Dirk's Star Trek - "The Time Trap" Diorama Build

Hey, guys

Welcome to another project. This one is being done for a group build being hosted in the modeling community on Youtube. Its called the "2020 48 Hour Group Build Weekend." Its pretty much like the Blitz-Bu's done here but in this case its for 48 hours rather then 24. My subject is going to be from the Polar Lights Star Trek Cadet series. There was a time that I though these tiny kits were a waste but I've become fond of them over the years. I mean these kits allow you to do things that the larger kits don't like building dioramas. I mean you can build a diorama with any kit but space becomes a challenge. With these kits, not so much.



My idea stems from the animated series episode called "The Time Trap. In this episode while engaging the Klingons in the Delta Triangle (The Bermuda triangle of space) the Enterprise finds itself trapped in another dimension. In order to get out they must put aside their differences with the Klingons before they are stuck forever.



The kit



There are only 9 parts for the Klingon D7 and 13 for the Enterprise











Some putty is needed for the D7 and the Enterprise Warp nacelles

Just a quick side bar. There are a lot of people that are very critical of these tiny kits. I just wanted to show you some of the detail that they have. These are both Klingon D7 Battle cruisers. One is from the original TV series (the one i'm currently building) and the other is from The Motion Picture set. The detail on the motion picture set is simply amazing,













Painting the D7. I used a mix of these two acrylic charcoal paints



I don't usually mix acrylics and enamels on a build but I didn't have anything close to the color I needed so... For the green I used Model Masters SAC Green





Next we will address the Enterprise.

Stay safe peoples, and B - Strong

Now its time to move onto the Enterprise. I'm sure a lot of people are aware that when Paramount released the latest Blueray collection of the original Star Trek series among other enhancements they changed the color of the Enterprise. In the original release the Enterprise was a white-iah color. Not bright white like in the Motion Picture but still a white. I'm not here to debate the actual color mixture but at a 30,000 foot view most notable modelers would use INJ light gray as the base and doctor it from there to get the original color. Then when the Blurays came out the ship became a Battleship gray or something close to that. I have to say I think I like the gray better.But I just built one of these Cadet series Enterprise's a few weeks back using the grey so I decided to try something different and try to get close to the ships original color. Because of time restraints on this build I didn't have the time to mix-match colors so I decided to use what I have on hand. In this case its a can of Dupli-Color Wimbledon white. I figure its close enough for this project.



Before I paint it I wanted to show you this. When Polar Lights made this model they molded in windows on the secondary hull. Its a nice gesture but they don't match the decals so they have to go.



I left the saucer off for now to aid in applying the decals. I also painted the bussards gold as a base. When dry I will apply a coat of clear orange



Using a Tamiya weathering kit I made the "rust" belt on the primary hull



Applying the decals







I made a mounting post to help attach the two ships together.



Mounting a post to the ships to mount in a shadow box



The final





This build didn't seem to garner a lot of interest but it was a fun build.

A special thank you to all of those that took the time to check out this little project.

Till next time... Stay safe and B - Strong

Sorry Dirk, I just caught up with this build. My favourite episode is 'Balance of Terro'. Nice work.