time for "Painting with Cylon-Knight"
Everyone get their Raiders ready!

Dear Build Diary:

I am hoping this weekend the weather will be warm enough to spray paint the hull.

Also, I found one of the engine fins on the living room floor chewed 'to heck and back' by the puppy.
Note to self: ENSURE all parts get back in the box and get ready to do some extra putty work to repair the part.

Oh my...

Is the puppy still with us?

You have indeed made a complex electronics buildup.

But it's working!!!

I'm following this build, that's fo sho.

Yes, puppy is okay

I'll have to work her into the photos next time round. Planning to do alot on the Raider this weekend.

Well... painting is around the corner - I realized I need to close up the hull and putty the edges smooth before I can do the final painting. However, I have to fix an engine part first...


Two sets of two vanes...
Can you pick out the one my dog CHEWED? AAAAAHH!


Sadly, there is no resurrection hub for classic Cylon Raider models. Frak!
Here I have started to rebuild the damaged vertical vane. Pictured next to the other vane it used to look like.

Note the white "dots" ... they are recesses filled with putty so the vanes will be nice and smooth on all sides when painted. Won't look so much like a toy model



Looking good so far - not as perfect as from the factory, but should be good for assaulting a colony or two.


Testing the fit of the re-fabricated vane.


More test fitting.


I got board waiting for the putty and glue to dry on the vane so I started on the display stand.


Look, a Cylon hooptie! haha.
(For any international members that might not know: hooptie is slang for a large older automobile, often in poor condition.)

This is awesome work. I love you spent the time to post this for us to see what you did, and show off the detail. It will look great once your finished.

Thanks GoldCylon, glad to share! Here are some more photos of the build from today:


I have the LEDs all masked off here - getting ready for the painting to begin.


I want to paint the inside of the Raider in spots to prevent any light from leaking out. Here I'm going to put some black down in the area where the LEDs will wind up.


My black paint didn't want to work very well... it is YEARS old
So, I mixed in some gray and it turned a dark gray.


The upper hull with gray paint, again to cut back on light leaks.


This has nothing to do with the build.
It is just a cool little robot toy I have... whos copyright date is 1978. 8)
Recently found him in some spring cleaning. He likes my Raider.


It is nearing time to glue this mean machine shut, so the switch needs mounted. A nice huge glob of hot glue, and we're good to go.


Oh dear. Here is a 2007 kit vs. 1978 kit item.
There are 4 extra holes in my raider. Without the working missiles - the missile bays and trigger holes are just eye-soars - and much LED light will be visible through them.


Solution to the above - cut some sheet plastic and mount inside.


Here are the covered holes. I thought about putting putty into the trigger holes on the bottom of the hull. But there are panel detail lines that run right up to the holes. So filling and sanding that would either create a mess of the detail lines, or result in a funny flat spot where they just end then start back up again. I've decided this is just a model and the covered holes are good enough as is.


Can you smell the glue? Wow, putting the hull together was crazy.
Imagine coating the entire edge of the Raider with a bead of glue and then matching the two halves up in about 20 seconds before things get all gooey. That's what I had to do! AAH

A tip for my fellow Cylons if you build a Raider. It would probably be a good idea to have a second set of hockey-gloved hands around to help with this part... and then some rubber bands ready to wrap around it to hold everything in order till the glue sets up.


Glue has dried, I have putty on one of the wings now. Waiting for it to dry now.

8) Please continue...

Dear Diary...

A minor update - I put all the putty on this past weekend, and sanded it all. I admit, it's not PERFECT (I got tired of sanding and putty work - HA). I am going to say that it is actually very detailed weathering to the wing edges that a Raider would certainly collect after flying around in an atmosphere now and again. (Like that? How about that for being creative?)

Next is painting this bad boy - however it has become VERY windy and storms are in the forecast so spray painting outside is on hold, as such, so is the build. Phooey.

P.S. Another tip for you Cylons that follow in my silver striped boot-steps, don't glue the guns on before you glue/putty the hull shut. They get in the way of filling the seams and sanding pretty bad. The instructions have you put them on very early - like step 1 or 2 - save some effort and hold off on them till you have the seams in the gun area taken care of.

Well

That looks awesome. Hey how about a stealth back one? Anyways great car collection also. PS I like the name "Dale"

Ohh a stealth Raider... heehee... now you're just filling my head with IDEAS!

I got some more painting done yesterday... AND NOW (again) it is too cold to continue - hard freeze expected tonight, and it is rainy/sleeting out too. Frakkin weather! HA


Here is the lower hull - before painting. You can see a bit of silver on it. That is overspray from when the top was painted.


The lower hull painted. Got a good coat on

UPDATE!


Ready to paint the smaller parts. I have them on my "newly patented" spray-paint-okay-no-fly-away folders. Each part has some tape under it so that I can spray and they don't blow way due to the paint, or wind, or carrying the parts back indoors to dry. These parts will be dark gray.


These parts will be silver, like the hull.


The "new" color that I'll be using.


Dark gray color's info.


The silver paints info too, for kicks.


Here we go

Now if your Cylon Alert photo gets a bit of a red glow to the finger nail LOOK OUT!!!

I've not forgotten about my Raider, just too much else to do these days. I did glue on the "cap" between the engine ports. I forget the name of it, now. But it is on.

I need to buy some black paint now for the stand and for detailing. I'll also need a new fine tip paint brush. The ones I've got now are all too well used, I don't think they will be as exact as I am wanting.