Lego Star Wars Hoth Base

My Son's 9th Birthday present started off as a discussion in the midst of playing Lego with my boys (9 and 5). The iconic 1976 Star Wars Empire Strikes back movie with the full sized Hoth ice base and hangar set is a favourite of most 35-45 year olds who now have young boys! So I decided to create one for my 9 year old's next birthday based on a set of design requirements from my son of course!

The main design requirements were as follows:

1. Must be able to actively play with the set (needs to be rugged and light)
2. Had to fit under my son's bed for storage
3. Needed to be able to access all areas easily
4. Set had to be able to be added to with Lego parts as the boys imagination evolved
5. Needed some working parts (doors and Ion cannon) and LED lights
6. Finally, it needed to be representative of the Hoth main scenes from the movie:

    a. Luke in the Hoth wampa cave
    b. Luke in the medical bay and bacta tank
    c. Leia and Han in the Command centre
    d. Main hangar for snow speeders
    e. Imperial attack in the shield generator and base

The master design document!

I used 30 x 20 x 3/16 inch white foam board to construct the Hoth Base hanger. I simply taped the sections together without gluing since the later foam stages would hold everything in one piece easily. The hardest part was to create the 2 sliding blast doors inside a frame.

The entire hangar was mounted to a single 20 x 30 inch board as the base. I wired up a set of small blue LEDs in series with 1K resistors and run back to a simple push button switch and AA battery pack. The battery pack was hidden in a compartment (accessible from under the playset).

I added the shield generator from circular bits of foam board and the Ion cannon base from a cut down plastic drink cup. Cutting up a large Lego base sheet, I glued the parts into the Hoth Base using contact cement. Next I used my favourite building material - expanding foam! Any type works but I used "Great Stuff" for windows and space filling. The key is to use a little as it expands 2-3 times its volume.

After the foam dried, I took a long exacto blade and trimmed the entire set into snow banks and ice covering the Hoth Base including around the top and inside the hangar in some sections.

The foam makes natural crevasses and hollows which are perfect for snow and ice scenes. I used a large circular ice cream tub for the structure of the ice cave at the rear of the set.

The Ion cannon was made from a Lego planet that I stuck thin strips of tape around to create the look of structure and detail. Parts of Lego were used to finish the cannon muzzle and handle. Blast doors were painted various shapes of grey acrylic paint and I used blue acrylic to tint the nooks, crannies and crevasses on the foam structure. The Ion cannon base was painted with grey plastic model enamel paint to avoid chipping and flaking later on. Finally the entire foam was painted using white acrylic paint (note - acrylic paints doesn't stick well to any uncut sections of expanding foam so its key to trim everything).

The final effect with the blue LEDs, Ion cannon and shield generator.

 For the details on each side (since this was designed to be a well used play set rather than a model or diorama) I made up the Hoth command centre and radar screens. The large red button on the wall is the LED on/off switch. All of the base walls were painted with a white Beauti-Tone textured paint (Flex-Rock) normally used for interior decorating. This paint is thick and can be used to create rough rocky (or ice in this case) surfaces.

The whole base cost around $35 and took approximately 20-30 hours to build and finish.

- 3 1/2 Foam sheets (20 x 30 inch) - $3.99 each
- Flex-rock paint (1/3 tin used) - $15
- LED set and battery box - $6.50
- Old 16 x 16 inch Lego base (cut up)
- Expanding Foam (2 cans) - $4.99 each

The final base all set up with figures, imperial troops and snow speeder. Ready for a 9th Birthday.

Ju-87B Russian Front

As usual I bought the kit then set about hunting for an image to create a diorama out of. The image below is a Ju-87B1 of II StG1 somewhere on the Russian Front getting rearmed in its dispersal bay. Not sure how urgent that unit was as the armorer is taking it easy lying down on the wing!

My Version

I didn't have a 1/72 scale horse lying around so I made do and the background I used isn't blue sky so the finished diorama looks a bit different.

I used the Airfix JU-87 B set (set # A03030A) for this diorama. As usual I cut open the canopy supplied (even though it is too thick for 1/72 scale) and scratch built up the inside cockpit walls and added tin foil seat belt harnesses. I brush painted everything as usual (no airbrush yet) but then used a fine grit paper to sand away and achieve some basic weathering (excessive weathering bugs me since aircraft rarely lasted long enough in WW2 to become weathered!! yet it seems to be a norm for modelers these days)

I started the diorama on wood block with old wall trim as relief.

Lashings to plaster Paris created the snow banks for the dispersal.

Old dried hydrangea blossoms painted white substitute for russian birches and I used the pine tree kit from Woodland Scenics. Additional scrub and trees were added later.

The 2 amigos re-arming the aircraft were originally Airfix RAF ground crew figures re-painted although this set is made from a very soft polyethylene or similar plastic and is awful to trim and sand (stick with resin or harder ABS mix plastic). Still, they are 1/72 scale after all.

I painted the plaster snow with tints of blue since thats what snow looks like in shade areas and mixed plaster with brown paint and weathering pastel to create muddy snow. I then used baby talcum powder for the top covering although it made the diorama stink like perfume! Overall the effect worked well and I shot pictures with a Canon T3i DSLR camera outdoors in natural sunlight to get the right shadows and snow glare.

TBF-1 Avenger Ditching in Sea

This is the image that started off the diorama of a TBF-1 Avenger that had just ditched next to its carrier during a failed landing.

