Operation Sucker Punch!

Taking some time off work really paid off; as if I didn’t, I wouldn’t have been able to finish the project within the confines of the AX deadline. Well, I think I could have, but it would have really been pushing things. From the last update, I started attaching the completed pieces of the project to the base. The silos and pipe works were glued onto the base. The tower light was attached and glued into position. The one building was also glued onto the base. Once these pieces were in place, I taped off some border areas and using some elmer’s white glue thinned down slightly with water; painted the watered down glue and then carefully sprinkled some colored ballasts (model train store scenics stuff) The stuff is great for replicating gravel and comes in a variety of colors. The damaged base area was painted with the diluted white glue and more gravel was applied. Once the glue completely dries; a few hours as the stuff dries pretty quickly (I let it sit for at least 8 hours as I’m paranoid). I did an enamel wash with a few colors to give a some dimension to the gravel. I also dropped in some more diluted white glue and added some yellow turf as a weedy undergrowth.

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Water Front Diorama: Clear resin poured for the water area

It’s getting down to crunch time. A little less than a week to go and things are slowing way down because things just need time to cure/setup. On Friday, I mixed and poured clear resin with some blue and yellow dye; but much more blue so the clear resin came out a deep blue. I should have mixed more yellow to get a greener tint, but I may just do some clear green tinting to get that effect. Or I may just leave it as it’s more “anime” effect if I keep it the current blue. I may just run out of time so that it may need to stay blue.

The first step was to apply a silicone sealant around the bottom, I did this last Thursday. I really did not want the resin leaking. The way the thing was put together, there is great potential for leaking; so I’m doing everything I can in precaution. Once the sealant was applied, it was left to set up over night. Friday afternoon, I mixed the clear resin and added the dyes, then poured. There was a little bit of a leveling issue, so I got some spillage from the front; but nothing too bad. I lined an empty MG Sazabi box with parchment paper too. The whole base was placed on top of two rolls of blue painters tape. Again, another precaution that if it does leak, I don’t have the entire base sitting in a pool of clear resin. Excess resin was poured into another mold that I keep around for making moon bases.

The resin I used is an enamel based resin that takes several days to cure. Since the base is too big to fit into my pressure pot, I needed a slow curing resin that will allow for bubbles to escape. The whole thing was then covered with the top of the Saz box to keep dust out while the resin cured.

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