Featured in the Crash of the Moons TV show. The film is very old, black and white, with simple models and funny physics. If you want, you can watch it on Youtube: 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9.
The ship was flown by hero Rocky Jones and his pilot Winky. Apart from the Orbit Jet, there can be seen several other ships of the same design. Most probably this was the only real 3D miniature rocket in the whole film - all other ship models looked flat.
Technical specifications:
Designed just for fun in no particular scale (most probably something around 1/200), based on two photos of a plastic model and several fuzzy screenshots from the film. The original rocket was probably some sort of metallic colour: steel, aluminum or the like. For best results, spray the model with some convenient paint when finished; my plain gray "textures" are far from perfection.
Differences from the film miniature:
1_3.BMP, 2_3.BMP and 3_3.BMP - kit parts; 1500x2100 px images in 200 DPI, intended for print on one A4 page each (or any size that suits you - downsizing is possible, the model is quite big)
NAVOD.BMP - instructional drawing; the same size as the kit pages
COTM.DWG - the original vector "source" file (AutoCAD 2002 format)
*.HTM - instructional texts. If you are disgusted by my misspelling (English is not my primary language), feel free to correct it or translate to another language ;-).
The model is quite large, so print on some sufficiently thick paper - cca 160 g/m2 (about 0.2 mm thickness) would be best. Or on a normal office paper (which is 80 g/m2) and laminate it with one layer of the same. For print, turn "preserve aspect ratio" on and "fit/stretch to page" off. The three little crosshair symbols must be equally spaced on all three pages, in both horizontal and vertical direction. The distance between them in mm corresponds to the print scale in % (usually 100).
You will also need some cardboard about 1 mm thick (exact thickness doesn't matter) for laminating internal formers, some wooden skewer Ø3 mm for shock absorbers and maybe two round toothpicks Ø2 mm for missiles, some office paper for internal reinforcements and maybe a piece of transparent foil for cockpit windows.
This part is optional, the model can exist without it. If you don't like handling tiny parts, skip straight to next chapter.
All parts with green number tails are to be laminated with a 1 mm cardboard. Exact thickness matters only for seat parts 25 and 26, the others can be up to half milimeter thicker or thinner. In the drawing, cross-section of the laminated parts is gray for easier legibility.
Start by assembling the main box 22. When scoring and folding, it is better to make the box a little bit wider (i.e. score along outer edges of the lines), so you don't have to trim every other part to fit inside. But don't overdo it, or there would be gaps.
Insert overhead panel 28 inside. Its sides don't need to be glued, the two tabs are enough. It is a good idea to punch a hole in part 22 under this box, so you can reach inside and correct 28's position if needed.
Test-fit door 27, it must align with the upper floor (24). Edge-glue it in place. Adding tabs to the two longer sides is possible, but not recommended due to small size. Adding them to the top and bottom edge is not recommended at all.
Continue by edge-gluing upper floor 24 in place. Align its top surface with the dashed line and the door 27. Maybe the corners will have to be chamfered slightly to better fit the folds of part 22.
Paint edges of seat parts 25 and 26 and glue one pair of them to place in the upper cockpit, the back rest first.
Finish the upper cockpit with dashboard 29. Be careful, it must not stick out or you will have to sand it down later to fit into the fuselage (especially if the window foil is too thick).
Start the lower cockpit by wall 23. Again, chamfer the corners if it doesn't fit into the main box. Also bevel the cardboard along the curved edge, so it doesn't stick out over the upper floor. Align its printed side with the dashed line.
Continue with control panel 30. When gluing it inside, it's better to apply glue on parts 22 and 23 and not on the 30's edges, otherwise the glue would get smeared all around.
Edge-glue dashboard 31 in place. It's the trickiest part of the whole cockpit, because you have no way to move it once all its edges touch the surrounding walls. There is a spare copy of this part in case you have to redo it.
Last part is the remaining seat 25+26. Paint backside of part 25 with some appropriate colour before installing it (it won't be visible, but you know it's there, of course :-) ).
Put the finished cockpit aside, you'll install it later.
Start from the central cylinder 1. Roll it to shape, then glue connector 2 inside around the edges. It is important to first roll then glue, because the connector may need some trimming due to its smaller diameter. Slots for wing spar 18 may be cut any time. Cutting is easier when the part is flat, but rolling and shaping is easier without the slots, so choose what you like more. When you have the cylinder ready, laminate two formers 3 with some cardboard (thickness doesn't matter, it may even be corrugated) and sand their circumference until they fit inside the cylinder (all formers except 11 and 47 have 0.2 mm smaller diameter than the outer hull plating to reduce the need for trimming, but everything depends on thickness of the connectors). Inserting them may be quite tricky, the central holes are there for easier grasping. Finally glue the formers inside; their outer surfaces must align with the edges of the cylinder and fold lines of the connector tabs. Use as little glue as possible to avoid buckling (this is a general rule for the whole build). Don't glue wing parts yet, they would obstruct further work. Just laminate spar 18 on a 1 mm cardboard, cut it out, test-fit and put aside.
