Blackadder's Lucius Pattern Reaver

[Kyban]

My remarks regarding the PR movie were meant primarily to amuse; I actually found the technical scenes and the human interaction plausible and informative. The anime-like action scenes not so much; it was just too unbelievable but that's just me, I require a modicum of credibility in the movies for me to enjoy them.

The biggest problem with Pacific Rim is the time period in which this is all suppose to happen. Right now western civilization is edging close to the death throes of its existence. I see acceptance of mediocrity, indolence and outright parsimony and corruption de rigueur.

I found most unbelievable Guillermo del Toro's Pollyannaism that our Western Democracies would have the wherewithal to meet any of the real world challenges present today and triumph let alone one of the magnitude presented in the movie. The real threat to civilization surrounds us every day and is readily apparent to those who bother to look.

Whoa! ease up Blackadder (smiley face)

I never said it was bad movie, just over hyped . The current state of our civilization is pretty depressing but we can improve it, one step at a time.



What kind of materials do you use/where do you get them for projects like this? I've found blank cardstock for credit cards works really well for cheap plasticard but haven't found much for the bigger stuff. I'd imagine you've got a pretty good little shop set up for hobby stuff as well.

[Blackadder]

I'm going to put a curb on my depressing alarmist rhetoric and concentrate on the business at hand.

For the scale acres of titan surface area I rely on wholesale styrene outlets found in most industrial parks. I fortunately have a small one within five miles of my home and a much larger one about 20 miles away.

For specialty styrene i.e. tubes, strips, rods, etc I still have to frequent hobby stores. I have over the years built up quite a stock of these items so it only costs me about $20 bucks a month to replenish dwindling stock.

I'm still petitioning Evergreen to have a restocker visit bi-monthly and set me up with a display rack but I don't see that happening in the foreseeable future.

I'm told that Real estate signs are styrene and can be bought at Home Depot and the like but I haven't seen them.

IBM computer ribbon cartridges work great, I built my Titan Hunter out of them but the plastic is thick 2,0 to 3,0 MM thick and tougher than hobby styrene so you have to use a saw to cut them. The best part of using cartridges is they are molded rectangular cases so they make for extremely strong hulls for tanks etc.



The hull and track wells are cut from the cartridge angles already formed in the model above.

[Blackadder]

Repetition:

I enjoy scratch building, the first piece you make is always an adventure, how can I do this ? Can I do this? Seems like its working. By George that not half bad......

All the while you're building in the back of your mind, "It would be easier/faster/better if I did it another way."

So the next time you build the same item things usually go better, fall into place, short cuts abound. Invariably it doesn't turn out as good as the first.

By the time you make six of the dimned things yer ready to chuck the whole project.

[url]http://i.imgur.com/wXv6iaa.jpg[/url]

[Blackadder]

Insidious Forge World:

You have to hand it to the FW designers, they are artists. At a casual glance one would say that the APOC Rocket Launcher array has a set back bevel in the front above the nose cones about 45°to the perpendicular.

I suspected that that was not the accurate angle so I cut my angle at 45° slightly forward if the position I decided would be the best in relation to the rocket pod tubes. It did not look right surprise, surprise. No the actual angle is less; I decided on about 42 to 43° looks better. I'll make all the rest at this angle while I think on this, the angle may be even less.............

[url]http://i.imgur.com/TTJiJjX.jpg[/url]


Judging by the photo I just took.

[url]http://i.imgur.com/63AtObw.jpg[/url]

[Blackadder]

They're Okay They're Okay.....

Thats what I have to keep telling myself.

Well the basic rocket pods are done I just have to detail them after I determine the final length.

[url]http://i.imgur.com/7y7TZnD.jpg[/url]


Right now they stick a lot higher that the floor of the carapace but once the top is skinned, it should be quite a bit thicker only the upper bevel of the pod should protrude above.

[url]http://i.imgur.com/LIkgG2P.jpg[/url]


The centerline pod will be the bevel height higher than the side pods as it appears now and the top two rows of rockets on the center pod will be capable of forward 'line of sight' launching.

[url]http://i.imgur.com/9JnBxRA.jpg[/url]


In all the upper level of the carapace should be a busy place, not a show boat but eminently practicable.

They're Okay They're Okay.....They're Okay They're Okay.....They're Okay They're Okay.....

[Nurglitch]

I'm sorry but I am willing to suspend my disbelief only so far i.e. how does Superman or Hancock fly? Some sort of controlled Flatulence? The Hulk bounds thousands of meters but still he is jumping, but where does he buy pants that can stretch dozens of inches in all directions when I have to loosen my belt and fly button after a Thanksgiving meal? How do transporters work without receivers? Why do light saber blades end at a meter in length? Ironman lands with a ground shaking thud yet his secretary (Gwynneth Paltrow![Blackadder giving his Homer S. drool.........])carries said suit around in an attache case? These inconsistencies bother me but not enough ruin the movie.

To me it was like watching one of those Saturday morning robot anime cartoons. The laws of physics were completely suspended for example; five helicopters cannot lift let alone transport thousands of tons of robot. Dropping said robot for any appreciable height would create less of a fighting machine than a pile of twisted rubble. Tossing said robot a couple of kilometers would destroy it even further.

