Starship Modeler Discussion Forums

Very nice.Now put inside the model!

Fiber optics are great for simulating panel lamps and other point sources. For larger illuminated areas, like ceiling lights or light panels, screens, etc. they won't work. A single LED behind the screen will produce a bright spot that is unrealistic even with a diffuser. A light box gives reflectio...

Darkowski wrote: ↑Tue Sep 05, 2017 7:26 pm
I may have found a way, but it will still require 3 circuits. And the wiring will be insane lol

After they drag you off to a padded cell can I have your models?

How many rotating strobe lights do you need. I'm guessing four from you message. It is possible to run four light from each output of your driver chip if they are wired in series, keeping the line current low. This will give you four lights all turning at the same speed. I would vary the positions o...

All LEDS have a maximum of 20-25 ma forward current. Typically a single 1.5 cell may allow you to run LEDs without a current limiting resistor. Using batteries with higher voltages or hooking batteries in series will increase the source voltage and require a line current a limiting resistor. Hooking...

Basically the main areas that model lighting falls into is steady on, blinking and pulsing. The blinking is on/off an is usually used in navigation lights. This can be accomplished simply with a 555 chip. A dual 555 chip will enable you to have two rates of blinking with little increase in board spa...

A single action only allows you to vary the amount of paint that is going on the model. Badger makes cheap beginner spray kits that are like this. A double action allows you to vary both the paint flow and the air pressure at the same time. This can give you some great effects but does require a bit...

Glad your chip is now blinking. Here is the data sheet for the 555 chip, I hope this can help with explaining monostable, astable, and other configurations. The 555 chip is a miracle chip for modelers enabling us to do many different things.

http://www.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/ne555.pdf

I got mine at a welding supply place over 20 years ago. You have to buy a regulator that will drop the 1400 PSI of the tank to a more usable level and an adapter that goes on the regulator that allows you to connect your 1/4" brass air hose line fitting to. T he regulator will also have some so...

In aviation a blue lens on the navigation light looks green at a distance.

I love old school scratchbuilt spaceships like this. The CGI ships while nice, lack a certain "crispness" that only something real can match.

I think you miscalculated your RC time and you have an LED blinking at too fast a rate for the eye to detect. I think your off blink time is about 10 msec. I suggest increasing your resistor and or capacitor values to get a longer RC time. You say you want a strobe effect. Do you want a short, brigh...

In a series circuit the current is the same and voltage varies. The same current will flow thru LED and they will all have the same ( approximate) brightness. the down side is that if one goes they all go, but with correct resistor values they will probably outlast you. In a parallel circuit each LE...

A compressor is a good idea. You can buy cans of compressed air but you will quickly find out that you are using several cans per model and the costs add up. So while a compressor may seem like a lot initially, it will save you money in the long run. Also make sure to get a compressor with an inline...

Without looking at in person and having an o'scope I can only offer this help. The LED is blinking, but at an extremely fast rate due the RC time constant of of your timing resistors and capacitors. Try different values. The LED is blinking, but the duty cycle (ratio of on/off times) has it mostly o...

If I have difficult parts to glue together that will only come meet with me holding them tightly, then I will use a small amount of superglue to hold the parts together tightly until I can glue the whole piece. Other than that the only thing I use superglue for is to fill seams and such.

Try Testors Glosscote but use a test piece first. On rattle cans you don't know how old they are. I suggest investing in an airbrush. You can get a cheap one from Badger to learn with.

A 555 chip isn't always necessary as seen here:
http://www.instructables.com/id/No-CPU- ... ulse-fade/

hoth rebel wrote: ↑Sun Aug 13, 2017 6:16 am So an acrylic wash will mess up the decals?

The water in them COULD loosen decals. I always seal in all my stuff before I start weathering.

I just received them in the mail today and they work great. My problem is the Red and Green LEDs that Blink/Flash are too fast. I want to slow them down so they Blink/Flash 4 to 6 times a minute rather than off and on, which is much faster than I expected. I'm wondering if I need to restrict the fl...

And make sure you are placing them in such a way that they're not overheating as that is death to LEDs. It'll kill a diode faster than overpower it. And how does one achieve that, the way in which the LEDs get placed is pretty much dictated by the model itself? What about securing them in place? I ...

What are you trying to do here? Are you trying to illuminate clear windows by lighting up the interior or light windows by using fiber optic? If you are trying to light up the interior then the first step is to eliminate any light leakage by thoroughly painting the interior black until all light is ...

I'm glad you were able to get all the LEDs lit and keep the current requirements down and still have a great model. I assume that the kit was permanently mounted to the wood base first and you then drilled from the top down. Are there points on the kit for mounting lights? The underside of the base ...

I have heard stories about LEDs used in commercial applications failing after a few months. Particularly the bright white ones. I've heard of ones failing after a few hours of continous use. I believe it has to do with the mixture of rare earths needed to achieve the white light as opposed to the mo...

Awesome!

I like the witch. Reminds me of the Fleetwood Mac song "Rhiannon" which was based on the tales of a Welsh witch.

Since PB will no longer support my 3rd party pics I posted earlier, here they are again.

http://s61.photobucket.com/user/2001shi ... %20shuttle

The idea of a light box is a good idea with acrylic rods to pass light to the surface from below, this is just a big fiber optic. You can bend the rods with a dryer carefully into a bundle that is lit by a single LED. I would have each side of the landing pad and walkway bound together in their own ...

Ok, so there are over 80 lights in the movie, I forgot about the ones around the base. That's a great site for the non-electronics person. I like the mix of serial and parallel circuits. You still have your work cut out for you though. Still, I'd try to see if I could cut down on the number of LEDs ...

A brass tube will be stiffer than a rod, either brass or acrylic. In some cases I have used 2 supports for a model. http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h61/2001ship/Star%20trek%20ships/DSC09911.jpg An acrylic rod gives the nice impression of a spaceship suspended in the air, but doesn't allow power li...

Typically a diode when forward biased (current flowing) drops about .7 v across it. In reality it's usually around .6v. Lets assume you have a 5v power supply capable of supplying 2 amps. To limit your forward current to 20 ma at 5v you will need a 250 ohm resistor. Common commercial values are 220 ...