You can count me in 18bravo for the sponsos, and if possible FLIR pod
Working on it. Hobby Lobby has been out of RTV. I can’t guarantee this’ll work - there are deep recesses for the wheel wells which will make the sponsons difficult to remove without harming the mold. I may be putting out quite a few bucks for something that only works once. The piece will be fine, but not the mold.
Ah. My bad - I didn’t notice - welcome to the forum! And adding the FLIR pod to the mold box isn’t a problem. In fact, it’s a good way to use up extra space.
Welcome aboard Garth.
i thought you were going to 3D print these, anyway good luck and good hunting.
I’m ready to do it. But I’m not going to order the RTV - I just have to wait for a new shipment. Two Hobby Lobbies near me and neither has it in stock. ![]()
Another option for 3D printing. Not my designs, but I have printed some of this guy’s other stuff and they are very nice.
Those would be a great, and possibly less expensive alternative, if they weren’t laughably inaccurate. Key phrase: My take
I tried to wrangle myself out of this a few months ago, but it looks like it’s still a go.
Agreed, I saw those as well, didn’t look right to me.
I can put my files up if you all like, but they’re not finished and accuracy is directly proportional to my 3d modelling skills.
Still thinking actual copies would be best or…
Could anyone 3D scan the originals? There are apps for phones etc to do that.
What I could do to insure better quality and reusability of the molds is fill in the wheel well most of the way, leaving maybe 1/8 of depth so the modeler could see the shape. Then take a thin Dremel router and route to proper depth using a provided depth gauge - piece of Evergreen with a notch in it. ![]()
That would work.
Yep, I was thinking something similar when you first mentioned it. I thought about filling it but just off the edges.
Can they be molded separately?
Each is three pieces. I could mold each separately but that would just drive the cost of materials up, and also increase the chance of problems. Even very slight shrinkage or warpage would make it hell to glue all three pieces together. Casting the assembled sponson is a much better option and makes it much more stable in the mold.
I hear ya,very true.
tell me more about these apps as I have an unassembled original and I might be able to help
Just photogrammetry apps. They take a bunch of photos and create a 3d object out of them. Meshroom-CL is a good one. Just need a bunch of photos with a contrasty background from all angles etc and put them in. Presto magico! a 3d model is created.
would this work if I take a load of pictures and send them to you in an email?
would i be better to construct the sponsons or leave them as parts on the sprue and photograph them that way?
Actually, what I use to do back in the day was fly a scene while taking video and then extract the frames and use those for point cloud creation. Much easier and faster as long as you have a decent camera.
Sending a link from a file sharing service (ie Dropbox or gdrive etc) would be best.
Assembling the parts would obviously reduce the amount of parts and reduce the chance of complications.
Maybe on some sort of a turntable or spinny thing with a consistent clean and contrasty background.

