1/20 Hummel Drone in 2026 - Piscean Works

20260503 What happened so far…

OK, this is one of those KIV Projects I had some inkling of doing it but there was no online record or noes of the work. But as far as I can recall, it was done during the Pandemic alongside the Neuspotter amongst other things. It was also a time of helplessness and fear. As I stared at it and held it again, bits of memory trickled back but it was not of the Model itself. Rather, it was the sense of depression and and boredom which was quite overwhelming to the point that it was better for me to just let go. In the end, I force my hands to work on these models, distracting myself from worrying about the Worldwide phenomenon and the future of my Family. The distraction worked for a while as I did not remember much and suddenly, the World slowly opened up…

And then, as we all picked ourselves up, I forgot.

And then, we moved places once again, it was not so important anymore.

This year, in 2026, the plan for the Hummel was to have its AI Core being revealed for maintenance. This is actually my backup model since the 1/20 Neuspotter suffered an unfortunate neck fracture. I was so ready to put the pieces together and then concentrate on the 1/20 girls I got from Tori Factory. My other backup was the 1/72 Mandalorian’s Razor Crest but somehow, getting it ready within a month’s time is not possible due to, mainly stuff from Work.

Before we continue, I must warn you, the whole Project is written in one single long page and not spread to multiple pages. The very sensible reasoning is because I do not have the luxury of time to work on them and also… because I can. So, this is more of a Blog cum Progress Notes page.

The moment I opened the box, I was really surprised that I had already worked on it long ago. The forgotten sad memories came back bit by bit but I am not sure why there were no ‘online’ photographic records. I will continue with where I left off and eventually, locate the older images when I come to it.

The front part of the Drone is is covered by a two-piece clear plastic and I wanted to ‘reveal’ its internals. I used the main fuselage of a 1/72 Bandai Y-Wing and inserted a very old and slightly wonky Cylon Raider Roving Eye (which I sold in 2011).

I forgot where these two red hooks came from and it is definitely not from a Dougram model kit. Or is it?
I inserted the Cylon Roving Eye into the Y-Wing rear fuselage and gave it a coat of green to darken it but I can tell you, it is still quite bright.

I am not sure why I did what I did. I have sealed up both front fuselage and now I am at a loss on how to glue the rods for the front transparent covers. And this is a big issue now because…

The whole Y-Wing body is secured to the fuselage via a 1.6mm bolt which is about 18mm long. But the bolt was missing. It took me a few days to find it and in the end, I replaced it with another M1.6 nut & bolt set. With this one, you can use a 1.5 Hex wrench instead of a miniature Philips screwdriver.

Securing the Y-Wing assembly to the Hummel’s fuselage is through the 1.6mm nut and bolt.

I was quite excited and also, impatient to use the UV glue on the 1.6mm bolt that I forgot there were more things to do before that stage…

20260504 The Hollowness

No doubt the shape of the Hummel’s/ Fledermouse’s/ Hornisse’s rear fuselage looks great, when I was doing the kit, it felt very hollow within. And if I were to insert LEDs in there, the unwanted lights can light up the empty space in there. And the two moveable rear flaps are also guilty of that. Ideally, I would like to have the chance to fill the whole inside with wiring, tubes and what-nots but since I have less than a month to complete this, I am not taking any chances. Yeah, the unwanted LED lights by then would be doing an amazing job of showing the mess in there.

It got me to thinking of how this design came to be. There are four visible holes at the top with netting and also, the front intakes (that comes with faux netting design that can be replaced with Three Sheeps Design photo-etch parts). Therefore the whole fuselage’s internal (save for the front) is basically an empty shell with the only air ducting that flows from the intakes to the four thruster motors underneath. They would be the ones controlling the roll and pitch of the Hummel and possibly, the yaw as well. As for forward motion, the rear thruster would be the solution and it is also mounted outside at the rear. So, the Hummel/ Hornisse/ Fledermouse is essentially a floating plaftorm!

If you look at the design, there is nothing on the yellow area and also, if you opened the twin flaps at the rear, you will be able to see them emptiness of the green area. So, yeah, there is a lot of space to put in some imaginary ducting and stuff. But I’m rushed for time and so, this will have to be on the next Hummel if I have the chance to get another one.

There was a Photo-etch by Three Sheeps Design in 2013 (I did not get into ma.K until around 2017 when the Hasegawa pkf.85 Falke arrived on the shores of Malaysia for the very first time.). The yellow areas blocked off the now ’empty’ parts of the model. I also noticed that there is another version of the part but this time, it is more or less a solid wall.

