(mostly) MOC: Another Saturn V tower

[DanNeely]

I have a (theoretically) working crane now.  Broadly speaking, what I did was to widen the truss part of the existing one I had from 4 to 6 studs (actual size would be 5, but there's no good way to build like that and secure to the turntable) stretched it slightly (it was a little short) and then added the axle/slider mechanism from whatsuptoday's design. 

While doing so I managed to find a level picture taken at the height of the top of the tower.  The beacon mast scaled about 50 feet high (2.5 decks) above the top of the crane; significantly larger than in any other LUT I'd looked at.  Luckily that corresponded to one of the more readily available sizes of tube.  I will be updating it with big tubes or barrels, because after double checking it's width turned out to be a bit over a stud in size, not substantially less as I'd assumed.

It's not visible from the outside, but I redid the counterweight to be completely solid to make it heaver and able to apply a larger counter-torque to whatever is suspended from the crane.

 

 

The string path, from top to bottom:

Through a gap between bricks.

Then down a hole through the turntable itself.

And into the machine room. Unfortunately there doesn't appear to be any tiles with holes in them which left me with a choice between this, or having a 2x4 plate with 3 holes on the top of the machine room.  (no 2x2 variant of that either.)

And then into the machine room itself.  I had to punch a hole into the floor to fit even the smallest size of spindle, which means there's no chance of being able to work gearing to link the two arm axles inside.  I may make a final attempt to rig the linking gears outside the machine room, but my earlier struggles suggest that doing so would be much easier said than done.

I suspect it also means there wouldn't be room to install an elevator hoist.  To deconflict with the cross braces, I'd need to come in from one of the short sides and then try to find a way to route the string over to the center of the shaft (where the crane spindle is) before sending it down. A working elevator was relatively low on my priority list, but with it officially not happening I can redo most of the floors to cut into the shaft instead of working around it to make them somewhat stronger.

Lastly, I discovered I had the stairs/ladder to the crane roof rotated 90* from the correct orientation and had to fix that as well.

This was a lot more fun than trying to contort piping around the service arms, so I suspect the next things I work on will be the white room, the tail service masts, and hold downs.

[DanNeely]

as a side note, I did try screwing around with groups/subgroups on the crane itself.  I wasn't able to figure out how to set things up so that repeated elements generated as make 6 of this (eg red crane segments) then install them all at once, instead of make 1, install it, make a second, install it ....  explode the page count ad-nauseum.

[DanNeely]

Tail service masts are in place.  While I was as it, I also redid the hold downs, mostly restoring them to their original state after stretching them when I opened the hole up.  Other tweaks around the rocket opening were to change the safety ring from yellow to orange so I could use the 45* corner tiles.

 

 

The main difference between similar designs and mine is that I moved the pivot point inward and can now fully rotate them under the hood as a result.

 

I've also finished most of the deck itself. putting down tiles and ringing the deck with a fence.  By shifting the tiles 1 stud off the pattern I used for the plates underneath, this leaves them straddling the seams between the plates which should marginally boost overall strength.

Still todo on the deck are the area around the HVAC unit, mostly needing to make sure it's correctly placed before putting down the tiles, and the big generator carts (in yellow).  The big problem there is that none of the pictures I have are from close enough to really see what they look like; and I've been totally unsuccessful at trying to google any specific results.

[NathanR]

On 8/26/2018 at 4:57 AM, DanNeely said:

Unfortunately there doesn't appear to be any tiles with holes in them which left me with a choice between this, or having a 2x4 plate with 3 holes on the top of the machine room.  (no 2x2 variant of that either.)

Do you know about Part 15535 (https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=15535#T=C)?  This might work better, and give a larger hole for smoother movement of the string.

A few suggestions for the crane:

• make the turntable base a 6x6 round plate instead of 4x4
• Add an extra 1 (2?) plates to the base of the crane, so it rests on the tiled circle. (reduces risk of a load popping the crane off it's turntable base)
• The red front section of the crane attaches to the yellow back half by just one stud per side, maybe add another plate underneath to reinforce it?
• The front of the crane has some red technic axles visible, I'd suggest swapping out to technic pins or pin/axle for a better grip.

4 hours ago, DanNeely said:

The main difference between similar designs and mine is that I moved the pivot point inward and can now fully rotate them under the hood as a result.