Continue with the front. Conical segment 19 is a cockpit section. If you have built the cockpit, cut out the two circular windows and cover them from the inside with a piece of transparent foil. Roll the segment and close it with connector 20. Glue laminated former 21 inside. Finally install the cockpit assembly and connect the segment to the front end of cylinder 1, aligning the seams in one line (front side is the one which the two rectangles are further from).
Next segment is easy: cone 32, connector 33 and former 34. Assemble as above, keep the seams aligned on all segments.
Next segment may contain missile launchers. Their barrels are rolled from parts 38 (texture inside). Best option is to make missile tips from 2 mm round toothpicks and roll the barrels around them (don't let the missiles stick out too much). If you don't like edge gluing, add some small tabs around the barrel edges. Apart from the launcher holes, the segment is built the usual way from cone 35, connector 40 and former 37.
Three remaining nose segments are easy again, parts going from 39 to 47. Connector 46 for the last segment is not shown on the drawing. End cap 47 is probably too small to be laminated and cut out, you can replace it by a droplet of glue and paint it when it is dry.
Move on to the rear half of the fuselage. Segment 4+5+6 may contain the airlock. If you want to make the door open, score it along the righ-hand edge, cut along the others and cover its backside with part 7. Glue airlock 8 into the finished segment, then attach the segment to the central cylinder.
There should be some device to get people from the door to the ground and back. In the film, it was just a simple ladder and only the bottom two meters or so could be seen. In reality, it would have to be split into several segments, with some safety railings and so on. And retractable, of course. It's up to you if you want, I was unable to come up with a feasible design.
The rearmost segment is the most difficult one. Start with the rear former 11. Cut all holes out and glue main thruster 12 into the biggest one. Auxiliary thrusters (or whatever they are) 13 are very small and may be quite hard to finish. If you don't want them, throw them away and just cover the holes from behind with something black.
Cone 9 has four slots for wing spars, one of them going through the connector 10 (this connector is not shown in the drawing). Here it's definitely better to cut them out after the part is rolled and glued to shape. Before gluing the segment to the rest of the hull, make and test-fit spars 15, 16 and 17 in it and trim or bevel their locks as needed.
Begin with the front pair of wings, they are easier. Cut out and fold skins 48L (left) and 48P (right). Glue them only around the edges, as shown in the drawing (the pink stuff) - the insides must stay hollow. Glue spar 18 into the hull. Laminate and cut out formers 65 and 66 and trim them as needed, so they fit within the inner dashed lines on part 1, between the spar and the wing skin. These formers are tricky to handle and you can omit them if necessary, but they make aligning the wings easier and prevent them from collapsing. Glue the formers to their places, then slide the skins over it all. The spar may need to be thickened a little at the wing roots, so that the skins align with the dashed lines perfectly. When everything fits, apply glue.
You can also add flap consoles 49 and 50, if you want (they are my fantasy, never seen in the film). Laminate them with anything convenient or burnish them into a teardrop shape.
Rear wings are trickier. First, glue skins 51 and 52 together. Apply the glue only along the leading and trailing edges; don't use too much of it, or the edges would ripple. Insert spars 15..17 into the hull without gluing and test-fit the skins on them. Watch the tips - they must be as symmetrical as possible. When you are happy with it, glue the spars together and to the fuselage. Prepare formers 67 and 68, test-fit, trim and glue to the fuselage. Thicken the spars if needed and finally glue the skins over them. Wing 52 goes to the bottom side (the seam side), the others are identical.
Start by cutting four stripes of standard office paper, as wide as the shorter edge of rectangles 53 (try to draw and cut as precisely as possible). Roll and glue the 53s to make hollow cylinders. Roll the prepared stripes, insert them into the cylinders, let them unroll as much as possible and fixate them by a droplet of glue. You should now have four hollow cylinders with quite thick walls, so apply glue on the wall edges and close the cylinders with "washers" 54 and 55.
Make four shock absorber struts 61 from a painted wooden skewer or a metal rod. Insert them in the prepared cylinders and glue at both ends. Don't make the feet yet.
Roll and glue cone 56, insert laminated former 57 inside it and edge-glue the assembly onto the front of the shock absorber cylinder. If you don't like edge gluing, add some small tabs, but it's definitely easier without them (just don't use too much glue, as always). Cone 58 is similar, but former 59 is probably too small, so you can omit it. Finally close the pods with cones 60.
Edge-glue the pods to the wingtips, the seams should hide within the wings. Then place the model on a flat surface and if it wobbles, sand one of the struts until it stops.
Landing feet consist of pads 62 and 64 with spacer 63 between them, glued on the strut ends. If you don't want to bother with all that, use just pads 64 alone.
Enjoy the build and see you later with another models.
B@F
This and other kits can be freely downloaded from PaperGallery.mzf.cz.