Over the past month or so I have been experimenting with Shapeways.com. I had various models shipped to me so I could gauge how good they were, and if I could sell them.

I altered, perfected, ordered again, until I was confident enough to open up a shop which now sells some of my designs in some limited materials that I know work.

Here are some of the models now available in my shop:

Konami 4.5″ Eagle Winch Pod

Seen in the premier episode of Space 1999: Breakaway, the Winch Pod was used to lift and transport nuclear waste containers. I based mine on the Product Enterprise 12″ “Freighter Eagle”. It is not, in fact, a freighter pod. A freighter pod is a flat pod that is used to carry a number of the nuclear waste containers.

Here it is sitting next to the Rescue Pod that the Konami Eagle came with. Originally I had plastic spanning the top of the pod, thinking the walls on either end would not hold. Originally I was right. But when I modeled the diagonal struts, those walls became very strong.

This version is made of Shapeways “White Strong & Flexible”. It is a slightly grainy material, like a fine sand, but looks great.

I spray-painted the winch barrels in a gray primer. No further painting was needed, I felt. But most people will probably want to weather it with a black or gray wash to make it match the Eagle a bit better, and I’m sure that would work fine.

If you buy this from Shapeways (here) you will find that it is actually a bit too long. I did that on purpose. I had no way to be sure all of these Eagles were identically-spaced. This way, if it’s tight, you can file it down a bit until it fits snugly but not overly tight.

Here is the underneath, painted with a silver spray-paint (rattle can). This could be done better, with a darker metallic gray for the jets, and a straight primer gray for the landing legs. But the bottom is fully detailed.

12″ Scale Stun Guns

12″ action figures like Action Man, GI Joe, Dragon Models, etc, are 1:6 scale. I printed one of these stun guns at 1:6 and it seemed a bit small, so these are more like 1:5 or 1:5.5 scale. But they look pretty good.

I sell them in White Strong & Flexible Plastic material, which is a bit grainy, like fine sand, but strong and it looks good. There are two files, however, if you want a set. Shapeways currently has no way of grouping everything into a single “product” or “project”. They are working on it.

The hand-grips glue in place, and make it so you don’t have to paint them. They look good in either Black Strong & Flexible Plastic, or Black Detail Plastic.

This set comes as two separate files. You need both:

• Stun Gun Bodies (x4)
• Stun Gun Hand Grips (x4)

Here are some of mine, roughly painted. I didn’t take a lot of time with them, and I didn’t clear-coat the white one before painting. That meant I got some paint bleed. But the silver ones worked better.

I have to say, they look pretty good in the hands of an action figure, like my custom Doctor Who Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, (who is holding one, for some inexplicable reason.)

Moon Buggy Scaled for 12″ Eagles

AMT made a very nice 12″ model of the Eagle back in the 1970s. Some years later, ERTL/AMT made a reproduction of it, and now a new version is available using the same molds. Product Enterprise also made a very very nice version of the 12″ Eagle with various different pods. They even sold one set that had a laboratory pod, a tank, and a scale moon buggy. I wanted some of the moon buggies for my 12″ Eagles, so I made one:

Unfortunately, the flat lighting shows NO detail in this photo, of the Strong White & Flexible Plastic version of my moon buggy.

This model comes in two separate files:

• Body
• Wheels and Seat

Here it is with a painted version. I’m not a professional model painter. I did this rather quickly in Testors yellow, and used a fine black sharpie to draw on the body detail. You will do a much nicer job, I’m sure.

But even with my crude lines, this tiny beauty looks great next to my Eagle (This is it before I drew on the body lines):

Here it is with my 4.8″ version and my 2.3″ version:

(I will be making decal sheets for the larger ones. Those were printed on my Afinia H479 printer.)

Cargo Crates for 12″ Eagles

These iconic double-trapezoidal crates are meant as props for your 12″ Eagles. They measure 6mm wide, and 7mm tall. The detail is there, but it’s so small it’s hard to see.

You get a set of four.

 

Cargo Crates for 44″ Eagles

These are also available at 20mm across and 22mm tall. Available in Strong & Flexible (and Polished) Plastic.

I haven’t got these printed at this size yet, but this is the 3D file as seen on Shapeways.

Moonbase Alpha Landing Pads

The 1970s version of the Moonbase Alpha model kit was inaccurate in several ways, but it looked pretty good to me. One inaccuracy is that there were only 3 Eagle launch/landing pads, when there should have been 5. They were also over-scaled to fit the overscaled Eagle models that came with the kit.

I modeled a version of the original-scaled landing pad so you can buy enough to make up the difference. But I also added the detail of the docking tube.

I also modeled a version that was more accurately scaled to the rest of the moon base, which was about 80%.

The cross landing pad is raised slightly to help with painting or decal application.

 

A Note on Materials

Strong & Flexible Plastic is a grainy plastic, and as the name implies, strong, and has some flex to it, especially on thin parts or areas. Good for display, good for priming and sanding and painting.

Strong & Flexible Polished Plastic is the same material put in a sand polisher. This smooths out surfaces but means tinier parts may not print as well. If I’m selling it in my store, it means I’ve tested it on small parts, and I’m very confident on larger parts it works well. Some items may not be available in this material because of the tiny parts I model. For the Stun Guns, you can use the “Print it Anyway” check box. This removes any guarantee from Shapeways, but I did this with the Stun Gun bodies and they look great.

Detail Plastic. This is a plastic for better detail, but some tiny parts will not print in this material. I don’t make many things available in this material due to its limitations.