I would still want to ‘block’ off the internal area. Since the front ‘intake’ has a big fan underneath, it is only logical to give it some kind of air ducting. The closest I could get were some front sprocket of an unknown 1/35 tank. Since I was too lazy to redo the pair of prototype boards, I decided to add some plastic strips for it to have the same height as the prototype boards. Unfortunately, I was too impatient to use heat, I had to take some even thinner strips to cover the sanded-off breaks.

This is how the fuselage looked like. It would be interesting to ‘open’ up and show the working internals of the Hummel.

As for this beautiful Fledermouse cockpit, I am going to keep it for the time being. I am not sure where this part originated from

2026.05.10 The Weekend

The last few days were not so hot for me. I plan to use my unreleased Star Trek Navigation and Strobe PCB as the basis of the Drone’s strobe. The board has enough memory to fit in the Nav/Strobe lighting sequence for four Starships. It took me days to locate the old IC chip and program it. By the time I got to the board, I wasted even more time trouble-shooting it. So, yeah, that’s where my Weekend had gone.

This was my very first PCB meant for Selling but it got taken over by the Battlestar Galactica’s Cylon and Viper lighting systems. Looking back at the 15-year old design, it had aged. At that time, I did not use EaglePCB’s Circuit layout which eventually led me to the Autorouter feature. This was also my first experience with a local company which required an MOQ before the PCBs can be manufactured. Anyway, with the absence of Notes, it took me quite a bit to realise how the system worked.

The board originally used 4.5volts (from 3x AA or AAA batteries) to 6volts where it passes through the LM7805 5v voltage regulator. Alternatively, one can plug in the pure 5volts directly which bypasses the voltage regulator. Because I planned this to be a module in a set controlled by the main system, there is a ‘Relay’ option for that. Thinking back, there was no need for the voltage regulator since the input voltage needs to be about 1.5 times higher. But I was not thinking about that since most people would be using 12volts to power up their Star Trek Enterprise models, especially the long Warp Nacelles. But the microcontroller IC only needs between 2.5v to 5.5v. Looking back this was me trying to accommodate the different possibilities of the user who usually do not use 5volt power and also, how the module was activated. So, I have about 30-plus or so, which I need to get rid off. Hue hue hue

Anyway, after replacing the faulty diode and removing the 7805 voltage regulator, the circuit works once I did a bypass or short (white) from the voltage regulator’s input pin to its output pin. But I am still wondering, how could a soldered 15 year old 1N4148 diode fail and it was not used since its last testing.

In the end, the LEDs are blinking but I have lost a lot of time. I was hoping to close up the model during this weekend. The left LED is the Navigation which would come on very slowly while the LED on the right would be a Strobe which blinks. I have switched to using the fourth Starship mode (ie Setting ’11’), which I think it is either the Voyager or the NX-01.

20260512 The New Wall

One of the easiest solution to prevent the revealing of the Hummel’s empty interior is to create a wall. This crude method saves me a lot of time and stops me from hunting my stash all over the Works Room for the proper greeblies.

The new wall sits nicely and will touch the main fuselage. I cut a small strip of styrene and glued it to the two plastic parts. Then I cut smaller rectangles to partially cover top.

This is how the new wall (yellow) looks like. After painting it black, even with the wire mesh, you won’t be able to see much. You will be very disappointed if you use a flashlight. Or maybe, I should put something funny in there…

As I said, the new wall will touch with the front fuselage and if I wanted to, I can glue both together. If I am going to do another Hummel, I would like to stuff the empty internals with a lot of details.

The LEDs I am going to use would be the 2mm types. The upper left with the dimple gives off a very strong white light, which will be used as strobes. For the bottom pair, which are warm-white LEDs, I will shorten the long resin lens, clear coat them with red and green, and use them as navigation lights on sides.

20260516 Adding some Greeblies

I am using four of the Parts #16 from an abandoned Academy Merkava. This model had vinyl wheels which over time, melted the plastic it looped over on. Plus, it survived the Termite Attack. With most of the parts gone or missing, I will have to use this two halves as paint mules with the rest being greeblies.

Using a blade, I cut off the rectangle locators so they will have a better grip on the styrene sheet.

Prior to this, I used a mechanical pencil and drew the front hull’s outline so that I when I glue these parts in, they should not interfere. Now, at least the insides of the Hummel does not look too barren anymore.

Lights in a Hollow shell

There are some lights on the Hummel of various difficulties. For example, the front landing gear would be a simple 3mm LED which I will let it stay loose. There are also lights in the drone’s core which uses some fibre-optic cables and my Cylon Raider Roving Eye PCB. Then it has 2x strobe lights and a pair of Navigation lights which needs to be light blocked. I will first paint them with reflective silver and then secure these LEDs with UV Glue (since they work faster than JB Weld’s epoxy) and then I will either spray over it with Black Primer. This would hopefully light block the LEDs.