Case in point; the Titanic broke in half because of the real world stresses on its hull could not sustain the gravitational stress forces it was subjected to merely by having its stern lifted out of the water but here we have Gypsy Dancer dragging a (out of scale) ship through the streets of Hong Kong and using it like a baseball bat BTW Gypsy was only 260 feet tall, in no way were the scales commensurate............the monster shown in the beginning of the movie poised in the skyline behind the Golden Gate bridge would have to be a mile tall for that image alone to be accurate! The list goes on and on. Going to the biological limitations of large scale animals an elephant cannot lift more than two feet off the ground at the same time in the simple act of walking and will sustain fatal injuries if it falls down a small embankment but these creatures are frequently being tossed thousands of feet without sustaining any physical damage.

Then we have the dubious political, economic and technological inconsistencies. Our present Governments could never be able to get their acts together for the mutual good to sustain such a retaliatory project, nuclear power robots could neither be produced nor piloted without sanctions from the NRC, EPA, and OSHA; environmental impact studies that would take dozens of years to get approved etc. Large animals so few in number could not be slaughtered without protests from PETA, Green Peace and the Humane Society. And the ALCU would castrate the Government for destroying the aliens and their dimensional tunnel without due process.

The USA has a problem in putting up a 1000 mile long chain link fence along its southern border; it took ten plus years to replace the World Trade Center but you are expected to believe a 30,000 mile long (conservative estimate) skyscraper tall retaining wall be built around the entire Pacific Ocean! No I have difficulty rationalizing how my titans can walk let alone maintain a suitably stable gun platform. The antics of the PR robots suspend reality. Cognitive estrangement in fiction involves using a person's ignorance or lack of knowledge to promote suspension of disbelief I.E. Saturday morning cartoonzzzzz or in this case 'Pacific Rim.'

So, you're oddly unfamiliar with the kaiju/super-mecha genre as a whole?

[Blackadder]

Having only seen the movie once (Sufficient thank you) I can't say I'm completely conversant on th "Kaiju/Super-Mecha genre" (There are more?) but I do have a working knowledge of Physics, Mechanics and Biology. This would have been a great movie were they to gear it to a sophisticate adult audience. The technology of the inner workings of the 'Mecha' I found interesting and plausible. The two pilots linked together and subsequently through servos to the appendages of the vehicle made sense. What did not work is the time period of the movie, without getting into the Political and Economic doldrums currently gripping the industrial World the unbelievable scale of the constructs; offensive and defensive especially for this time period, and the totally unbelievable agility, durability and reaction time of both the Mecha and the Kaiju stretches credulity way beyond the breaking point.........

[Blackadder]

Rocket Array Elevation/Rotation Mechanism Redux:

Initially when I had the 'Pan's Pipes' array I planned to have the rocket launcher totally hidden beneath the carapace skin.

[url]http://i.imgur.com/UN1jr22.jpg[/url]


As such it would have been relatively easy to make a simple retract/rotation system in the confines of that area but with the current ambition this array has engendered I was forced to come up with a more sophisticated system.

Below is the beginnings the new improved hydraulic jack system I came up with.

[url]http://i.imgur.com/kPgjut2.jpg[/url]


This system hopefully will be compact enough to be confined in the shallow channel below the array and keep the frontal view of the Reaver analogous to the Mars Pattern frontal elevation in overall height.

[Blackadder]

First the Mechanism:

Ye Gods! how could anything so simple cause so much consternation?
I have been wracking my poor gray matter for a viable solution to raise the pod out of the carapace; levers, scissors, screws, etc....... when suddenly BOING! Hydraulic jack lifts such as were seen in gas stations before they specialized in just selling gas.

The mechanism is disturbingly basic:

[url]http://i.imgur.com/i3jeiOc.jpg[/url]


Just a tube through a plate with a collar glued on both ends.

Then a sleeve to slid over the collar which will be glued to the plate the sleeve that is.

[url]http://i.imgur.com/AFcgKN0.jpg[/url]


The mechanism plugs into the recess hole in the original resin weapon arm support.

[url]http://i.imgur.com/wC7EBKu.jpg[/url]


I may secure this with a rare earth magnet ultimately but the fit is snug for now and will allow me to continue the detailing of the carapace pod recess.........

The rocket pod in action coming up............

[Blackadder]

Open the Pod Bay Doors Hal..............

Geez; how far off base was Arthur C Clarke with that prediction!

No 'Big Wheel' Space Station, No Colony on the Moon, No Hydrocephalic Stewardesses,

No frick'n Pan Am even for Crissakes!

But hey we do have bankrupting Social Welfare Programs up the Whazoo and free cell phones, thats something I guess.............

Rocket Pod Lift and Rotation in Action:

So even though nothing is glued together a sequential series of images showing the pod emerging from stowed to firing position:

Queue up the Waltz..............

[url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdrqeAKNLM8[/url]

[url]http://i.imgur.com/z2OuRvx.jpg[/url]


[url]http://i.imgur.com/I9hqJPv.jpg[/url]


[url]http://i.imgur.com/bHVFUR8.jpg[/url]


[url]http://i.imgur.com/fDSZEm9.jpg[/url]


Ballistic Launch Mechanism next.