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Thread: Battlestar Galactica Mod

  1. #71
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    Here's a quicky update:

    Work continues on the LCD panel. Placed it on the case with the side panel for positioning.


    Testing for clearance...


    After that I decided to get the smaller lettering glued on.


    A closeup shot (don't mind the mess, the letters will be painted):


    Here's a shot with the protective sheet peeled off. I screwed up by spilling CA glue all over the front of the panel.
    Now I got some polishing to do!


    A couple shots with the ccfl's behind it. Looks like the opaque black acrylic isn't as opaque as I thought. Will have to
    cover the back of it with something to keep the red from showing through.




    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

  2. #72
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    Another quicky update:
    Got the foil tape from my friendly neighborhood Pep Boys. Only $3.49 for a 2" x 10' roll.
    Applied it to the back side of the panel and cut away the area around the lettering holes.



    Here's a shot from the front with the tape applied. No more red showing through! I also hooked up
    the LCD screen to make sure it worked, and threw on the landing bay for grins and giggles. :wink:


    That's it for now. Will have another update for ya Sunday night. Til then!
    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

  3. #73
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    Quote Originally Posted by The boy 4rm oz View Post
    ........................................
    BLOODY FANTASTIC. Man this mod is absolutely fantastic, keep up the awesome work. +rep
    Thanks man!

    Quote Originally Posted by Tech-Daddy View Post
    in-freaking sane....

    everything has already been stated Bod.... you certainly dont need me telling you how fantastic this baby looks.... but I will anyway!

    Truly, an awesome and inspiring piece of work. You are doing a consistently excellent job. Way to go!

    -=TD
    Thanks TD! Your Deuce project is coming along quite nicely as well. Being a hot-rodder as well I can really appreciate the work you are doing, especially the paint work and flames. Can't wait to see it all finished up!
    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

  4. #74
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    Ok, it's Sunday night and, as promised, here is another update!

    I revised the blast door setup yet again, in an attempt to make it even simpler. Trying to synchronize two servos
    at varying speeds proved more difficult than I thought, and produced inconsistent results at best. So I have returned
    to using just one servo, and having it control both rollers. Since I already have one servo connected directly to the smaller
    roller, I will just need to add a small pulley to it, and a long o-ring to attach the larger roller. The speed difference will be
    accounted for in the pulley sizes.

    Another alteration is to simplify the path that the door has to take. I had originally intended for the door to travel towards
    the front, and make a 90° turn into the hard drive cage where the rollers were located. That was adding too much drag, and the
    door was getting caught up at the turn. So my solution is to hack away part of the hard drive cage and mount the roller
    closer to the window, thus shortening the path.

    So here is the roller, and approximately where it will be relocated to:


    After cutting away part of the hard drive cage, I took two pieces of aluminum angle bar and sandwiched
    them together, with the HD cage in the middle.


    Using pop rivets in a staggered fashion, I fastened them together. This will provide a good solid mount for
    the cut-down roller holder.


    Then I pop-riveted the holder into place, utilizing the holes I drilled prior to riveting down the angle pieces.
    Believe it or not, I actually thought ahead for once!


    Once I get the second roller in place, I can measure the distance between the two and see how large an o-ring or belt I will need.
    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

  5. #75
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    Another quicky update:

    Worked on making a small pulley for the small roller last night. I measured out a circle about 1/2" diameter on 1/4" thick acrylic and cut it out.


    I stuck a bolt through it, then using the ol' drill press, I proceeded to file it down to size. This makes a perfect circle.




    Then I made the channel of the pulley with a round file.


    Next up, gluing it to the roller, and adjusting the servo mount.

    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

  6. #76
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    Moving right along, I'm getting things wired up. Starting with some led strings, one for the dummy lcd screens in the cluster,
    and another for backlighting the medallion.

    First, I printed some BSG graphics onto transparency paper and cut them out. This particular transparency
    paper has an adhesive backing.


    Stuck them onto the screens. These leds will be white.


    I forgot to take a picture of the leds wired up and in place behind the screens. I will post that and a shot
    of it all lit up this weekend.


    For the medallion, I drilled six holes behind the bird to fit the leds. These will be red.


    Then I soldered them all together in series.


    For the medallion base, I routed out some material to make room for the wiring. This will all be hidden
    behind the bird, which will be painted.


    Here's a shot of the leds placed in the routed area. I drilled a hole through the base at the bottom
    for the wires to feed through.


    Once I get it all soldered together and tested, I will use some hot glue to keep everything in place,
    then sandwich it all together. Then I can paint it!
    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

  7. #77
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    Thanks, everyone!

    I've been working more on the led strings, and did some testing. I decided to do all six led's in series,
    with a 10ohm resistor. Here is a shot of the medallion string soldered together and in place:


    Since I haven't painted the bird yet, I threw some masking tape over it to give you kind of an idea of how it
    will look with the backlight. So disregard the faint bleed through! Although it does show you where the leds are. ;-)


    And here is a shot of the other dummy LCD screens all lit up:


    Starting to come together!

    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

  8. #78
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    I've been working on more led's. This time I'm wiring up the running lights that will blink sequentially
    on the landing deck. Now I'm no electronics guru, I think I've mentioned that before. About all I'm good
    for is determining positive from negative, and basic soldering. So since I can't make up a custom circuit
    that will make the led's blink in sort of sequence, I found one online!

    Here is the landing deck as I am drilling holes for the leds.


    A closer up shot of the front.


    Qkits sells these led kits in many forms. This one in particular has 15 leds in a row that blink sequentially from the center out.


    The kit is really quite simple, it just requires you to solder all the components onto the circuit board.


    After about an hour of soldering, I got all the pieces mounted, with the exception of the leds. I will be
    replacing the red 5mm ones with white 3mm leds. The resistors in the kit should make them a bit dimmer, but thats ok.


    Now obviously, I won't be soldering the leds onto the circuit board, as they have to be relocated to their
    respective places on the landing deck. To accomplish this, I will be using a spare floppy drive ribbon cable.
    It has 34 wires, but I only need 30. So I simply slice off the remaining 4.


    I soldered one end to the kit's pcb where the led's would have gone.


    Done!


    Now with the led's in place, I can cut the individual wires to length and solde them up. This kit has 15 leds,
    and runs the lights from the center out. So I will be putting the first led up front under the power button, then
    the rest down both sides so it will blink in pairs into the landing bay.


    I also made some rails out of styrene to hold the pcb underneath the landing deck. You can see them in the last pic.
    Hopefully I can finish this thing up tonight and do a test run.

    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

  9. #79
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    Ok, finally got the vid up! So, withour further ado, here is the testing of the running lights:

    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

  10. #80
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    Default Re: Battlestar Galactica Mod

    Well, I'm trying to button up the whole front panel this week, so I test fitted the small 2.5" lcd's into their pocket frames. I needed to figure out what to do with the top to cover the opening. The screens give off some heat, and they have small flat cables coming out of the top, connecting them to their control boards, so I couldn't just make a lid and cover it all up.

    So I decided to make some vent covers out of one of the stock mesh grills that came with the stacker case.


    Here are all three cut, with areas cut away for cable clearance.


    Installed.


    A close up of one.


    Also, the cables were an ugly orange color, so I colored them all black with a sharpie.
    Honey Roasted Peanuts Ingredients: Salt; Artificial honey roasting agents; Pressed peanut sweepings.

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