1/15th scale Space Shuttle

[kyledehart5]

Astonishing. This is just such an incredible project. Great work.

[mach7]

Very clever and effective!

[406 Silverado]

And the awesomeness continues on......WOW!!! I'm so glad that you are sharing this with us here. Truly amazing project and some really fine work going into it.

[deafpanzer]

WOW! You have been hurting my jaw every time I see your updates. Cause my jaw drops all the way down hitting the desk! Amazing work!

[Whiterook]

Oct 7, 2023 21:07:36 GMT -5 406 Silverado said:

Oh WOW!! What a grand and honorable undertaking. I'll be watching this for DANG sure Christopher!!!

[bradley25mm]

Back to work on the shuttle.

[armornutii]

  We need a jaw dropped emoji WOW....no really I hope my garage stays that clean.
   Beautiful work guys

[kyledehart5]

Jaw dropping is right! Wow

[deafpanzer]

WOW! It is going to be GREAT!!!

[bradley25mm]

Well, the last of the holes have been drilled. The front nose has been sanded and primed. Flip the shuttle over this morning and started filling all seams. The bottom is ready for tiling. My friend Chris is going to be here tomorrow and Saturday. Hopefully we can get a lot of work done. Thanks for having a look.

[chromdome35]

How are you painting this, assuming you are using rattle cans or are you using a full-size spray gun?

[deafpanzer]

WOW! The cut out windshields look far better than the painted on windshield. Like Brian I am very curious about your painting method for this beast too!

[bradley25mm]

Well, both Chris and I have thrown around ideas on how we’re going to accomplish the painting . I think because the heat shield tiles have so many varying shades of black, we could easily get by with a rattle can. We can then take an airbrush and shoot some gray and white on the surface to simulate heat streaks. Possibly just use Tamiya Fine white primer for the rest. The thermal heat shield blankets Have varying shades of white just like the black tiles. Some of them are even stained brown. When Chris gets here this weekend, we will nail down exactly how we’re going to get it painted..
I have all the poly styrene sheets separated by shapes and sizes. Three different sizes. Two of the shapes will go on top of the orbiter and the sides. The largest stack of poly styrene that you see is all black tiles for the bottom. Since every sheet is scored already, this makes it a lot easier to either put a full row down at a time, or individual tiles if we want to mix things up. All of the seams and nicks in the surface have been filled with Bondo, and sanded. Smooth. We are ready for tiling.!!!!

[handiabled]

This is going to look simply amazing with the efforts your group is putting into this restoration

[406 Silverado]

So far......definitely so good Christopher. That tiling is going to be alot of work but I already know that the results are going to be well worth it. At this point I'm wondering how many cans of that primer you're going to go through on this big of a project which is a great choice of paint btw.

[bradley25mm]

Dec 8, 2023 19:45:36 GMT -5 406 Silverado said:

So far......definitely so good Christopher. That tiling is going to be alot of work but I already know that the results are going to be well worth it. At this point I'm wondering how many cans of that primer you're going to go through on this big of a project which is a great choice of paint btw.

I purchased all the paint in bulk, lol.

Christopher

[themongoose]

Nov 29, 2023 20:07:09 GMT -5 armornutii said:

  We need a jaw dropped emoji WOW....no really I hope my garage stays that clean.
   Beautiful work guys

Yeah man this could only be done in his garage!! You could eat off that floor…although not now without tasting like chalk haha we laid down a center chalk line tonight and man that stuff goes everywhere 😅 we used the front center mounting point as our baseline and drew everything from there. All the layout work got done tonight. Tomorrow morning we start tiles 🤯
Here’s a few pics i took tonight 

[bradley25mm]

        The goal today was to plot the locations for gear doors, and hatches. The carbon fiber leading edge is clearly marked now. Chris also plotted out the different angle where the tiles meet. 
     Our goal for tomorrow is to have the bottom tiled. We start in the morning. 

Christopher

[406 Silverado]

[deafpanzer]

Holy smokes! That explains why we can't find those white styrene sheets anywhere now cause somebody got all of it recently!

I am more impressed that you have managed to keep the garage clean while working on it. I am really enjoying this thread very much. +1 for you!

[roland66]

That leaves my mouth hanging open. wow

[themongoose]

Well we were up and it it today coffee in hand! Real work today, not just that pencil and tape stuff 😅
Gel CA was the way to go. We’d roughout a 1/2” line of it and tac down each section. Kudo’s to Harry!!! He made the perfect cuts in these sheets, easy to snap off lines of the stuff but tough enough that individual tiles don’t break off. Makes the tiles a dream to install in rows 🍻







Then it’s rinse and repeat. As we got to each line we made broad cuts so the edges will be straight.






So here’s about how we left it today, almost all the port side done and a good start on starboard.







Christopher will be doing a bunch during the week and then i’ll be back next Saturday most likely for another big round, maybe even turning it back over…

[adt70hk]

That's coming on beautifully. The topside looked fantastic after the restoration.

Keep up the good work.

Andrew

[reserve]

Quite the enormous job you guys are doing great

[kyledehart5]

Very nice progress

[stikpusher]

Superb devotion to the project and attention to detail of the subject. Bravo!

[Steve Zuleski]

That underside tile pattern is wild, impressive work, Gents!

[bradley25mm]

All, 
       More progress on the shuttle. With the holidays fast approaching, and family gatherings, things will slow down for a bit. (Although, I will sneak out in the garage every chance I get). I’ve said before that this has been a collaborative effort. (Chris,Myles, and Harry. Thank goodness Chris is not to for away. I could not have made the progress I have without his help. 
       I’ve never seen anyone put simulated heat shield tiles on so fast. Lol.

Christopher

[kyledehart5]

You guys are amazing. This is such a cool project and it continues to amaze me with every step. Nice progress.

[deafpanzer]

You have nailed it adding the texture to the Shuttle! I was surprised to see how rough the surface was especially its underbody when I saw it few times at the museum in Virginia.