The kit was mastered by Nik Jardine who has done a fine job designing this neat little mecha crab. I noticed that the symmentry on some parts was a little off but this my no means takes away from how much fun it was to put this little kit together. The crab is meant to be 1/48 scale to tie in with the newer same scale armor kits and also with 28mm wargame figures but I think I'm going with 1/35. I came to the conclusion that the size of he droid looks more impressive in this scale. I'm also going the unmanned droid route.

Box Art 58 Parts

The casting on this first run was a little rough which wouldn't have been much of an issue if I didn't have to repeat the same cleanup steps for the six leg assemblies. The most notable flaws were the up to 1/4 inch air bubbles which sometimes resided under important details such as bolts. I used Aves and spot putty to fix most of those problems. Other than that, clean-up consisted of sanding down seamlines and surface bumps.

The legs took some time because, again, I had to repeat the same steps six times. Each and every part was pinned for added stability. As with most of my models, I thought it would be best to cut away any resin hydraulic pistons and replace them with aluminum tubing. I also inserted small pieces of tubing into the end of the upper most leg part and "hip" piece to act as hydraulic couplings so that I could install wire to simulate hydraulc hoses. I'm not really going for a100% real working feel however hoses do add a nice touch of realism. Aligning the legs so that they were all angled the same was the trickiest part. The first built leg was used as a template for all the others.

Leg Assembly Hose

I mentioned before the slight irregularities of this model and they definitely showed when trying to align the upper and lower halves of the main body. I countered gap problems with plastic shins underneath the edge of the lower half so that it didn't sit so sunken in. I then attacked the large seam with Aves and finished it off with spot putty wherever necessary. It does look a little off centered but this actually lends the feeling of a gritty, real life, beat up animal struggling to survive.

Seam

The next area was one I added on my own. I wasn't digging the hatch on the back only because I wanted an unmanned vehicle look. While scrounging through my spares box I stumbled upon a aircraft cockpit tub. It was a perfect way to simulate a sort of engine compartment. The greeblies may not appear to serve a great purpose but I was ultimately looking for a way to give the droid an organic feel. I like the bar running across the top for some reason. Underneath, I rolled a length of copper wire, widened the coils to push against the wall of the tub and the greeblie inside to stay in place without glue.

New Part Cables

I knew that I wanted to have some white stripes running down the surfaces of the crab so I started with a base of white primer. Now I would just have to mask any areas that I would want to show through after the main color. To do this, I used masking tape and latex rubber. I purposely made jagged cuts into areas of the masking tape so that once all done, the stripes would appear very worn. Kind of a backwards approach for the intended effect. As far as the latex, once removed, we no had nice little wear and tear paint chips.

Primer and Mask Leg Shields Weathering

I really wish I could remember the paint mixture. I decided upon the color by researching the Blue Crab. The actual crab only has blotches of blue. I took the grays and browns from the rest of the crab and subtly tried to mimic them through weathering and different colored panels. I think it's a cool effect because in actuality, for instance, the large panel on the body had probably been changed out due to maintenance ( judging by the burn marks).

MORE UPDATES COMING SOON...