Estes USS Enterprise #1275, Part 39, Painting The Propulsion Caps

Painting the propulsion caps is a bit tricky. 

On the rim are three raised dots. I decided to mask these, leaving them along with the shoulder ring, a light gray.

This picture shows a marked Scotch tape mask "dot". The next picture shows how it was cut.

To mask the raised dots, I marked a strip of Scotch tape with a wide Sharpie. Wipe off the excess ink with a paper towel.

When punched, you will be left with a perfect circle. Lift it off the dot and hold it on your knife tip.

Place the dot onto the cap while still on your knife tip.

The sides were masked with brown masking tape. Normally I'd use Scotch tape for the mask, but the shoulders of the cap is tapered and Scotch tape doesn't flex. Both brown and blue masking tapes have a little "give".

The back caps were masked using marked Scotch tape.

Here's the caps after the tape was pulled.

That gray might be a little too dark.

The dome color suggestions are copper, bronze or bright orange. I went with Rusto copper.

Thinner, Lighter Centering Rings?

If you don't have .050" thin cardstock centering rings, You can lighten the engine mount a bit by "halving" 5/20 or 20/50 rings.

On the left is a 5/20 thick centering ring.

Start by drawing a pencil line around the outside of the ring.
 

Using a fine razor saw,

Carefully cut around the ring following the pencil line.

Clean up the rough sawn face using 220 grit on a block.

Here's a single ring, split in two.

Maybe not as light as flat white cardstock rings, but still a reduction of weight in the tail end of the rocket.

 

Estes USS Enterprise #1275, Part 38, Paint - Finally!

The contact cement gluing strop was scraped and lightly sanded before masking with brown masking tape.

The underside of the primary hull.

The smaller rectangles and dowels will be glued on after the decals.

The front and rear propulsion caps were also sprayed off the model.

The Tamiya Insignia White spray paint was the lightest gray I could find. It is gray but with a slight beige tone.

The entire lower body assembly was sprayed with Insignia White.

Estes USS Enterprise #1275, Part 37, Sensor Stem Detail, Funky Glue Putty

This works best with yellow wood glue, not white glue - 

Place a drop of glue in the heel of your left hand.

Spread the glue around using your right hand index finger. Let is set up for 20 seconds or so -

As it starts to dry, the glue puddle will gum up.

Continue working the glue into a small ball. Make it as round as possible. Make a few in different diameters.

Let dry overnight.

Drill a tapered hole using a #11 style blade hobby knife. 

This hole should fit onto the tapered dowel.

Here's the sensor stem detail ball in place and shot with a white undercoat.

It's probably too large, but much better than a lopsided glue drop.

Estes USS Enterprise #1275, Part 36, Sensor Stem Detail, Funky Glue Putty

The instructions say to use a drop of glue to simulate the sensor stem detail. 

 

On the right you can see that small drop of glue. I was constantly turning it as it was drying trying to keep it round. Wet glue runs!

I tried three times to get a round drop of glue on the end of the tapered dowel.

I let this part of the build slip until I remembered a fix -

FUNKY GLUE PUTTY!

Here's a picture of my Dr. Zooch Saturn V build. The turbopump exhaust manifold isn't plastic, but formed out of rolled wood glue!

You can form some details out of glue. It's a little like playing with sticky Play-Doh.

I'll explain in the next post . . .

Estes USS Enterprise #1275, Part 35, Repainting The Probe & Secondary Hull Assembly

The recovery probe was sanded and repainted gloss black.

This time all was smooth and glossy.

It'll get a dull coat in a few days.

The second white undercoat showed the fillet bubbles (where the support struts meet the secondary hull slots) were filled.

More fillet bubbles were found.

Glue fillets and another white coat will be needed before I shoot the final light gray. Still, progress . . . 

Estes USS Enterprise #1275, Part 34, Painting The Probe

It's difficult to spray paint the recovery probe, it's over 30" long! It should have been called the "stability extension."

I noticed the upper BT-50 tube dried faster than the low BT-20 end.

It could have been the painting wand locked into the engine mount area. The upper tube was open, I removed the nose cone.

Less air was circulating inside the BT-20 tube.

The probe tube black paint dried rough. I had to sand smooth with 400 grit.