Wow, nice!! The single stud connections to the hinge will be a bit weak, but that's way better than mine.  I couldn't figure out any way to get the arms to "retract" behind the shields.  Also, I love those hold-down arms.

Oh, and just to be really nitpicky on two details... The Saturn V should be rotated 90 degrees, the column of 1x1 bricks up the S-1C should be facing the tower (and the S-II should have the white tile with printed black rectangles pointing to the tower).  And the four white boxes on the MLP that represent the shields for the pad cameras (parts 29119, 29120) need spinning 180 degrees.

 

[DanNeely]

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

Do you know about Part 15535 (https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=15535#T=C)?  This might work better, and give a larger hole for smoother movement of the string.

Not sure why I didn't use it to be honest.  They're right next to each other in LDD and in addition to everything else, it'd be more discrete.

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

A few suggestions for the crane:

• make the turntable base a 6x6 round plate instead of 4x4

Now that it's grown no reason not to I suppose.

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

• Add an extra 1 (2?) plates to the base of the crane, so it rests on the tiled circle. (reduces risk of a load popping the crane off it's turntable base)
• The red front section of the crane attaches to the yellow back half by just one stud per side, maybe add another plate underneath to reinforce it?

I considered both of these while building, decided to hold off until doing the initial build test on both for aesthetic reasons.  On the former because I don't see how to extend the crane down without it looking like I just added something to dangle down and make contact.  I've similar issues with the latter because the crane looks extra spindly in pictures so I'm trying to avoid excess bulk anywhere.  The design I started with had a single 92593 centered connecting the two plates from underneath.  The pair of axle's running the length of the crane presumably add more overall strength so I'm hoping I won't have to.

 

 

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

• The front of the crane has some red technic axles visible, I'd suggest swapping out to technic pins or pin/axle for a better grip.

I had 3 long pins there at one point, swapped them out because 18654 doesn't come in red or yellow.  I'm not above painting bricks if I have to but would rather not and 6541 does come in both.  I wouldn't be surprised if that does end up being changed for at least the forward most axle though.

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

Wow, nice!! The single stud connections to the hinge will be a bit weak, but that's way better than mine.  I couldn't figure out any way to get the arms to "retract" behind the shields.  Also, I love those hold-down arms.

I can't take any credit for the holddown arms.  They're unchanged from Bailey Fullerton's design, they work a lot better on a 14x14 opening than they do a 12x12 where they extend too far onto the platform.

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

Oh, and just to be really nitpicky on two details... The Saturn V should be rotated 90 degrees, the column of 1x1 bricks up the S-1C should be facing the tower (and the S-II should have the white tile with printed black rectangles pointing to the tower).  

I'll worry when mounting it, in LDD all I need is a surface to measure against to make sure everything is the right length.

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

And the four white boxes on the MLP that represent the shields for the pad cameras (parts 29119, 29120) need spinning 180 degrees.

Do they?  The few pictures of the white lozenge version (i've got pics of at least 3 variations, the others being a small solid white box, and a wire/truss looking small yellow and gray box) looked symmetric toward and away from the rocket.  I  considered making them 2x3 using 50746 mini roof tiles, but decided that made them look a bit too large in both length and width instead of just the latter.

 

 

I added one other change since the my last update, I found a few diagrams I forgot I had for the lightning mast and discovered it needed to be able to fold down (presumably to clear the VAB doors).  At the moment I'm using old fashioned 2/3 finger hinges, but am debating switching to the type that's a 1x2 brick.  That'd look better folded down, but would be less stable erect.

 

[NathanR]

6 hours ago, DanNeely said:

The pair of axle's running the length of the crane presumably add more overall strength so I'm hoping I won't have to.

I wouldn't rely on the axles for strength, they're 32L  and in my experience they are rather bendy.  Just storing them straight can be a challenge.

6 hours ago, DanNeely said:

I'll worry when mounting it, in LDD all I need is a surface to measure against to make sure everything is the right length.

Ok, but when I fixed the rotation of the Saturn V in my LUT, I had to go back and shorten one of the arms to avoid a collision.

6 hours ago, DanNeely said:

Do they?  The few pictures of the white lozenge version (i've got pics of at least 3 variations, the others being a small solid white box, and a wire/truss looking small yellow and gray box)

Huh, I only knew about the white lozenge version, which is kind of barrel-like.  I wonder if that was just a protective cover during rollout, or if it's a part of the pad that change from mission to mission.

