BUILDING THE ID4 ALIEN ATTACKER STUDIO SCALE MODEL

Greetings!! Once you open your box, you will find the following components making up the ID4 Studio Scale ALIEN ATTACKER: 1.) The Main hull. This is cast as one piece. it has been rotocast to allow for a hollow interior. This allows for 1.) a lighter finished model and 2.) access to the interior for LED intallation. 2.) The Pod. Again this is ONE piece. It is cast SOLID from the highest grade urethane resin. 3.) The gun pods. Two highly detailed one-piece castings. 4.) The canopy bracers. This will need to be trimmed with a dremel. 5.) The canopy lens material (a template is provided to help guide your trimming 6.) Front mandables (set of 2) 7.) Set of struts that connect the pod (this is 6 separate pieces) 8.) Engine bracers (this is one large piece that needs trimming on the dremel. It covers the undersid of the engine housing. 9.) Dozens and dozens of small detail chips the line the interior of the ship veins. 10.) Access panel cover

Updated 6/08

This is what the kit looks like. All parts are raw and untrimmed.

Detail of the UNDERSIDE. Notice the open area that becomes the access panel.

Start by using a dremel to trim away the flashing on the hulls. Switch to a cut-off disk where necessary.

Use bondo to cover the seamlines and any casting errors. Sand, sand, sand!

Use the cut-off wheel to trim away the access area. If you plan on mounting the model, a 1/2 section of PVC can be cemented in place as shown:

Using a belt sander, a dremel with the cone sanding attachment, and plain old fashioned sandpaper, trim away the detail pieces. It's a bit tricky but just take it once piece at a time. The best repair medium is EPOXY SCULPT.

Now that your parts are all trimmed out and cleaned, it's time to start assembling. Begin by superglueing the pod onto the hull. Next, begin adding the pod supports. There's no specific placement for these so just use your creative freedom!! I usually save the engine assembly strut for last since it's a bit of a fragile piece, but this photo shows its placement.

I call 'em detail chips, by the time you're done trimming, you should have a few dozen of these. Glue them randomly in the fissures surrounding the ship, top and bottom. The gun pods are simply glued in place.

INSTALLING OPTIONAL ELECTRONICS!!!

If you're LUCKY, the electronics package comes pre-wired like this:

You'll need to create a backing to mount your LEDs. You can build a cockpit interior or just use a sheet of black styrene.

Drill two 5mm holes into your cockpit backdrop and hotglue the LEDs into place. If you mounted a 1/2 PVC post (shown earlier) this makes an ideal mount point for the battery.

The on/off switch can be mounted anywhere you'd like, but I find it's most easily hidden and easily accessable right there in front of the access panel. Hotglue it down.

Once you have everything hotglued into place, glue down the access panel and install your canopy lens and canopy supports showing here:

"I have GOT to get me one of these!!!!!"