SebastianP Posted January 31, 2006 Share Posted January 31, 2006 Someone appears to have sat or stepped on the box to the VE-1 Elintseeker kit I just picked up from the post office, and because I didn't see any damage (they'd cleaned the box up pretty good), I think I may have lost my right to complain about it... I'm lucky in that only a few pieces have taken the brunt of the damage - the trouble is, at least one of these is absolutely required to build the blasted thing in any configuration... The pieces that are definitely broken beyond all hope of repair include A5 (lower main fuselage half), V4 (port outboard dorsal booster half), and one W15 (booster exhaust bell) - these are way beyond my ability to fix. The rest is basically OK, though - or marked as not for use, which is a relief... Does anyone have spares for these parts that they could find it in their hearts to send me? SP Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SebastianP Posted January 31, 2006 Author Share Posted January 31, 2006 The good news is, I managed to get the A5 part back into its original shape, more or less, using brute force, strong cement, and CA glue for reinforcement. I lost some detail, and I'll have to sand down a bulge or two, but I actually managed to assemble both the front and center fuselage completely without it looking too bad. Yay me. The bad news is, I found a couple of more mangled parts - including one of the "space" intakes. The intake lip part has been completely sheared off from the FOD cover, and is nearly broken in two besides - which means no amount of careful gluing in the world will fix it. Couple this with a missing piece of the dorsal booster shell, and numerous mashed up vernier thrusters, and I've decided that this one will end up in Atmospheric configuration - because that's about all the options I have... SP Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jardann Posted January 31, 2006 Share Posted January 31, 2006 That really is a bummer. I'm sure it can still be built into an interesting model though. Will you still be able to use the large radome without the space boosters? I would jsut go ahead and make it as individual as I can so that it becomes an even more interesting model. Give it a backstory like it's part of a special forces unit or something and give it a killer custom paint job and people will love it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gabe Q Posted February 1, 2006 Share Posted February 1, 2006 Hey, can you post a pic of the broken parts? I might be able to help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SebastianP Posted February 1, 2006 Author Share Posted February 1, 2006 Hey, can you post a pic of the broken parts? I might be able to help. 365304[/snapback] My camera is broken, and the pics it takes would probably be too blurry to see the damage anyway, or I would have posted some. Much of the damage is moot, anyway, since I've mostly built around it - the booster problems were pretty much solved by building it land-based, for example. The big broken pieces were as stated earlier the lower fuselage half - one of the wing pivots had punched through the plastic from the inside, and I think some of the injection stubs from the other sprues had been forcefully pressed into the plastic because it's full of small "bend lines" where the plastic has weakened. Since I managed to fix the important part - the pivot - and the destroyed detail is mostly invisible after assembly, I used it anyway after some consideration. The second big part is the portmost piece of the main dorsal thruster assembly - part of the shell has been literally torn off (the edge is bent to hell, and the missing piece is just that, missing.) This one is the most immediately replacable part, though, since it's included, but unused, in the Super/Strike Valkyrie kits, and I've decided that I *will* get one of those, eventually. The exhaust nozzle for one booster has been slightly flattened, though - it's half-way D-shaped. Since it's not cracked or anything, I may be able to fix it with hot water and gentle pressure. Hopefully. There was just enough left of the intake pieces to complete one closed and one open intake, thankfully from opposite sides, so that's what I did. I'll have to come up with a story reason why the FOD cover on one side is closed, but not the other, but that's a pretty minor detail... Since there was no way to build the correct booster, and I decided against waiting for replacement parts (a month at least - I'm not that patient!) I used some ingenuity and spare pieces from the A and K sprues to build a new tail with extended fins. Basically, I carved off a bunch of plastic from the bits that would make up the folded tail, and butt-joined them with CA to the rear of the center fuselage. I also built the legs to go straight back (none of the spacers nor guide bars). They're not quite perfect, since I got the tail a tad crooked and made the legs to match before I spotted it. What's actually left to do now is the arms, head, landing gear and the cockpit (which I left for last because I could). And the painting... I will eventually build the VE-1 specific booster parts - both leg, arm and dorsal units - though I think I'll wait until I've gotten a Super or Strike Valkyrie, so I'll have replacement pieces. Maybe I'll display them separately? SP Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gabe Q Posted February 1, 2006 Share Posted February 1, 2006 Sounds like you got it all figured out. That's great and good luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kanata67 Posted February 3, 2006 Share Posted February 3, 2006 I'd comment but nobody else seems into making customs that involve blood and gore splattered around the inside of a canopy so I won't Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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