20260524 Installing the LEDs

For this weekend, I plan to install all the relevant LEDs into the Hummel’s Body before wiring them. And if I have enough time, I will also proceed to complete its frontal details, namely, the clear parts that covers the front fuselage ie its Face.

I had to take fresh 2mm Top Hat warm-white LEDs because the two body halves would not close completely. You can then see the unwanted LED lights shining through the gap left behind. When I forced the fuselage to close, the upper half, which has an angle, when pressed with the bottom half, would squeeze the LED and pushes it inward. Rather than second guessing the distance from the edge and then sanding everything that touches, I used a much simpler method (below).

First I put a drop of UV glue on the fuselage and laid the LED on it. When I close the two halves, the squeezed LED would move inwards, giving me the correct gap. After making sure there are no visible bulging, I just activated the UV Glue. Now, the LED is permanently fixed and with the right distance.

The two white strobes would be using the 2mm white LEDs which already have a pre-determined height of maybe, 2mm which is good enough to peek out of the model. They will be placed at the top and bottom of the Hummel and also, secured with UV glue.

The Front of the Hummel (aka The Face)

The front part of the Hummel is made from two clear parts. Years ago, I wanted to display it with the top front opening upwards while the bottom ‘jaw’ swings downwards. At that time, UV Glue technology was kinda weak and so, I had to come up with a system of styrene hinges and frames, which to my disappointment, were too fragile. And that was one of the problems which made me kill the idea completely.

After experiencing the new (industrial?) UV Glue with a few attempts, I decided to adopt the concept of sliding the front outwards via a hydraulic system. I had to keep fighting with myself on the ridiculous nonsense that the clear parts would not be clear after gluing and painting. In conclusion, I settled on a simple solution of using plastic tubes and lots of UV glue. Just like my Falke, it was always these last minute frightening ideas which are fragile.

The first thing I needed to do was to break the UV Glue to get at the 1.6mm bolt which holds the Drone’s core (Y-Wing). It took seconds for it to harden and minutes to chip it away. The plastic there was already very weak and I might have to reluctantly reinforce the area with some hard plastic if the worst case scenario comes up.

The idea is to mount a plastic tube within the interior of the front and use that as the holder for another smaller plastic tube to slide into. I can only use a single 4mm plastic tube for this purpose. There are no gaps left on the opposite side unless I have a stronger small metal tubing (which I do not).

After cutting and shaping the tube to conform to the interior as much as I can, I used the UV glue to secure it.

You can see a lot of gaps within the curved interior wall which I hope to cover them with some plastic greeblies.

The Face of the Hummel

So far, so good and now, its for the first Home Run; attaching the clear front or, let’s just call this the Face. The insides of the Face was filled with curves and I had to do a conform sanding to the styrene tube so it has a better grip. And on its other end, I had to cut a slanting angle so that when the tube is pushed into the bigger tube, it will align itself with the curved interior wall.

I started with dry-fitting the Face to the Hummel body and then using de ol’ eyeball, maked out the positioning circle for which the small tube would be glued on the other side. Once the Plastic Magic Glue dries the tube into position, I used UV Glue.

To make the other side look more plausible, I opted to scratch a small panel instead of scribing the patter to the Face directly. The problem I have with these metal scribing templates is that it is very hard to judge since it is no transparent. Anyway, after cutting out the rectangle, I ran the corners over some sandpaper to round it, then used a pencil to draw some alignment lines. To secure the plastic part, I mounted it on a 3M double-sided tape and then used paper masking tape to make sure the scribing template does not move as well.

With the circle done, I ran it over with some Plastic Magic glue to soften the edges. Then I used my custom rivet maker which is a syringe needle with its sharp tip removed. If the rivet is not deep enough, you can spread some styrene glue which will make the strip slightly soft (but I do not recommend this) for a deeper effect.

I coated it with the Tamiya Black Panel Line so you can see the final effect.

After more conform sanding, I glued the panel to the Face and pressed it so the soft rectangle more or less conforms to the curve. Since the Face is clear plastic, it can crack and so, without any jig, I did not press too hard.

This is how it looked in the end. I did not slant the Face (because I forgot about it). Since the UV Glue has set, I do not want to push my luck. But if I had smaller diameter brass tubes, this would probably look much more convincing. Hmm… the Drone’s core looked so boring, maybe I should add some thin wiring to it…

The Face is easily detachable (for transport) and I am quite scared it will fall off before I can get it to the display table. So, yeah, I would have to bring the whole UV Glue set with me.