 

6 hours ago, DanNeely said:

Iadded one other change since the my last update, I found a few diagrams I forgot I had for the lightning mast and discovered it needed to be able to fold down (presumably to clear the VAB doors). 

Wow, I did not know the lightning mast could do that, that's a really sweet touch for the model!

Edited August 29, 2018 by NathanR

[DanNeely]

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

I wouldn't rely on the axles for strength, they're 32L  and in my experience they are rather bendy.  Just storing them straight can be a challenge.

That's disappointing, I've never used anything longer than a 12 before though.  Not really any other options for the crane, but I might be able to swap in shorter ones for the arm mounts...

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

Ok, but when I fixed the rotation of the Saturn V in my LUT, I had to go back and shorten one of the arms to avoid a collision.

The only arm at risk I can yank a plate from if needed.  Trying to get it in place in the first place was enough of a nightmare I've no desire to ever screw with it again.

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

Huh, I only knew about the white lozenge version, which is kind of barrel-like.  I wonder if that was just a protective cover during rollout, or if it's a part of the pad that change from mission to mission.

Not sure.  Going through my collection again I found at least 5 variations.

Apollo 6 - white lozenges:  https://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/alsj/a410/ap6-KSC-68PC-30HR.jpg

Apollo 12 - black boxes:  https://c8.alamy.com/compde/khr4mr/die-nasa-apollo-12-von-raumfahrzeugen-und-saturn-v-tragerrakete-lassen-sie-das-kennedy-space-center-vehicle-assembly-building-in-der-vorbereitung-fur-den-start-und-mondlandung-mission-am-8-september-1969-in-merritt-island-florida-foto-nasa-foto-uber-planetpix-khr4mr.jpg

Apollo 14 - white pyramids:  https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-dRMmDtzKP7U/VX7Y_oTmz_I/AAAAAAAAXuU/aWrAdWqLZ4k/s640/A14%2B2.jpg

Apollo 15 - gray and yellow boxes (trusses?) : https://archive.org/download/S71-33781/S71-33781.jpg

Apollo 17 - smaller white lozenges rotated 90*:  https://i.redditmedia.com/weg7bBy2kS8rP-RvRx78AdfoyS6X5S9V1cyM2yNaDW4.jpg?s=6bb16cb259ca073d2509b37fa6fb665c

 

 

16 hours ago, NathanR said:

Wow, I did not know the lightning mast could do that, that's a really sweet touch for the model!

yup.  Not sure where I found the diagrams, but I reposted them here:  https://imgur.com/a/vsNV0bG

[DanNeely]

It's been a relatively slow week and a half, mostly I've worked on secondary items.

The first one is adding a second row of 1 stud wide plates to the bottom of the crane to give it a little more strength.

 

The next 4 things I did were all related to the swing arms (next 2 pics).

I replaced the 32m axles holding the main swing arms with shorter ones.   I tried to stick to cheap 12m's but ended up having to use 16's twice because there wasn't anywhere among all the pipes and arms to fit a coupler.

I finished the arm attachments by using a technic beam with a cross hole to rigidly anchor the arms to the axles (vs the existing anchor being a freely turning hole.)

On the other side of the arms I built the wrapping bricks to be 3 bricks tall instead of 2.  Arm 2 with a pipe connection in the way is the only one not updated yet.  I need to look more closely at pictures to decide between raising the pipe and lowering the arm as a fix.

I also redid the ends of arms 3 and 4.  For Arm 3 I was able to eliminate the half plate gap I had previously due to snot alignment issues.  For arm 4 I made the structure a bit less massive and increased the separation between it and the rocket body slightly, there's still a small gap I was unable to work out.

Also visible here is one of the camera platforms I added.

 

After that I ran into a bit more trouble when I tried adding the gaseous nitrogen pipe immediately behind most of the camera platforms and the zigzag pipes on the other side.  In both cases I ran into major conflicting problems with all of the other cross braces/etc I had on the lower levels.

You can see here that I had to take out one of the 4 short cross braces between the main l60 platform and the outer part of the a-frame.

It was a bit worse below the diagonal piece highlighted in purple would need removed as well.  For aesthetic balance reasons that would require removing all 4 of them.

