Has any of you tried putting some sort of illumination inside the tanks? Would a LED be good for choice?

I have a M88 and I am (scratch)building the interior.. How difficult would it be to illuminate the interior? What kind of illumination would that beast need (color and brightness)? Any suggestions?

Mario M.

For an older Vietnam era M88 and maybe an older A1, I would use a red LED. For a newer M88A1 use blue.

Where would those be located?

Mario M.

Now, that's a really cool idea. Mario, if you get it done, please show some pictures.

A dome light is located at each of the different crew stations and also in the rear of the crew compartment. If it were me, I'd mount one between the driver and assistant driver hatches and one in the back corner of the crew compartment. Don't want too much light there.

Would these work?

http://www.monroeperdu.com/mpd021.htm

Thanks guys.. I guess it would be cool to make "red light district" M88. :-)

BTW, I have never worked with LED so if you have any more pointers they would be very welcome.

Mario M.

The LED would have to be a very low power and subtle in colour or it would look like a search light inside.
Remember the scale effect inludes things like lights...........
If you overdo it, it'll look rubbish... (garbage to you in the US 'n' Canada)

Mind the heating too. So ask your Radio Shack (or similar store) for yhe "colder" leds they've got.

Typically with LEDs you don't need to worry about heat. Hiding the battery and wiring on the other hand...

Hey Mario,

You have hit on something that I have been thinking about for some time.

First, those LED Light from Monroe Perdu Products (while excellent and really cool) would not work. They have a little interupter circut built in them that cause them to flash back and forth of the colors (brings to lite of a fire possibility, but....)

What I was playing around witht eh idea of is fiber optics. What I thought would work (still thinking about the details, but it seems easy enough) is to work in the fiber optic cable intot he interior of a vehicle just as the real wires would go. The end (light emiting end) of the wire would go into a receptical while the other would be worked through the vehicle and down into the base. Form there, the rest of the details (wires, lights, abtteries, etc.) would be hide away.

Let me know what you think (and others) about thsi idea. This is by no-way a unique idea as I am sure that some little kid (young or old) has done this to some Sci-Fi figure.

Later,
Dave

Yeah, I've noticed.. I don't want to set my interior on fire so MP LEDs are not an option here.. :-)

Toni (Envar) has put LEDs in one of his vignettes, so I asked him to brief me on the basics, as I've never done anything like this before.. I like your idea on fiber optics, but I must admit I don't know where to get something like that (I live on the end of the world )..

Anyways the effect could really be good, dragging the attention to highly detailed interior.. This could really be fun!

Mario M.

As this LED thingy surfaced again, here´s the vignette Maki was referring to.
Below a rough sketch about the LED connection I used. Note that there should be a resistor at the end of wiring and it´s not in the drawing. The whole light set cost about 2 euros in electric shop.




Waiting to see your project, Maki!

Toni

Mario,
My "War of 2112" dio has lights in it. I guess I have to go home a take pictures of it all lighted up know. Really, I broke some wires and I havnt fixed them yet. I used "grain of wheat" light bulbs. You can find them in the train section of your hobby store. They have them in different sizes. Back to the dio, I placed 3 blue light bulbs in the scratched built interior of the "Alains" APC. They where small enough just to let out enough light. Like said before, LED are better to use because the last longer and are low heat. Grain of wheat bulbs will burn out eventually. Blue LED's are hard to fine, they are out there but usually are expensive.
Rob forgot to mention, In tracked vehicles you have both red/white light or blue/white light. Meaning, when a vehicle is buttoned up, the crew usually uses the regular white light. When the hatches are open, there is switch that turns the white light to blue or red. This effect would be very easy to simulate with LED's or light bulbs and some swtiches. If you likw, I can draw up circuit diagrams, especially since that is what I do for a living, electronics.

OK, so with hatches open I'd have to go with red LEDs.. Epi, one more thing; I have seen your M88A1 in the gallery - do you know what are the differences in the interior between Vietnam version and later A1 versions?

Did your interior had problems with heat emitted from those bulbs? That is my biggest fear with this project.. building and detailing everything and then melting it all with a stupid bulb..

Mario M.

One more thing I wanted to ask.. it seems like a complicated job and the effects could be barely visible. Do you think all that work is worth it?

Mario M.

Mario,

With you idea of having the lights come on when the hatches open, you will have to iontroduce a closed circut into the drawing on Envar hey, really cool BTW).

THe switch, two small pieces of brass for example would close the circuit when the hatch is open and will open the circuit (turn the lights on) when you open the hatch. Right, I do nto remember my circuitry course, so someone else may be able to chime in on the propper circuit set-up.

Dave

If you feel it's worthwile - then it is. I've used fiber optics on Sci-Fi models with success and think they're invaluable in trying to create a sense of realism in the overall subject - or better said - replicate their presence on screen. Winky-Blinkies and Light Sheet work good here too.

For armor models, I've tried it, but think they are less critical in acheiving an effect. The grain of wheat bulbs are better for throwing light, and the fibre optics are best for point lights - like indicator bulbs. The interior of an armor model is small, and it's tricky not to create a 90 degree kink in a fibre optic line - which dramatically reduces the amount of light reaching the terminator.

As mentioned, I like them in diorama settings, like fill light effects for fires, railroad signals, street lights, etc., better than in use on the armor model itself. Subtle is very good, but I think it detracts from the individual model if overdone.

Just my thoughts...

Gunnie