20260527 Detailing the Hummel Core

Today is Hari Raya Aidiladha aka Hari Raya Haji which is a Public Holiday for us. The Hummel Project is moving as fast as possible. I felt that the Core is not detailed enough and so, for today, I am going to add more stuff to it before calling this part done and moving on to the two remaining panel covers; the bottom Face and the upper cover.

I have added some greeblies and wedged it between the interior wall and the plastic tube. Since everything would be dark inside, I coated the tube with Tamiya Black and Brown Panel Line instead of breaking out the airbrush. I also used the Vallejo Environment Weathering 73.819, Rainmarks. This was the only weathering left when I was a Hobby Shop in Kepong. I thought the results would be a slightly yellowish but satin streaks. However, when I used it, it was more like watery yellow mud, something which I did not expect. One day, when they restock the shelves, I have to make sure of what I need to get and not buy stuff on impulse.

I added some photo-etched details, such as grill covers. Instead of superglue, I dabbed the surrounding with a new UV Glue formula before placing the PE part on top. This UV glue version is for Jewellery and requires a 3minutes to 8 minutes exposure time. At this point, I am thinking of either getting or making a UV light with a gooseneck and a timer (or a ready-made kitchen timer). Since I do not want to waste the whole day solving that minor issue, I just used MP3 songs instead.

I wanted to make the Core look busy and hence some black and red wires. Unfortunately, it was difficult since the wire’s diameters were 0.4mm while the smallest drill bit I had was a 0.3mm. I could not find my other HSS drills which has the 0.4mm drill bits. The glue of choice was cyanoacrylate but this (the one and only CA glue I had) was meant for repairing shoes. Ultimately, I used the UV glue again as the wires refused to ‘stick’ into position.

I was puzzled why the earlier 0.3mm holes had issues with the 0.4mm wires but the subsequent holes were OK. Then I realised, the 0.3mm drill bit had caught molten plastic which helped to widen the holes…

For the top cover, I thinned the plastic until the eight holes are visible. The plastic’s curves are a challenge to the grinder because of its straight head and I could not find the bullet shaped version. At the final stage, I had to use sandpaper and Plastic Magic to weaken and melt the holes slightly.

Almost there and the holes really looked transparent like rice paper. I used a sharp tool to poke out the holes, then go over the shape’s edges with a sharp scalpel before using the Plastic Magic cement to melt off any stray plastic.

The rear of the Hummel’s fuselage is empty and so, it needed more greeblies. I cut off this part from an Academy Merkava and reworked it. The ‘paints’ are from Tamiya’s Black and Brown Panel Line. It looked wet but it is actually dry.

Using some spare styrene strips, I wedged the part in there and then cemented it. At the bottom, I cut off a piece of square tubing so the wires have a place to ‘hide’ and channel through to the back, where the circuit boards are.

Before I ‘painted’ everything dark with Tamiya Panel line, this is how the rear looked like if I decided to leave the upper panel exposed.

Using the 2011 nuBSG Cylon roving eye and the (unreleased) 2009 Starfleet Nav & Strobe board for the Hummel. Both circuits were designed to run off 5volts.

20260531 Rearranging the Face

Today is Wesak Day and so, it is a day of Celebration for the Lord Buddha. And today is also the day I want to re-arrange the Face. Somehow, having it extended upright does not make it look… believable. And so, I am going to spend the better half of the day in scraping off the UV glue.

It is quite a time-consuming process because the clear part can crack any time. So, using my ‘customised’ scalpel, I carefully scraped off as much glue as I can before I experiment with some 99.9% isopropyl alcohol (IPA). To my surprise, the IPA got to work as soon as I poured it. And within minutes, both parts separated clean enough for me to scrape off any residue.

After sanding the plastic tube for an angled position I glued it back and again, used the UV glue. I separated the plastic tube into two pieces with the 15mm cut nearest from the Face. Then in inserted a smaller tube within. This allows me to ‘twist’ the face for alignment.

This is the final look of the Face when it is extended.

20260601 The Bottom Cameras

Remember the lower part of the Face? Let’s call it the Jaw (heh). Instead of following through in creating hinges and stuff for it, I am going to glue it to the fuselage. That area will now be used for cameras. Originally, I wanted to create come kind of a canvas bag with a riveted clear window for that part. Unfortunately, I forgot to de-frost the Aves Apoxie and so, I needed to come up with another idea. It would look cool but for a flying craft, this idea would create an unnecessary drag.

The problem started when I do not have a thin pla-plate to create a lens bezel and so, I glued two plastic strips and went to two with the scribing stencil. This is the shape of the ‘hole’ I wanted and later, I will cut around it.

With the lens window now sanded into shape, I created some rivets using my own tool, which is 0.7mm circle maker.

