Part V Base and electronics

If you recall, from my first post, this is the base that the Y-wing model kit comes with.

And once assembled, the model would sit on the base like so.

The problem with this base is that the curved arm is plastic and flat, leaving nowhere for wires to run to the model for lighting.  So I'm going to be changing how the model is supported by the base.  I want to use a thin brass tube to support the model as well as run my wires through.  There's really no way to support the tube in the kit base itself, as the area in where the tube would connect to is very thin and no support.  So I got a piece of clear acrylic square rod that fits in between the 2 center base columns.

And a piece of 1/4" brass tubing.

My plan is to drill a 1/4" hole into the acrylic rod for the brass tube to go in to give more support.

The first thing I did was cut a small piece from the acrylic rod to fit in the base. Because I do not want the brass tube to go all the way through my acrylic piece, but I do need the wires to run all the way through, I'm first drilling a slightly smaller hole all the way through the acrylic, then drilling a 1/4" hole almost all the way through, creating a sort of stair step.  This way, the brass tube can be inserted in for support, but will stop at the smaller hole.  You can see what I mean in the following pictures.

So I then glue my acrylic square into the base of the Y-wing model.

And you can see here how there's a hole all the way through for all of my LED wiring.

I then painted the base with primer, which because of it's color, I'm going to keep as my base coat.

And you can see how the base now supports the brass tubing.

And from drilling out the hole in the bottom of the Y-wing in my last blog, you can see when it's attached to my brass rod how the Y-wing will be in a slanted upward position, slightly tilted to the port side.

So now that I've figured out how I'm going to attach the model to the base and run my wires, it's time to figure out placement of my electronics and how they will all fit inside the base.  This includes my  5v USB pwr board, an Adafruit 3.3v Trinket board (controlling the LEDs),  my Sound FX Mini board (for sounds), my 2.5W Audio Amplifier (for powering the speaker)  the speaker itself, main pwr button and 3 micro buttons for my effects.

So this is the placement I'd like to put them in inside the base.

Knowing where I'd like my buttons to go for the effects, that will be the first area I will work on.  So I start out by carefully cutting away around the little square areas in the front of the base that I would like to be the buttons.

The buttons fit nicely inside the cutout area.  Then the plan is to take the square piece that was cut away and glue it to the button, to 1) conceal the button, and 2) look like part of the base.

So with the button areas done, and knowing where the boards will be placed,  it's time to paint the base with some black wash before I begin attaching my electronics.

Now I need to cut away plastic to allow for the boards to sit inside the base, as well as remove some plastic on the sides for the USB plugs to be able to be accessed.

With all the plastic cut away, it's then time to start attaching the boards and buttons.  Starting with the FX buttons, I secure them into place with hot glue, which I will be using to secure all of the electronics.

Then it's on to the main power button for the whole base, which is hot glued on either side, as well as a styrene rod glued between the button and the model for extra support from the button being pushed...

the USB power board...

the Adafruit Trinket board...

then some soldering of the positive and ground wires from the USB power supply to the Trinket...

the Audio FX Mini Soundboard...

then soldering of the positive and ground wires of the soundboard as well as the 3 white trigger wires from the sound board to each of the three activation buttons...

And finally hot gluing the 2.5W audio amplifier into place.

And after soldering all remaining wires, a power up test and everything appears to be working fine.

So with all of the electronics in place and working, I then attach the cut away button from the base by super gluing them to the push buttons.

And here are all 3 buttons glued down and working as my sound and lighting activation buttons.

And a little sample of what the buttons will do.

And the very last thing I do is paint my brass rod with primer and a coat of flat black.

And the base is now complete.  All that's left is detailing and weathering the Y-wing model itself and running the LED wires through the brass tube and soldering those into place in the base.




So stay tuned.  More to come...