For the kit I used the 1/72 scale Academy TBF-1 Avenger set which is pretty decent. The panel markings are (as usual with this scale) too deep and pronounced and the glass is rather basic but I enjoy scratch building from what I have. I recided to have a shot at a cast polyester resin diorama because all the other ditched Avenger dioramas I've seen used plaster or a thin coat of resin for effect. I wanted to be able to see through the water form the sides and beneath.

My first scratch task was to cut apart the canopy to create an open pilot section and rear radio operator/ gunner canopy hatch. The effect is always offset since the plastic is too thick and I don't have a vacuum form table to make new ones. I also still paint with a brush and haven't yet graduated myself to an airbrush over the past 30 odd years (one day maybe) and so the model isn't as good as it could be with. I cut out the flaps and painted the ribs rather than using sprue (which I probably should have done).

I used the Castin' Craft polyester resin with catalyst agent (32 oz/ 946ml tin at about $45). I had to do a fair bit of research on the resin having never used it before and was rather nervous dunking my finished avenger in globby plastic! You have to be 100% accurate with the resin and catalyst amounts. I created a plastic tray with 1/16 inch plastic sheet taped together (so I could pull the sides off and release the mold easily). Then I made 4 pours of about 1/2 inch as follows:

1. Initial 1/2 inch layer and leave to set for 30-40 minutes

2. Insert Avenge in resin then pour 1/2 inch layer #2

3. Wait 30-45 mins and pour 1/2 layer #3

4. Wait 30-45 mins and pour 1/2 layer #4

You can see that layer lines have formed meaning that I left it too long between pours and should have waited only 25-30 mins. Bubbles in the mold were not a problem since I wanted lots of them to be realistic. I also dropped in a few drops of blue and green food dye to tint the water (do this at the mixing stage before adding the catalyst to the resin and before pouring).

As can be seen from the view beneath, I couldn't get the base plastic off so it rather looks like an ice sheet (unintended). I broke off the undercarriage and door flaps and left in the #2 layer to give the effect of them sinking.

 After everything was dry (after about 1-2 days it is hard as glass) and then started sanding down the sides with a rough paper and ending with a fine 600-800 grit cloth which really starts to make the sides clear (I didn't sand the top or base). I then painted on the waves using Liquitex High Gloss Acrylic Gel which you can get from an art store. I painted the white foam using acrylic artist paint then applied another thinner coat of Liquitex.

I masked the resin and sections of the Avenger and used a gloss spray lacquer to shine up areas where the nose and wings would be wet from waves (a dry matt model doesn't look right dunked in the sea!). For the figures I used an old Airfix RAF crew set and painted in USN pacific uniform (not the best figures as they always reduce the diorama realism).

P-40 HS-B Desert Crash

During WW2 a P-40 crashed in the Egyptian desert only to be found 70 years later in 2012 by a polish oil worker. Human remains, presumed to be the P-40 pilot Dennis Copping were later found a few miles away as he likely decided to walk out not knowing the nearest settlement was 200 miles away . I decided to create a diorama of the aircraft as it was such a poignant aircraft recovery story and similar to the B-24 Lady Be Good find in the 1950's and testament to the lonely sadness of war and the very young pilots who died.

My version

The challenge for this model was the extensive clean sandblasted weathering of the aluminum aircraft skin. The sand had taken the paint off in patches and in some cases revealed the aluminum green undercoat and faded RAF roundels. The crash had ripped off the entire propeller and spinner as well as crushing the radiator entirely, exposing the engine.

I used a standard 1/72 scale Airfix Curtis Hawk 81-A-2 (kit number A01003) which is obviously the wrong type as the real P-40B. I cut off the bottom of the entire radiator up to the wing root and scratch built an engine complete with pistons, struts and dangling pipes and then used tin foil for the damaged aircraft skin ripped up during the landing as well as the open radio compartment. I built up the upper air intake with putty and sanded away the 2 cowling guns that the 81-A-2 had and flattened the shape for the P-40B intake.

P-40 nose showing tin foil as crumpled and ripped radiator cowling. Scratches of dried grey paint were used as debris under the engine block.

Initially I painted everything in Testors aluminum enamel (by brush!) and then added several layers of aluminum green, then tan and brown, each time, sanding it back down to the initial silver layer with an 800 grit paper. The canopy was painted and then sprayed inside with paint to mimic sand fogging. Using a tiny drill, I hollowed out each of the exhaust pipes and used a metallic bronze enamel to add rust and heat discolouring.



P-40 diorama showing rudder and elevator ribs painstakingly cut and filed out (they still need to be thinner!)

The longest task by far was to cut out, thin and sand the rudder, aerilons and elevators which were fabric covered on the real P-40 and had been sand blasted away in the crashed aircraft. The real challenge was to get the spars thin enough for realism but I think they are still too thick (there probably an etched set available for a high price, but I wanted to scratch build the entire set). The prop (from Quickboost) was the only after market resin part (having somehow lost the original spinner and prop during the build (3 months).





 The base of the diorama was on plywood with a coat of plaster paris for the rock base (smoothed out using a popsicle stick for wind blasted rocks) and painted a flat pink/grey. I used Tamiya weathering pastels (tan and mixed with white plaster paris powder) for the sand which is actually much more yellow in the real shots. Overall as satisfying build and could have weathered it for months to come had I not finally decided enough was enough.