Layering some plastic strips to fill in the gaps before I glue the part (left). I am not expecting the whole assemble to hold its shape as it will all be glued to the fuselage later. The blue tape over the camera lens would protect the lens from the painting later. In a sense, this was going back to creating a hinge for the Jaw to drop out…

Looking at my box of greeblies (I think its time to get another 1/35 Tank with interior), there was a very nice panel that looked like a long tray which lets me glue to the fuselage of the Hummel instead of using more plastic tubes and strips. I went along this route because tests with using the UV Glue to create clear lens looked promising.

I drill out the hole (on the left) and inserted a UV Glue lens. I did the same for the bigger lens on the right. However, during insertion of the said glue, it created a bubble which I quickly shine the UV light on it.

Then I used more UV glue to cover the cavity left by the bubble. Now looking back, I should have put a red clear dot in there before using the UV Glue to seal it up. It would look weird but now its too late…

The camera was painted with Tamiya’s Black and Dar Brown Panel Lines but it does not show any difference. Anyway, I hope to sneak in a decal or two before I start to solder all the electronics.

2026.06.01 The Bad news…

Just as I was about to start on soldering, I noticed a resistor had come off the prototype Board. This means the solder joint was loose. So, I would have to weaken the hot-melt glue and pry loose the circuit board for repairs.

Underneath the prototype board was a 4020 SMD white LED and the resistor was a 150 Ohms Brown-Green-Brown), limiting the current to about 10mA. Which is half of the LED’s maximum operational current capacity. When it comes to Scale Lighting I would very much prefer to light the LEDs in below 10mA for vehicle cabins, interior lighting and so on.

In the end, I really, really had to pry the board off as bits of copper kept falling out or cracked when I used the grinde to remove the SRBP material. Anyway, this picture is quite worrying. The 2019 hot-melt glue (yellow) came off easily and I had no issue scraping the leftovers. In addition, the UV Glue (Green) also did the same. Maybe it was because both was applied over the Mr. Finishing Surfacer 1500 Black. But look at the ‘exposed’ round copper traces as they look to be corroded…

Almost there but still so far away. After sanding the Hummel’s 5 wheels, I only had enough time to spray more Mr. Surfacer Black. Before I do, I cut some plastic strips to ‘cover’ the wiring for the side LEDs. There is a narrow notch where the pair of thin wires can be laid across.

2026.06.02 The Front Headlight

So far, so good and I hope to get the Hummel sealed up and ready for painting. Alas, in the last minute while soldering the electronics, the 3mm warm-white LED in front of the landing gear stopped working. And not only that, in the previous last few minutes of its Life, it was throwing a very dim un-warm-white colour too. I had connected it directly to 5volts without any current limiting resistor…

After easily removing the UV Glue with IPA (this is seriously becoming a very worrying theme now…) I thought it was the broken soldered wires that was the main issue as the LED was moved countless times during handling. But this was not the case as the unprotected LED was really burnt out from the excess voltage.

This is a very serious issue. Originally, the soldered pair of wires were placed between Parts A2 and A3 (Shaded in Yellow) before it was cemented shut. After checking it all over, I realised there was no 100 Ohm (black-brown-black) current limiting resistor. This is the least of the problem now as I need to solve the (yellow) wiring first.

This is the view where all the electronics has been soldered. Pardon the thick USB cable as this was what I was using all the time to test the board with 5v DC power. It will be replaced with another plug/socket system. In the meantime, I will have to create some kind of downward funnel to the upper fuselage since the fine wire mesh still allows the observer to look through and see the wiring. As you can see, I have really modified the green 2009 Starfleet Nav & Strobe PCB to suit my own purposes, so do not worry about the weird bypass wirings and missing through-hole resistors.

2026.06.03 Repairing the Front Headlight

I have two methods of resolving this issue and although both are challenging, one of them carries the risk that should I fail, the end result is to use the second solution, which I am not too happy with; that is to open up everything and rewire the LED completely. So, I want to try the first method, which is to repair the wiring as best as I can.

If you look at the diagram above, the wiring to the 3mm warm-white LED is actually made up of two sets of cables. The thicker red & black terminates to the pair of two thinner pair of black wires. I have no recollection on why I did this instead of a straightforward pass. Looking at the assemble diagram above, the pair of black wires passes through the hollow A2/A3 parts and then exits at the middle of the B8/B9 assembly. Originally, the B8/B9 parts are solid and I had to drill a tunnel through for the wires to exit at the C22 junction.

I had to be careful because if I yanked the wire too much, it would snap off which means threading fresh new wires into that part. Getting it to come out at the perpendicular hole is a great challenge in patience. Thanks fully, with a tiny dab of Singer Oil, I managed to get the positive wire to come out.

