A Galleon sets sail ^_^

Its been quite a while since I posted >.<  Between moving from Arizona to Tennessee, and all the packing, move hassles, my health issues, and then Papa passing away shortly after we got here, it's been difficult getting back into the hobby side of things.   Making it more difficult was not having any space to work, the garage I had been promised as a work area, was(still is) packed to the gills with stuff thats not mine and will take alot of time to work through.

So, I had to replan and turn my bedroom into a mini studio.  Which is annoying since it meant giving up closet space for clothes, but I can keep those in another room.

So, with the tools I was able to bring with, and what I've scraped up on bargain shopping on Amazon( a Makita drill and impact driver set for 100$- worth thier weight in gold)  and a table saw off Craigslist for 50$  I'm slowly getting some tables and shelves built.

But, I decided its been too long since I built something.  And sure I have several kits I could have built, 40k tanks and a couple Warmachine Jacks.  But those aren't exactly challenging.   So I splurged and bought a Colossal off ebay for 81$ with free shipping.  Bought it monday night, got it Thursday afternoon, and finished the assembly last night(Saturday).

Assembly would have taken about 4-6 hours if I had just removed the mold lines and glued/pinned it. But nooo, I had to core out the smoke stacks and throw magnets in it.   To be fair though, the coring bits I have are pretty awesome, they're actually for cutting holes in bottles, but they eat through resin and plastic too.

 Magnetizing the crane arm.  I knew this appendage would be a monster without buying the 50$ foam to transport it.  But, a few magnets, and the jumbo arm can be tucked away.  One pair wasn't sufficient to hold the arm, maybe if they had been rectangular bar shaped.  Two pair still had the leverage popping the arm off.  Three seems almost enough.  But I'll probly drop a 4th set on there, I dont want the arm falling off.

The harpoon is the same problem as the crane-its huge and presents transport issues.  So it got magnets rather than the entire arm.  The rather ugly metal chain from the winch to the harpoon will get replaced when I can find it(its in one of these boxes)  or when I got to Hobby Lobby and spend 2$ to buy some more, the aluminum kind takes paint well enough and wont weigh down the magnet(which actually can support the pewter piece, I jsut dont like how it looks).  Since I cut the ugly chain off I also opened up the achor rings on the metal posts on the harpoon, that will make attaching the jewlery chain easier when I ger to that step.

 The waist is socketed for now to facilitate painting, and I might leave it as its quite stable with an 8mm brass tube for a pin that I seem to have actually managed to hit dead center-not always the easiest task but oddly the soft plastic of the PP resin makes it easier since you can push the tip of a drill bit into the spot you mark and your drill wont wander.   And while not pictured(because you cant see it) the legs are attached to the hip piece, drilled straight though and pinned with a piece of braided wire.

Usually I use a dremel for work like this.  But its been replaced, this little 12v Makita is just awesome.  I got it for home improvement and shop work.  But when the dremel was smoking the resin with those coring bits, I tried the Makita and its lower speed and ergonomics gave me alot of control, as the three bored out smokestacks show(the cores are on the left by the yellow files!).  One was a bit off center, but thats mostly a learning process on my part.   The coring/hole cutter bits are awesome.  I got a set of them, and the variety of sizes had one that was always nearly the right size.  At first I was using them for the magnet sockets,  but getting the center piece out was tedious.  So I switched back to regular drill bits and then used my 5$ set of chinese diamond burrs to grind out the socket for the magnet to fit flush, it was easier.   

The other tool that was very handy were the diamond files, the two yellow handle ones are 180 grit and made short work of all the mold lines.  Even on the resin.  I was concerned after hearing all the bitching and moaning about the PP resin is would just shred and I'd end up needing to sand it with like 1000grit sandpaper to get it smooth.  But it seems most of those complaints are just from inept modelers.

Complaints I do have,  is there were ALOT of mold lines.  It took over 2 hours to get the mold vents and flashing off.  And during the assembly/pinning I was still finding new lines.  So probably three hours total.   There also were some bubble issues.  Not like 'OMG it has the finecaast plague!'  but the winch on the upper claw I had to rework a whole corner and it need a line of rivets now.   The smokestacks,  I just can't get this damn thing to fit flush, which means I'm going to have to spend like another hour or two on assembly essentially sculpting it on, then waiting for the putty to dry.  Which delays painting another day.  And the stupid smoke stack bit on top of the left arm.  That stupid thing doesnt stand a chance without getting pinned as well >.>  And since I drilled it out already Im sure as hell not leaving it off...

I know alot of gamers don't like the idea of spending money on tool before more toys.  But some hobbyists will go for tools before toys.  I'm glad I did, I've had to wait a while on my minis, but the Makita and the diamond bits made the process so much easier.   The diamond bits, the 30 piece set of burrs was 7$ total, works in my dremels and drill, I used 5 or 6 of them just on the Galleon.  The Hole cutter set was 12$ I think, for 10 bits, 1/8" to 1/2".  Worth every penny.   The Makita,  I got as a set with an impact driver for 120$  And its the new LiIon model thats really small.  It cost alot more than any dremel tool.    But I can't use a dremel tool to build a table or hang shelves.  The impact driver assembled my work table too.  So, they're high mileage tools if you can use them for more than one task.