 

That said, I probably will if I can figure out a way to attach them.  The problem is that the fences mean I can't directly attach them to the top of the deck, while the angle clips slightly overlap the blocks they're hooked onto meaning I can't fit a bricks directly under either unless I offset the entire assemblage by half a brick.  Doing so would have it in the way of the bricks holding the outer crosspiece of the a-frame in place and would make simply connecting them top and bottom instead of passing through a lot messier at best.  I'll need to play around with this a bit more, I'm not sure if I'll end up keeping it or not.  I haven't had time to check yet, but I'm hoping they connect to boxes on a few decks, if so I could potentially use those as the primary attachment points instead.

 

I don't have a picture handy (I did the experimenting in a separate file from this one), but ran into similar problems with the attaching bricks being in the way on L60 and crossbraces on L30.  If I can get past that though, at least I won't have problems with attaching the pipe to the tower.

In somewhat unrelated news, after discovering that the water based ink in the first set of paint pens I bought remained sufficiently non-permanent after drying that slightly damp fingers would end up stained by touching the bricks it (the maker suggested setting it by baking in a 350F/175C oven, obviously not reasonable for me) that I tried a set of oil based pens.  The color matches were almost identical (despite different branding I suspect the same manufacturer is behind both sets), but the oil based ink made a much thinner layer and was closer to the gloss of normal Lego bricks.

 

I also found pictures of another persons MoC LUT.  He used flex tubing for all the piping on the sides and by using the gaps between adjacent clips as extra holders, which is a major design win.  He also used them for piping on some of the arms, and there - as I feared when asked about the possibility earlier - they tended to flop around and poorly hold to expected shapes/routings.  Depending on how tightly they can bend, it might be possible to do better with a larger number of anchor points.  Making it work would definitely require a different style of arm build than I've currently got though, so at this stage it's a non-starter to change over.

 

http://www.moc-pages.com/moc.php/443614

[DanNeely]

I figured out how to get the piping attached.  18677is just short enough to fit in place without interfering with the clips holding the crossbeams in place, using those let me secure the zigzags in multiple locations going down the tower.

At the bottom I ended up attaching the outside pipe directly to one of the plates serving to anchor the outside beam into place.

 

On the other side I couldn't do that because I needed the bend to be occurring at the same level as the deck, not several bricks below.  I was able to work out an alternate way to attach the outside beam through so I could slip this through behind.

 

The only other update I've done has been to redo all the decks to be solid going through the elevator shaft instead of keeping it open for the car it's now clear I won't be able to do.

 

Also, I did cross the 6k brick threshold with this update.  Bricklink's still putting the total around $700.

Edited September 16, 2018 by DanNeely

[DanNeely]

I decided to review my TODO list from early July to see where my progress has gotten.

 

1) The platform walls (waiting to see how exactly eiffleman did them for his space shuttle launch platform)

Not done, still waiting on Eiffleman's MLP instructions to copy his design.

2)  Find a way to fit the gearing to connect the two sets of control arms that's out of the way.

Won't be done.  Not enough room to fit them in the machine room.

3) piping from the sides of the tower to the arms

Done.

4) Piping on the arms, along with tweaking their appearance slightly.  Probably not to the same level of detail as NathanR's design, partly because the box trusses leave me less freedom to route piping, and partly because I find some of the more tortured construction needed to match the convoluted piping designs rather ugly and am willing to sacrifice realism for aesthetics.

Half to 2/3rds done.  I ended up doing the first 6 arms in rather more detail than I'd originally intended, and still have the top 3 to do.  The first 6 will need a bit of tweaking because they've got a few white axles in non-available lengths that'll need something done about.  Either design tweaks, or gray ones I can paint I guess.

4.5) Access walkways to the arms.

Todo.

5) Make the crane functional.

Done.

5.5) Final decision on functional elevator, and implementation.

Not being done for the same reason the two swing arm shafts aren't being joined.  A properly sized machine room doesn't have the internal volume needed.

6) Redo the tail masts to be retractable, better adjust the hold downs to fit with the larger 14x14 opening (vs the 12x12 they were designed for).

Done.

6.5) Add camera platforms (have design, so just need to insert them).

Done.

7) Misc external piping.

Done.

8) Misc control boxes.

Todo, other than the LoX valve complexes.

9) Something to simulate the cable runs?