In the end, I got about 4mm extra, which to me, is a lot. As I was pulling, the C10/C22 assembly came off which gave me hte opportunity to slightly widen the hole for the wires to go through.

Soldering in a plastic environment is very risky. But in this situation, I was lucky. In hindsight, I should have bought a role of those heat resistant tapes and used them.

This is how the LED looked after the soldering is done. I could have cut the LED’s legs a little shorter as the interior of the C10 cup kind of tapers to the middle. So, it is jutting out like a sore thumb…

After gluing in a short length of plastic tubing, it kinda looked weird so I will definitely need to add some greeblies to make it look more ‘natural’ and I intend to show the ‘light leaks’.

20260605 What a mesh…

Before closing up the model, there is the issue of the metal mesh that is supplied with the kit. They are shiny and I cannot located my Mr. Metal Primer which is somewhere in the Works room. It has never been opened since 2018 which I used for Kylo Ren’s Command Shuttle. Once I have removed the metal’s brightness, the real issue is then revealed.

This is what I am talking about. Without the mesh, you can already see wiring and other electronic components placed inside the body. It would make no difference even when the mesh is installed and painted.

I just discovered that the 99.9% IPA is able to remove thin coats of Mr. Surfacer Black 1500. Originally, I was intending to use Mr. Tool Cleaner but that too, is somewhere in the Works room. The alternative would be to sand the plastic or use the (too fine) fibreglass pen which would take a longer time.

Without the Mr. Metal Primer, I went ahead and primed the metal mesh with Mr. Surfacer Black 1500. This is one of the methods I liked about inserting metal parts to plastic. I never like to depend on cyanoacrylates where its reliability can severely be affected by humidity changes. In this case, you just place the metal part onto the top fuselage, and cement glue the holding frame.

With the metal mesh in place, now I will show you the issue.

When the metal mesh is sprayed with darker colour or have its sheen removed, which, in this case, with Mr. Surfacer Black 1500, you can now ‘see through’ everything inside. So, I will have to create a visual barrier below these metal meshes.

OK, thank goodness I used some newspaper to protect my Works Table…

So far, so good. This is the top view of the Hummel Drone. Everything is working fine but there is a slight problem with drawing power from the Mobile Powerbank. I have split the electronics into two parts. The first would be the constant 5V power to the Roving Eye circuit, the front landing gear and the belly lights combo. The second would be the Navigation and Strobe Lights which is driven by a microcontroller. When the USB is first plugged to the Powerbank, everything worked but 30 seconds later, the Nav/Strobe section is off while the first section is still running. Subsequent unplugging and plugging of the USB solves this issue. So, this is the problem I have with modern Powerbanks which if it detects minimal current drawn, it would shut down.

20260606 More Electronics

Soldering on a Saturday night is a great way to relax and a nice opening to the Weekend. Unfortunately, I have less than 4 days to complete this Hummel. And so, I have to think out of the box again since there is not much time for anything else than to seal up the model and find a suitable base.

This would be the final image before the Drone is sealed up. The only thing left is the rear light which I have forgotten to install. As the PCB has already been hot-melted to the fuselage, I had to locate and tap/ solder any exposed 5volt power lines.

There are a few ways to supply power to the Drone:
1. Mount a LiPo battery inside the model. However, this would make the model heavier and the (unglued) landing gears, especially the side ones, might collapse. Moreover, I would still have to connect the model’s battery.
2. Insert a connection system to the model. Normally, a simple (solidly glued) USB connector or a 3.5mm audio jack will do the trick. However, I would still need to drill out the appropriate holes for them.

So I chose the latter option as this is a good opportunity to test those magnetic connectors. I did not use induction coils because of two issues; first the power received through each receiver is just enough for a LED and second, the distance from the coil to the receiver is around the 5cm height.

Soldering the magnetic piece is quite a challenge since I am using a 30W iron. I had to scrape off the plated coating before the solder can take hold, which took a long time. This worries me since heat can destroy the strong magnet and also, the rubber insulation within. Speaking of which, I had to use a strong holder to stop the magnet from attracting everything, even the soldering iron’s bit.

The 3750 warm-white LED is quite bright and if you peek at its bottom, there is a solder patch which allows you to transfer excess heat to the PCB. I chose this LED because I wanted a wide spread of bright light as other LEDs were either too dim or ‘too high’ inside, thus creating an unwanted hotspot. Notice the ejection pin ‘dimple’ on the front side? The image below shows its effect. I was tempted to grind it out but this would create a very obvious uneven optical effect, akin to a marred surface.

This is how the dimple affect the final outcome. You know, I can carefully grind a ‘hole’ inside that dimple to create a circular effect but alas, I do not have a cone shaped grinder bit. I also have an Ice Blue 5370 LED and the colour really looked nice. Since this is ma.k where electronics are still in the pre-integrated circuit, I would keep lighting to the warm-white or just white.

With the masking tape on created from an ‘unofficial’ DSPIAE circular cutter (they were sold out when I wanted one, so I got this instead)

The light easily comes off even after it is cemented. And looking at its back, it is boring so I added another greeblie to it. There is a small gap under the light’s base, which I slid in a small detailed part, hopefully, this would reduce the chances of the lamp coming off again.

20260607 The Downward Facing Camera

Like most ‘spy’ planes, there is always THAT camera. After creating the lens bezel, it is time to prime the clear piece. But alas, the masking tape had mixed with the UV glue got stuck with the bezel. Furthermore, stray cement also marred the surface. Therefore, I had to re-condition the clear piece first, before moving to the next stage.

To create a nice finish, I went with my Tamiya Polishing compounds. They were stores in an airtight container since 2018. And so, they dried out and were falling apart. What I loved about these polishing compounds is that they can be washed away with water.

The first of the Tamiya Polishing Compound is the COARSE grade where the paste contains large particles. This is used to ‘clear’ or smoothen out rough surfaces. Alas, when I opened the cracked cover, all I got were these dried out stuff. Using a cotton bud, I scooped some onto the surface and rubbed on it. As you can see on the top right, the particles still more or less works and most of the rough features were starting to go.

The same remaining two compounds FINE and FINISH suffered the same fate but with the FINISH grade’s aluminum tube reacting badly to the paste. Still, I more or less got the finish I wanted. which can be seen on the bottom left. I can go further with the ROUGH Grade to get a much better surface but it would be taking more than an hour.

20260607 Sealing an Priming the Drone

With most of the Drone done, now is the time to seal it for priming. Most of the parts are black because I have used the Mr. Surface Black 1500 on them a few years ago.

It is sad that I need to glue to top cover as I have run out on both time and ideas to keep it open. In fact there is no reason for keeping it open for this situation.

This proves the Mr. Surfacer or other lacquer paints are not sticking to the metal mesh. Perhaps adding a drop of Mek (Methyl Ethyl Ketone) to the paint might solve the problem but on the other hand, it might not anything.

I forgot to take photo after gluing this blacking plastic, which is the Academy’s Merkava’s side skirt.

Tyres flap connector base

It took me a few tries to get as close to, as possible on these round stickers. This is not the official DSPIAE and so, the measurement gauge is not only inaccurate but loose (until you lock the nut). Once I got the diameters correct, I have to cut them with a lot of surrounding space. This is because I will use the cut holes to mask the tyres while spraying Mr Color’s #137 (Tire Black). And then, the remaining larger tape with the hole will be used to mask the tyres while I spray some other colour.

This is how the larger tape was used, which is to mask the tyre itself while I sprayed on the rims.

With the other parts all glued in and in place, I primed the Drone as much as I can. Right now, I do now have any paint scheme for it, except that I want the underneath to be sky blue.

These engines are hard to get it to look right. Unlike the Round2 Space:1999 Eagles, the engines for the Hummel Drone is in two halves and so, there was a lot of sanding and whittling away of the plastic they felt like a real circular cone.

20260608 All Your Base is Belong to Us

As the Hummel is my ‘back-up’ model, I never plan for it to have a base at that time. And even that, it was more of a hangar diorama. Therefore, after this morning’s jaunt to the scrapy… er, Community Recycling Centre, I decided to try my luck at the shops. All I need was just a decent A4 sized container of about a 1-inch height, workable material for me to dig holes, etc. and also, sturdy enough to withstand everything.

I was disappointed my 4″ x 6″ x 2″ photo frame was too small because once the Drone is fully done up, it would need about close to an A3 size working area. The next best thing was this (last one in the shop) photo frame which was almost enough for the Drone. But because of its design, I had to get a very much slimmer 10,000mAh powerbank. As for the sheets of #600 grit sandpaper, they also double up as tarmac texture.

One weird feature about this Photo frame is that the front (with clear plastic window) can be opened and kept shut with a magnet while the rear, is a piece of covered card which is used to hang the whole frame. I am not sure how the rear

The Drone is quite big and in order for the whole thing to work, it needs about two Photo frames. But hey, since this is theoretically a VTOL craft, the space can be workable.

20260608 Painting the Drone

I now have a paint scheme for the Drone. On its lower surface, I will have a mottled blue pattern while on its upper side a wavy green mixed with some mottling. I would like to follow the scheme I did for the Falke but I do not have some of the paints and also, I just discovered, most of the my Paints, which were stored for years in the previous location, went bad. Maybe it was the average temperature in the mid-30°C’s…

I really need to start getting used Models for source of greeblies as this was the result of a few hours of searching for the right parts.