Todo

 

Anyway, adding it up, of the 12 items on the list, 5 are done, 1 is in progress, 2 were dropped, and 4 aren't started.  A bit disappointing considering I'd hoped to be done by now, but only 2 of the remaining items are substantial amounts of work. 

On the more positive side, I've managed to avoid any scope creep, so my analysis of what still needs done was solid at least.

Edited September 16, 2018 by DanNeely

[DanNeely]

Here's a gallery with 4 very tall images of the current LDD, one from each side.

https://imgur.com/a/oO0PYJR

[DanNeely]

Arm 7 is done.

[DanNeely]

8th arm is done too.  Really wish I had some better images for how to color this one though, but the 9th arm was always in the way.

 

[DanNeely]

9th arm is done along with an initial version of the white room.  I'm probably going to keep tinkering with the latter; I'd like to try and get the taper on the rearmost segment to be symmetric.

 

[DanNeely]

I was able to work another round of tapering into the back of the white room.  It ended up working better than I expected and allowed a closer alignment with the command module than I had before.

[DanNeely]

I started building up the outside walkways to the arms, went to test how arm9 would swing to see where the limit needed to be and disaster struck.

 

In it's fully built up state it won't pivot past 90 degrees.

 

And stripped fully bare and with the access way removed it still won't fold flat.

 

I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do,  Reasonable options seem to be moving the axle a stud farther out, or reworking the arm so the pivot point is on the interior side not the exterior.

[DanNeely]

On 7/23/2018 at 4:55 AM, NathanR said:

When building my LUT, I had a problem that the bottom 4 arms got placed fine, but the top crew-access arm was placed about 3 bricks too high.  So I looked at the rocket:
   Width of S-IC = 10m (real life) = 28 plates in Lego, therefore scale = 1:110.6.
   Height of Saturn V = 110.64m (real life) = 313 plates in Lego, therefore scale = 1:110.5.
The upshot of this is that a 1:110 rocket should be two plates taller than it currently is.  So I shrank my tower 2 plates, but I was still 7-8 plates too high with the crew access arm.

Then I discovered that the LES system was two bricks too tall.  The LES and BPC (Booster protection cover, which covered the CM) was 12.02m tall.  At 1:110 scale (or even 1:110.5), this is 11 bricks+1plate tall.  The Lego model has it as 13 bricks+1plate high.  That is, they double counted the height of the CM.  This error means that the relative heights of the S-IC, S-II and S-IVb may all be a little off, but let's ignore that for now and concentrate on overall height.

Remove two bricks from the LES and the rocket is now 307 plates high.  This means that the width is scaled at 1:110.5, but the height is actually scaled as 1:112.6.

A bit of an old comment, but I'm revisiting it because it's part of the ongoing headache I'm having with the crew access arm.

 

After the previous go around I've got all of my decks within a plate or so of the correct 110:1 height; and the bottom 6 arms are all where they're supposed to be relative to the rocket.  Based on that I'm assuming the S-IC and S-II stages are both about the right height.

 

Arm 7 is at the right height on the LUT but about 1 brick high relative to the black ring at the top of the S-IVb.  I'm not critically concerned there, although I might lower it a plate or so.  Trying to tweak the height of the rocket stage is more complex than I care to think about doing anyway.

 

The bigger problem is arms 8 and 9.  The full impact of the 2 brick too tall launch escape system is weighing in here.  Arm 8 should centered halfway between the two decks to reach the service module, and the bottom of arm 9 should be slightly below line with it's deck.  But what I actually have is arm 8 aligned with the bottom of its deck, and arm 9 aligned with its top in at deck height.

I'd been semi-aware of this for a while, but until I started trying to build the scaffolding to access the arms it hadn't really mattered.  At this point I don't see a good way to make it work without adding 2 bricks to the upper part of the rocket and redoing the launch escape system to be shorter.  As I commented earlier, adding an extra brick of height to the S-IVb stage is way more work   That leaves the payload fairing, service module and command module as places to add additional height.  The easiest spot to do so would be the bottom of the fairing by adding 2 more rows of macaroni bricks (and with the black ring at the top of the S-IVb a brick low, probably at least half the height adjustment should be done here).  I'm going to hold off doing that until I can hunt down heights for the manned parts of the rocket because if I can justify it, I'd rather add it to the manned section instead.

 

My current LUT (complete with backing around the arm pivot).

 

Apollo 13

Edited October 1, 2018 by DanNeely