Even the square panel detail looked so off…

One of the paints I needed when the shops are almost closing. It turned into a liquidised bubble gum and despite adding some thinner and some stirring, the paint could not be revived. Time to change plans…

The only ‘blue’ I have left which did not really make me happy. By now, I am already demovtivated…

I did the same mottling with the only green left and it was quite bright. After sweeping Tamiya Panel Line Dark Brown, it became too dark. I will need to use a naphta based solution such as lighter fluid to hopefully remove some of the enamel based solution.

This is the closeup of the painting before I went over with the Panel Line. I know that bright colours over a dark layer will eventually fade into it but it was still too ‘bright’. However, when a clear liquid ran over it, I can see the brilliance of the green pattern. I am so tempted to spray a two to three coats of clear, then more green streaks and another one or two coats of clear, with a little more green puffs and sealed with a final coat of satin clear… nah.

20260609 Decaling

Tonight was spent on decaling the Drone. I do have quite a number of white decals of various scales. Sometimes it is hard to ‘read’ or gauge the print quality since they’re white. Only when it has been applied, then do I notice these things. Come this weekend, I will have to check out if there are any other sci-fi or warning decals along with more paints.

Spent the whole night putting some choice decals on the Drone. Despite using Mr. Mark Setter and Mr. Softer, the decals had some silvering. I am going to leave it for the next evening to see the result. If it does look bad, I am contemplating in giving the Model just a coat of satin clear, to bring out the green a little more. Right now, I am more or less OK with the mix of white & red decals since most of them are as subtle as possible. Anyway, this (is the only) readable decal says, in verbatim, ‘CAUTION. AFTER APPLICATIOM. BOTTLE MUST BE CLOSED’

20260610 The Semi-Clear Coat

I thinned Mr. Color #181 Semi-Gloss Clear at about 1:7 and gave the Drone two coats within a window of about three minutes. It is more or less there and in certain lighting or angles, the green really shows while for the rest of the time, its just a fragile mass of dark. Unlike the Falke, I would not be adding any chipping, rusts or peeling paints due to some Joker on Facebook highlighting ma.k uses ceramic and titanium. But in actual reality, weathering is enjoyable but takes time and I do not want to rush it.

This is the image of the Drone after using Lighter Fluid to selectively ‘clean up’ Tamiya’s Panel Line Black. This subtle changes will hopefully give the surface more detail as if it has gone through rough weather and prolonged wear & tear.

This is the Drone after two coats of semi-gloss clear. It brings out the green more and makes the dark background deeper shade. Note the surface is intentionally rough. If I gave it a clear coat first, then the effect would be lost. I wanted to add more green patterns as mentioned before but after looking back at it, that might be a little to excessive.

In my haste to get to this stage, I had forgotten to clean up the light leaks. Sigh.

It is quite funny that by adding this particular decal, the rear light now becomes a pimple light.

Adding the two antennas at the rear is not easy and I had to use super-glue. This particular antenna is made up of three 0.6mm metal wires. As I do not have red, I used a paint pen which alas, gave a pink shade instead because it is running out of ink.

For this antenna, I painted five stripes. This one is quite loose because it does not have a 0.6mm hole and I had to manually drill it out with a 0.7mm dill bit.

I was expecting the Drone to be quite small length-wise but once the side wheels and the antenna were added, it became a very fragile pancake. I have to remind and retrain on myself how to hold it since the antennas were super-glued and can come off easily. Or worse, bent. In addition, it would be nice to have the antennas lighted up (but what shop selling brass tubes with 0.3mm OD at this time of night or even, ship this close to D-Day?)

There are a lot of unused parts because I did not follow the instructions fully. Apart from the alternative landing gears, the parts are mostly for the rear of the engine, which I did not want to detail.

This is the overall lighting effect that is on the drone (apart from the AI Core which has the Cylon Roving eye).

20260610 Final Touches

There are a lot of things I wanted to implement on the Drone but at every step, I felt that it was either too late or, it needs more time to un-glue and so on. This, I recognise as fatique which affects my Judgement and planning. That is the disadvanatge of coming back from work tired and looking back at it, my optimistic planning did not into account for tiredness and last minute Family stuff. So, I am going to stop here, with regret. But I still do wished I had more time which I can then add a figure and a proper base to tell a story.

The only bright side is that I got to more or less complete the model in just 5 weeks. Right now, I am thinking of the Drone being worked on/re-programmed inside a small repair hangar with those nice warm-white lights making circles on the wooden floor. Maybe that will be reserved for a future continuation…